‘Bleep beek squeak gleep,’ it said as it bounced Selby one more time and then hurled him up onto the deck.
‘He saved your life!’ Mrs Trifle said, holding Selby in her arms. ‘What happened?’
‘He must have fallen overboard,’ Dr Trifle said. ‘He’s probably still too dizzy to walk.’
‘Gleep bleep squeak bleep,’ the dolphin said.
‘I recognise that voice,’ Selby thought as the dolphin leapt high into the air again. ‘Did Dr Trifle say Dizzy? It’s him! It’s Dizzy the dolphin! I rescued him from Dr Squirt’s research station years ago! He must have recognised me and saved me! Which just goes to show that if you do a good deed for a dolphin, he’ll do a good deed for you.’
‘Isn’t that funny,’ Dr Trifle said as Dizzy swam in circles around the boat balancing on his tail. ‘He must be a trained dolphin.’
‘I think you’re right,’ Mrs Trifle said. ‘Look he’s wearing a sparkly collar. Goodness! It’s like a necklace with a huge hunk of glass hanging from it.’
‘If I didn’t know better,’ Dr Trifle said, ‘I’d say it was a diamond.’
Dr and Mrs Trifle laughed at the thought of a dolphin wearing a diamond necklace and patted Selby some more.
‘And Dizzy is welcome to it,’ Selby thought as Dizzy leapt again and was gone. ‘Who needs all that money? I don’t. I’ve got the best thing that anyone could ever have: Dr and Mrs Trifle. And they love me and I love them so much I could scream. Well I could scream but I don’t think I will.’
Author’s note: Well I hope you had those tissues handy. It was a happy ending but it was one of those happy endings that brought tears to my eyes when Selby told it to me. I am always touched when he tells me how much he loves the Trifles. Who needs lots of money when you have that?
Paw note: If you want to read another story about me, the Trifles, Dr Squirt and how I rescue a dolphin named Dizzy, read the story ‘Selby Sinks to New Depths’ in the book Selby’s Secret.
S
FISH WISH
I wish, I wish, I wish, I wish,
That I could be a little fish
And swim around the sea and play
With other fishes night and day.
I’d dart among the seaweed and
Then rub my belly in the sand.
And when it was my time to sup
I’d gobble littler fishies up.
Hang on a minute! Don’t you see?
A bigger fish might snack on me!
Forget this little fishy lark,
I think I’d rather be a shark.
Or maybe I could be a whale
And have a huge almighty tail,
More teeth than you have ever seen,
And plenty more of me between.
Of all the creatures in the sea
The biggest one’s the one for me.
MY PET SHOP
Of all the shops that I have known
There’s only one that I would own.
For reasons that are plain to see
A pet shop is the shop for me.
If I could only get my wish
I’d have one filled with tanks of fish
And cuddly kittens in a heap
Then lots of birdies going cheep.
Of course there’d be a dog or two
Perhaps a panda from a zoo
Then how about a kangaroo:
A joey – with its mother too.
Rhinos, elephants and camels
These and other sorts of mammals.
Along with many many more –
Of course I’d reinforce the floor.
And then I’d let them out to play
Before I gave them all away.
When finally I’d done my dash
I’d buy another shop – for cash.
I’d play with all the pets again
And give them all away and then,
When every pet had found a home,
I’d sit and write another poem.
BOWLED OUT
ABOUT THE AUTHOR
Duncan Ball is an Australian author and scriptwriter, best known for his popular books for children. Among his most-loved works are the Selby books of stories plus the collections Selby’s Selection, Selby’s Joke Book and Selby’s Sidesplitting Joke Book. Some of these books have also been published in New Zealand, Germany, Japan and the USA, and have won countless awards, most of which were voted by the children themselves.
Among Duncan’s other books are the Emily Eyefinger series about the adventures of a girl who was born with an eye on the end of her finger, and the comedy novels Piggott Place and Piggotts in Peril, about the frustrations of twelve-year-old Bert Piggott forever struggling to get his family of ratbags and dreamers out of the trouble they are constantly getting themselves into.
Duncan lives in Sydney with his wife, Jill, and their cat, Jasper. Jasper often keeps Duncan company while he’s writing and has been known to help by walking on the keyboard. Once, returning to his work, Duncan found the following word had mysteriously appeared on screen: lkantawq......
For more information about Duncan and his books, see Selby’s web site at:
www.harpercollins.com.au/selby
BY THE SAME AUTHOR
Emily Eyefinger, Secret Agent
Emily Eyefinger and the Lost Treasure
Emily Eyefinger and the Black Volcano
Emily Eyefinger’s Alien Adventure
Emily Eyefinger and the Devil Bones
Emily Eyefinger and the Balloon Bandits
Piggott Place
Piggotts in Peril
Selby’s Secret
Selby Speaks
Selby Screams
Selby Supersnoop
Selby Spacedog
Selby Snowbound
Selby Surfs
Selby Snaps!
Selby’s Joke Book
Selby Splits
Selby’s Selection
Selby’s Stardom
Selby’s Side-splitting Joke Book
Selby Sorcerer
PIGGOTT PLACE
Duncan Ball
‘Tell me what I should do with my life!’ Bert wailed. ‘Should I catch a boat to South America? Should I learn to play the trombone? Should I start an ostrich farm? I need your help! Give me a sign, any sign!’
Sadly, Bert was talking to the only one he trusted in the whole world: Gazza, his stuffed goat. And, once again, the goat wasn’t talking …
Piggott Place is a riotous but touching comedy about twelve-year-old Bert Piggott as he struggles to keep his family of dreamers, ratbags and scoundrels together. Everyone hates the Piggotts and now the council is going to evict them from their once beautiful mansion, Piggott Place. But the authorities haven’t bargained on Bert and his young friend Antigone (would-be star of stage and screen) and their crazy scheme. The question is: can two kids take on a world of adults and win?
PIGGOTTS IN PERIL
Duncan Ball
Piggotts in Peril begins with the shy and sensitive Bert Piggott accidentally finding the map to pirate treasure hidden many years ago by his great-great-great-great-grandfather. At first a quest for untold wealth seems the answer to all his problems but getting it means bringing along his scheming, ratbag family. Little does he know that what lies ahead are problems that even the pessimistic Bert could never imagine: the terror of turbulent seas aboard a ‘borrowed’ boat, capture by pirates, being marooned on the Isle of the Dead, and more.
Piggotts in Peril is a warm, adventure-comedy about the origins of the universe, the evolution of humankind — and pirate treasure.
Copyright
Angus&Robertson
An imprint of HarperCollinsPublishers, Australia
First published in Australia in 1999
This edition published in 2011
by HarperCollinsPublishers Pty Limited
ABN 36 009 913 517
harpercollins.com.au
Text copyright © Dunc
an Ball 1999
Illustration copyright © Allan Stomann 1999
The right of Duncan Ball to be identified as the moral rights author of this work has been asserted by him under the Copyright Amendment (Moral Rights) Act 2000.
This work is copyright. Apart from any use as permitted under the Copyright Act 1968, no part may be reproduced, copied, scanned, stored in a retrieval system, recorded, or transmitted, in any form or by any means, without the prior written permission of the publisher.
HarperCollinsPublishers
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National Library of Australia Cataloguing-in-Publication data:
Ball, Duncan, 1941–.
Selby surfs/Ball, Duncan
ISBN: 978-0-2072-0003-8 (pbk.)
ISBN: 978-0-7304-9530-7 (ePub)
1. Dogs — Juvenile fiction. I. Stomann, Allan. II. Title.
A823.3
Cover and internal design by Christa Edmonds