Читать книгу Casper Candlewacks in the Claws of Crime! - Ivan Brett - Страница 9

was the summer of 1374, and a young knight rode out into the countryside to hunt weasels. Suddenly, he was ambushed by a band of villains. They nicked his horse and pushed him down a hill. Down he tumbled, over rocks and under cows and through prickly thistles, until he landed face down in a river running with the clearest and sweetest water he’d ever drowned in. Fortunately, he was rescued by a passing river nymph with long wavy hair and scaly skin. They fell in love, built a house by the river and had eighteen beautiful children with thirty-six beautiful gills (which is two each, if you share them out nice and fairly).

However, their peace was disturbed when the band of villains returned, demanding a refund for their horse, since it had broken down and they didn’t carry a spare. But the young knight muttered those famous words, “Hast thou a receipt?” and slew the leader with his gigantic iron sword. Then with the help of his eighteen fishy children he rounded up the rest of the band, wrapped them all up in a brown paper parcel and posted them to Norway. They were never seen or heard of again. Then, to celebrate, the young knight popped down to the shops and spent his pocket money on some priceless rubies and emeralds and a pot of glue, and stuck them all on to his sword.

That young knight was called Sir Gossamer D’Glaze, the river was the Kobb and his house by the river came to be known as Corne. Sir Gossamer had many adventures, but when he died he bequeathed his sword to the village, and there it has remained to this day (apart from one time when it was sold in a car-boot sale to a dentist with a limp, but that doesn’t count, for obvious reasons).

So now it is clear why Corne-on-the-Kobb is so proud of its sword. If, say, somebody were to come and steal it, who knows what hysteria would follow…