The BFG

He will probably eat me raw, just as I am.

Sophie couldn’t sleep.

A brilliant moonbeam was slanting through a gap in the curtains. It was shining right on to her pillow.

The other children in the dormitory had been asleep for hours.

Sophie closed her eyes and lay quite still. She tried very hard to doze off.

It was no good. The moonbeam was like a silver blade slicing through the room on to her face.

in various grotesque attitudes of sleep, and the sound of their snoring was indeed like gunfire in a battle.

The BFG raised a hand. The jeeps all stopped. The soldiers got out.

‘What happens if one of them wakes up?’ whispered the Head of the Army, his knees knocking together from fear.

were driven down the ramps. Each jeep contained six soldiers and a vast quantity of thick rope and heavy chains.

‘I don’t see any giants,’ the Head of the Army said.

‘The giants is all just out of sight over there,’ the BFG told him. ‘But if you is taking these sloshbuckling noisy bellypoppers any closer, all the giants is waking up at once and then pop goes the weasel.’

‘So you want us to proceed by jeep?’ the Head of the Army said.

‘Yes,’ the BFG said. ‘But you must all be very very hushy quiet. No roaring of motors. No shouting. No mucking about. No piggery-jokery.’

The BFG, with Sophie still in his ear, trotted forward and the jeeps followed close behind.

Suddenly the most dreadful rumbling noise was heard by everyone. The Head of the Army went pea-green in the face. ‘Those

What is he talking about?’ said the Head of the Air Force.

‘Work it out for yourself,’ the Queen said. ‘What time is it? Ten a.m. In eight hours those nine bloodthirsty brutes will be galloping off to gobble up another couple of dozen unfortunate wretches. They have to be stopped. We must act fast.’

‘We’ll bomb the blighters!’ shouted the Head of the Air Force.

‘We’ll mow them down with machine-guns!’ cried the Head of the Army.

‘I do not approve of murder,’ the Queen said.

‘But they are murderers themselves!’ cried the Head of the Army.

‘That is no reason why we should follow their example,’ the Queen said. ‘Two wrongs don’t make a right.’

‘And two rights don’t make a left!’ cried the BFG.

‘We must bring them back alive,’ the Queen said.

I’d like to make one more check before I call out the troops,’ the Queen said. Once more, she looked up at the BFG. He was eating doughnuts now, popping them into his mouth ten at a time, like peas. ‘Think hard, BFG,’ she said. ‘Where did those horrid giants say they were galloping off to three nights ago?’

The BFG thought long and hard.

‘Ho-ho!’ he cried at last. ‘Yes, I is remembering!’

‘Where?’ asked the Queen.

‘One was off to Baghdad,’ the BFG said. ‘As they is galloping past my cave, Fleshlumpeater is waving his arms and shouting at me, “I is off to Baghdad and I is going to Baghdad and mum and every one of their ten children as well!” ’

Once more, the Queen lifted the receiver. ‘Get me the Lord Mayor of Baghdad,’ she said. ‘If they don’t have a Lord Mayor, get me the next best thing

The Witching Hour

Sophie couldn’t sleep

ng right on to her pillow.

The other children in the dormitory had been asleep for hours.

Sophie closed her eyes and lay quite still. She tried very hard to doze off.

It was no good. The moonbeam was like a silver blade slicing through the room on to her face.

The house was absolutely silent. No voices came up from downstairs. There were no footsteps on the floor above either.

The window behind the curtain was wide open, but nobody was walking on the pavement outside.

‘Then where is you going to sit?’ the BFG asked her.

Sophie looked him over for a few moments. Then she said, ‘If you would be kind enough to swivel one of your lovely big ears so that it is lying flat like a dish, that would make a very cosy place for me to sit.’

‘By gumbo, that is a squackling good idea!’ the BFG said.

Slowly, he swivelled his huge right ear until it was like a great shell facing the heavens. He lifted Sophie up and placed her into it. The ear itself, which was about the size of a large tea-tray, was full of the same channels and crinkles as a human ear. It was extremely comfortable.

‘I hope I don’t fall down your earhole,’ Sophie said, edging away from the large hole just beside her.

‘Be very careful not to do that,’ the BFG said. ‘You would be giving me a cronking earache.’