Snakes' Elbows Read Online Free Page A

around them was a huge crowd of people laughing and clapping their hands, congratulating Jasper and telling him how clever he was. For as you may have guessed by now, it was he who had both cracked the whip and held up the hoop. Yes, as far as Cannibal and Bruiser were concerned, the circus party had definitely been the worst so far.
    On Wednesday morning the postman made a special delivery to over two hundred peoplein Woodford. He brought them a long flat white box tied with a green ribbon and inside each box was a bar of milk chocolate. PARTY! was written on it in white chocolate, and then below that:
    Jasper Jellit requests the pleasure of your company this Saturday night at his amazing, unbelievable, no-expense-spared, once-in-a-lifetime, never- before-seen -in-Woodford-nor-indeed-anywhere-else- for-that -matter CHOCOLATE PARTY!!!
    Below that again was added, ‘Eight o’clock sharp. Posh frocks and best suits essential.’
    All the guests were terribly excited. ‘There’ll be a chocolate pudding as big as a bus,’ they said to each other on their way to the party on Saturday night, dressed up to the nines. ‘There’ll be great pyramids of Woodford Creams all over the place. Buckets of chocolate ice cream. Chocolate biscuits and chocolate toffee and chocolate fudge and chocolate gateauand chocolate creams and simply hundreds and hundreds of bars of chocolate!’ And do you know what? All the guests were completely …
    Wrong!
    At eight on the dot, two trumpet players came out on to the top step of the white marble staircase that led to the front door of Jasper’s flashy great mansion. They blew a fanfare and all the guests who were milling around on the lawn below fell silent. Then the front door of the house flew open and there was Jasper, looking rather dashing in his dinner jacket, with Cannibal and Bruiser on either side of him.
    â€˜Welcome, friends, welcome!’ he cried, after the applause had died down. ‘I am delighted that you have all been able to come to my party and I promise you a night to remember. When you are weary old folk with grey hair and boring lives you will still be able to impress people by telling them that you were here tonight, because this is a party that is goingto go down in history. And so without further ado, let the Great Chocolate Party begin!’
    Immediately the gardens were all lit up and the fountains came on. And suddenly the air was full of the smell of hot chocolate, because that was what was flowing through Jasper’s three fountains this evening instead of water. There was one fountain of white chocolate, one of milk and one of plain. The guests also noticed that there were lots of new statues scattered about the lawn and they too were made of chocolate. There was a whole orchard that had been put in place for that night only and from the branches of the trees hung pears and apples made of chocolate. In the flower beds were chocolate roses and snapdragons and lilies. ‘Help yourselves!’ Jasper cried. ‘Have fun!’
    To begin with, it was all very well-behaved. Beside each fountain stood servants with china cups so that the guests could fill them with the hot chocolate if they wished to drink. There werealso baskets of strawberries and marshmallows, biscuits and tiny cakes, together with long forks so that the guests could dip them in the basins of the fountains and coat them in chocolate before eating them. ‘How clever of Jasper!’ they said as they politely waited their turn. ‘Always so original. Always so imaginative,’ and they snapped off a chocolate rose or two and nibbled on them delicately.
    Cannibal and Bruiser slunk around the garden hoping they wouldn’t be noticed. They hadn’t forgotten the day Jasper had fed them the Woodford Creams. Someone licked the toes of a statue standing nearby. ‘It really is made of chocolate,’ she said, ‘the best chocolate I’ve