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Grumpy Grandad (1) Meets Maurice the Mole

Grumpy Grandad was feeling very pleased with himself. In fact he was so pleased he hadn’t grumbled once all morning and that was most unusual for Grumpy Grandad. Normally, you see Grumpy Grandad grumbled about everything. He grumbled when the phone rang, he grumbled when the postman was late, he grumbled when Nelly the dog barked, he grumbled when the paper boy left the gate open, he grumbled about the weather and he even grumbled when he could hear the television set from next door. Yes, that’s right, Grumpy Grandad grumbled about anything and everything. He was only happy when he was grumbling.

But the trouble was the more he grumbled the more angrier he became and it was dangerous for Grumpy Grandad to get too angry. The doctor had told him that getting angry could make him very ill. Grumpy Grandad’s wife, Crazy Grandma, was very worried about Grumpy Grandad. She knew that he was always grumbling and was really worried that he might get too angry and have to go into hospital. So she came up with a plan. She decided to hang a little bell around Grumpy Grandad’s neck, so that when Grumpy Grandad got angry and started to shake with anger the bell would ring. Crazy Grandma knew that when she heard the bell ringing she had to do something to cool Grumpy Grandad down. And the best way of cooling him down was to throw a bucket of cold water over him.

But today was different. The reason Grumpy Grandad wasn’t grumbling was because he had just finished his patio at the bottom of the garden. Now Grumpy Grandad had worked very hard indeed to make himself a patio where he could go and sit out in the sun and read his newspaper without people disturbing him. He picked up his paper, put on his cap and walked down to the bottom of the garden. He stood and looked at his lovely new patio. He felt so pleased, he had forgotten to grumble about anything all morning. He took out his chair from the garden hut and sat down. “Wonderful” he thought to himself “now I will be left all alone and I won’t have to grumble at anyone. Grumpy Grandad started to read his paper but it wasn’t long before his eyes became heavy and he fell fast asleep.

Now, unbeknown to Grumpy Grandad just at the back of the hut under the ground lived Maurice the Mole. He had lived there for a long time and every night came out of his tunnel to hunt around Grumpy Grandad’s garden. He wasn’t very pleased at all that Grumpy Grandad had put down hard paving slabs in front of the hut to make a patio. It had made it very difficult for him to dig his way out of the tunnel, and sometimes he bumped his head on the slabs as he tried to get through. Maurice the Mole decided it was time for him to make a hole up through Grumpy Grandad’s patio so he started to dig.

Digging and tunnelling with his feet and claws as fast as he could, Maurice kept on pushing the earth away with his paws until he came up against the slabs on the patio. Little did he know that the chair Grumpy Grandad was sitting in was right on top of the slab he was trying to push up. Grumpy Grandad was sleeping like a baby and he didn’t feel the ground moving under the chair. Maurice the Mole kept on digging and pushing the earth, digging and pushing, harder and harder, digging and pushing, digging and pushing when suddenly the slab started rising into the air with Grumpy Grandad sitting on top of it.

Higher and higher went the chair with Grumpy Grandad still asleep. Popping his head out of the hole, Maurice saw what had happened and started to laugh. Well, the sight of Grumpy Grandad sitting on top of a huge mole hill still fast asleep had to be one of the funniest things he had ever seen. But just then Grumpy Grandad woke up. His chair was so high above the ground that his legs were dangling in midair. Straight away Grumpy Grandad did what Grumpy Grandad always did, he started to grumble. He saw Maurice the Mole laughing at him. “That’s it”, he thought to himself, “I’m going to get that mole.” And forgetting that he was now sitting so high above the ground, Grumpy Grandad made a swipe at Maurice. But this was a big mistake because his chair toppled over, sending Grumpy Grandad head first into all the dirt that Maurice had dug up. When Grumpy Grandad saw what Maurice had done to his nice new patio he was so angry he started to shake with rage. And because he was shaking the little bell hanging around his neck started to ring. He was just about to spring into action and catch Maurice the Mole when – splash! – he was hit by a bucket full of cold water. Grumpy Grandad got such a shock as the cold water soaked him through that he forgot about Maurice the Mole for a split second and when he turned round Maurice had gone. “Now look what you’ve done, you crazy old woman” Grumpy Grandad shouted at Crazy Grandma, “Why didn’t you wait until I had caught the Mole?” “I’m sorry” she said, “but I thought you were going to make yourself ill with rage”. And Crazy Grandma went back into the house. Poor Grumpy Grandad. He was soaking wet as well as being covered in dirt and Maurice the Mole had run back down his tunnel. “Tomorrow”, he said to himself, “what ever happens I’m going to catch that pesky Mole”.

Grumpy Grandad got up bright and early the next morning with a plan of action. He was going to set a trap for Maurice the Mole. Using his spade to dig a deep hole, he discovered the tunnel that Maurice was using to get into his garden. He placed a trap at the end of the tunnel and waited for Maurice to come up.

Grumpy Grandad waited all day, grumbling to himself all the time. He had just begun to think that Maurice wasn’t going to appear, when – what was that? – he heard a noise inside the tunnel. It was Maurice making his way up the tunnel to have some more fun in Grumpy Grandad’s garden. Infact, Maurice was so excited about all the fun he was going to have in the garden that he didn’t notice the trap that Grumpy Grandad had set for him. No sooner had he entered the trap than – bang! – the door slammed shut behind him and he was caught. Grumpy Grandad picked up the trap and looked at Maurice the Mole. “I’m going to take you far away from here so you won’t ever get into my garden again” he told him.

Grumpy Grandad took him a great distance over many fields until he was far away from his garden. Then he lifted the trap door and set him free. Maurice ran away as fast as he could over the fields. Grumpy Grandad smiled to himself, “that’s the last we’ll see of him”. But little did Grumpy Grandad know. Maurice the Mole was very clever and he was determined that he would find his way back into Grumpy Grandad’s garden again. Grumpy Grandad certainly had not seen the last of him by any means. This was only the beginning of lots of other adventures that Maurice the Mole was going to have in Grumpy Grandad’s garden.

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