Paws

By Chris Hewitt

Eleven-year-old Sophia Owen wants to spend her half-term holidays doing nothing. But something stalks the streets of Windmore. It’s chased Farmer Harrow, eaten Mrs Hibbert’s dog, and it’s leaving giant paw prints everywhere. The town is in panic. Luckily, Sophia, Yogesh, and James have a school project to complete and they’ve found their topic. Catching the beast of Windmore. Despite an inept police force, an attention seeking reporter, and a lord who may be a werewolf, the three friends will risk their lives for adventure and good grades

• Language: English
• Publisher: Chris Hewitt
• Release date: Oct 13, 2018
• ISBN: 9780463334102

Book preview

Paws

Chris Hewitt

Chris Hewitt lives in Manchester, England.

He is the creator and writer of a spoof blog, which has featured in the national press and has over one million readers.

Paws is his third children’s novel.

Also by the author:

Saving Christmas

The Book of Doom

Paws

Copyright 2018 Chris Hewitt

Smashwords Edition

First published 2018

Chris Hewitt has asserted his right under the Copyright, Design and Patents Act 1988 to be identified as the author of this work.

Front cover designed by Chris Hewitt

Copyright 2018 Chris Hewitt

Front cover font Hitchcock Copyright Matt Terich

For mum, dad, Em & Meatball

Contents

Chapter One

Chapter Two

Chapter Three

Chapter Four

Chapter Five

Chapter Six

Chapter Seven

Chapter Eight

Chapter Nine

Chapter Ten

Chapter Eleven

Chapter Twelve

Chapter Thirteen

Chapter Fourteen

Chapter Fifteen

Chapter Sixteen

Chapter Seventeen

Chapter Eighteen

Chapter Nineteen

Chapter One

Bird song drifted from the tallest trees of Windmore’s woodland. The chirps and calls of nature’s winged angels announced a fresh day. Mrs Harrow’s snoring chased it away, each nasal whine sounded like a squadron of fighter jets.

Farmer Harrow stood yawning in his yard, his grubby fingers picked at his morning eye snot. His wife’s snores drifted through the solid stone walls of their cottage. Who needed an alarm clock, he thought?

In his haste to escape the noise, he’d grabbed his dark green coat but forgot to change his red and white striped pyjamas. He half twirled as if modelling.

Not a perfect match is it, Sparky? he said to his loyal, brown and white Jack Russell.

Sparky danced, happy to be out of the house. Her noise didn’t just affect humans.

He wasn’t a farmer even though he lived on one. When he bought the farm, the nickname came with it. Cows scared him, so did sheep. He kept chickens, but the eggs were his. A tractor he couldn’t drive sat idle in one field and an empty hay barn rusted and crumbled in another.

Sparky sniffed his Wellington boots as he crunched across the gravel path. They passed the chicken coop, and the farmer glanced in, jealous his feathered egg machines were asleep.

He unlatched a long wooden gate leading to a field. What he loved about the farm was the view. Fields of soil and grass stretching to the woods. Only today a thick fog blocked it.

Sparky bolted, lost in the cloudy haze. Farmer Harrow followed, packing his chipped pipe with tobacco. The mist gathered around him as he put the pipe to his mouth. His dog knew not to run too far, but the farmer called anyway.

Sparky.

Sparky barked, and the farmer lit a match.

Something else growled.

He paused, the match flickering between his fingers. Had he heard a growl? Could it be his stomach, he thought? Or his wife? Her snoring travelled long distance.

HOWL!

Certain it wasn’t his wife; the farmer’s imagination ran wild. He pictured an animal as hairy as a mammoth and the size of a rhino. Two heads each with three rows of shark’s teeth in a mouth drooling with hunger.

Sparky must have thought the same and scurried from the fog, through his master’s legs homeward. The abandoned farmer stood scarecrow still. So much for man’s best friend.

Whatever stalked the field shifted. Paws slapped the farm land, circling him. He’d seen enough nature documentaries to know what that meant. The farmer wanted breakfast, he didn’t want to be something else’s.

Every joint in his sixty-year-old body groaned and clicked as he sprinted across rough soil, something very hard to do in Wellington boots. He glanced behind, but grey smoke hid the animal.

If he could get close enough to his house, he hoped his wife’s snores might frighten it. He’d once watched burglars flee her brain-aching snorts.

He passed the gate, skidded to a stop and hurled it shut, satisfied when the latch clicked into place. Sparky yelped for him to hurry by the locked kitchen door.

The gate splintered, ripped from its hinges by the animal. Out of breath, the farmer unlocked the door and dived inside with Sparky, bolting it shut behind them.

The animal struck the door, shunting the farmer. Sparky retreated as each battering ram thrust shook the walls. His wife’s prized ornamental plates shifted closer to their shelf edges. If they smashed, he’d rather be eaten than face her anger.

A trail of condensation and drool formed by the bottom of the door as the animal sniffed. The small misted window over the sink darkened in shadow. A red eye appeared, searching the kitchen through the haze. Cross legged, the farmer hid under the table, away from its glare.

He noticed his wife’s snoring had stopped. It happened when she rolled onto her front. After a few minutes he dared to peep over the chequered tablecloth. Quietly, he opened the kitchen door.

Mist greeted him, but no wild animal. Slobber and muddy paw prints covered the door, leading back towards his fields. The chicken coop was unharmed, their wooden houses untouched. But the chickens were awake clucking in panic.

Sparky appeared behind him and sniffed the floor for a scent. The farmer patted his pockets for his pipe and remembered it was out there in the fog. In all his years he’d experienced nothing like it.

Most unusual, he said.

Windmore was certainly an odd town.

Chapter Two

Eleven-year-old Sophia Owen leant against newspapers stacked on Mrs Patel’s