But while he stood trying to decide what to do if the bull hit him. He would never have believed anything could be so heavy or so hard. He knew it was too late to think of doing anything. He was already flying through the air, numbed with the awful black shock of the bull’s impact.
He landed on the floor at the side of his bed. Wildly, before anybody could put on the light, he felt at his face and ears. He was normal. He sat there for a while, beside the bed, letting the ordinary world come back.
The rest of that night he did not sleep. He kept his eyes as wide open as he could. He was afraid of both the bull and the tiger, waiting there for him the moment he closed his eyes. He didn’t feel like sleeping either. Now and again he would reach down to feel his foot, to see if the fur had come back.
Next day was a Saturday and no school. He idled away the morning with his brothers, polishing their bicycles for the Sunday ride. But at last he left them and rode off to the edge of town. He rode along the cinder path by the canal, he left his bicycle in the grass, climbed a fence and crossed a field. Even before he got to the thick hawthorn hedge he paused. From the field beyond came a dreadful sound. For the first moments he was certain it must be a tiger, maybe that other tiger. It was a groaning roaring complaining sound — like somebody roaring down a long pipe. He crept to the hedge and peered through. There were the black and white cows. And there was the bull. A big white bull. He was walking through the herd, here and there pawing up sods and flinging them back over his haunches, lifting his nose to sniff and make that terrible sound. He was so thick and white and huge, he looked like some other species than the cows.
Fred retreated. His adventure as a tiger had given him a whole new notion of the world of bulls. He had never properly looked at one before, but now he had seen enough. He got back home as fast as he could.
But an odd thing happened when he reached home. He saw his aunt’s red car drawn up at the front gate and felt a little jump of pleasure, knowing that her dog Peter would be with her. This black labrador was a particular friend of Fred’s. Whenever they met the dog would go into a frenzy of joy, writhing and squirming towards him, making gleeful whimperings, nearly hurling itself from one side to the other with the violent swings of its tail, and lifting its upper lip from its teeth in a dog laugh and standing up to embrace him.
Fred ran into the house. His brothers were there with two friends, all going round on hands and knees, pretending to be dogs fighting, and Peter was taking part in frenzied delight, growling and barking and whacking the furniture with his tail.
As Fred came into the room he called to Peter, ‘Here boy!’, to get him away from his brothers. The dog jumped up erect and looked at Fred, tail swinging. But after that first look a strange transformation took place. Peter’s body seemed to double in size, as all his black hair stood on end, and all his teeth appeared as his face shrivelled up in a mad snarl, and he backed away crouching. Then suddenly he uttered a yell, and dashed from the room into the kitchen, yelling as if he had been run over.
Fred’s mother came out of the kitchen demanding to know who’d hurt the dog. His brothers stood up, baffled. Fred could hear his aunt in there, coaxing Peter.
‘Something’s absolutely terrified this dog. I can’t get him out,’ she called. Then they all went into the kitchen. His aunt was on her hands and knees, reaching under the stove where Peter had jammed himself far back against the wall.
Fred bent down, eager to reassure his friend, and reached a hand under the stove. ‘Come on, Petie boy,’ he kept saying, ‘come on.’
A noisy scramble turned into a black silent bolt of dog hurtling from the kitchen back into the living-room. Then everybody heard a crash of glass, followed by silence.
They went into the living-room and saw the jagged edges of the main front window. Peter had obviously gone straight through.
The boys rushed outside. Peter had disappeared. The boys started to hunt.
But Fred didn’t join the hunt. His meeting with Peter had frightened him afresh, more than it had frightened Peter. He knew that what had frightened Peter was a tiger.
Somehow, looking at his old friend Fred, Peter had seen a tiger.
Fred went to his bedroom. He took his shoes off and felt his feet, then sat looking into his eyes in the mirror. After a while, even though it was early afternoon, he crept under the blankets. What should he do? Ought he to tell somebody? What if he actually was turning into a tiger?
He just didn’t know what to do. And he didn’t dare tell anybody. He found a book and lay there, trying to read.
When bedtime came, Saturday night, his brothers were noisy, but Fred told them he had a headache and lay in bed with his face turned to the wall.
Gradually they fell silent. And Fred, too, eventually sank off to sleep.
About the Author
Ted Hughes (1930–1998) was born in Yorkshire. His first book, The Hawk in the Rain, was published in 1957 by Faber & Faber and was followed by many volumes of poetry and prose for adults and children. He received the Whitbread Book of the Year for two consecutive years for his last published collections of poetry. He was Poet Laureate from 1984, and in 1998 he was appointed to the Order of Merit.
About the Illustrator
Joe McLaren is a freelance illustrator. He graduated from the University of Brighton in 2003, and now lives and works in Rochester, Kent. He has taught Foundation Illustration at Central Saint Martins, and has worked on internal and cover illustrations for a number of publishers.
By the Same Author
The Iron Man
The Iron Woman
How the Whale Became and Other Stories
Nessie the Mannerless Monster
Meet My Folks!
Ffangs the Vampire Bat and the Kiss of Truth
The Coming of the Kings
Season Songs
The Dreamfighter and Other Creation Tales
Collected Animal Poems volumes 1 to 4
Collected Poems for Children
(illustrated by Raymond Briggs)