On Sunday afternoon they�re filming the scene in the beer garden where the monkey throws the weighing scales at Cyril�s head. Steve brings the monkey and the weighing scales with him, but this has nothing to do with the film. There�s a man called Phil who often drinks in the pub, and a few weeks ago, Joe and Steve spent an evening playing roulette with his mouth. His teeth would hurt every time he ate a sweet � he always put a hand to one side of his mouth as he ate it. Joe and Steve kept giving him sweets and betting on which side of his mouth he�d put his hand to.

By the end of the night, Steve was losing heavily. He had a twenty-euro note left, and he put it all on the left side, but before they gave him the sweet, Steve went over to Phil�s wife and told her that Phil said she was like a demon in the kitchen and Antarctica in the bedroom. Steve expected her to slap Phil across the face, and he knew she was right-handed, so she�d hit him on the left side of his face, but she kneed him in the groin instead. He put his hands on his groin, and he kept them there as he ate the sweet.

Joe and Steve wondered if this was like getting a zero in roulette, but neither of them knew what happens when you get a zero in roulette. They argued about whether Phil�s hands were leaning more to the left or to the right, but they couldn�t agree, so they decided to spin the wheel once more, and they bet on whether she�d knee him in the groin or slap him across the face the next time. Steve told her that Phil had said she had the intelligence of a headless chicken. She punched him in the face � right on the centre of his nose.

So now he had one hand on his nose and the other on his groin. They had another go. They bet on which part of his body he�d leave a hand on if he became injured in another part of his body. Steve said he�d leave a hand on his groin, and Joe went for his nose. This time Steve told Phil�s wife that he said that whenever he watches rugby, he�s always reminded of the way she dances. She hit him over the back of the head with a pool cue and knocked him unconscious. He removed the hand from his groin and his nose. As he lay unconscious on the ground, there didn�t seem to be anything else they could bet on.

So ever since then they�ve been looking for a way to settle the bet, and the monkey with the weighing scales has provided the perfect opportunity. Phil is always in the pub on Sunday afternoons. Joe and Steve will get him to say �John Donne� and they�ll bet on which side of his head the monkey will hit him with the weighing scales. Steve has gone for the left and Joe has the right.

As Phil is walking past their table on the way to the bar, Steve says, �Phil, settle a bet for us here. What�s the name of that poet whose surname sounds like his first name?�

�Ah� I haven�t a clue.�

�His surname sounds like John.�

�Samuel Johnson?�

�No, his first name sounds like his surname, and it begins with a D.�

�Don Johnson?�

�His first name is John, and his surname starts with a D.�

�John Donson?�

�That�s close. Just drop the �son� at the end of it.�

�Ah� John Don?�

Joe and Steve look at the monkey, but he has his hands over his ears to block out the sound of the guitarist, who�s just started playing.

�Yeah, that�s what it is,� Steve says. �Thanks for that, Phil.�

�No problem.�

Joe asks Steve about the monkey�s name, and Steve says. �I don�t know what it is. Jane�s aunt never found that out. Obviously the monkey can�t tell her. It�s not you-know-who anyway.�

�I suppose if you just refer to him as �the monkey� people will know who you�re talking about.�

There�s no sign of the elf who�s supposed to play the monkey. The rust puppy is there to play the kitten, and Alfred got a red-rose rust puppy to play Joe. Alfred points at Emily and says, �Can you act?�

�What, me?�

�No, the kitten.� Emily had brought Little Kitty Fake Tan along because it�s supposed to make its appearance for product placement.

�She�s never acted before,� Emily says, �but she�s willing to have a go.�

So Little Kitty Fake Tan plays the monkey. The puppy playing the kitten isn�t too happy with the casting, but then the kitten stares at him, and it seems to have the same effect that it has on Joe.

Joe has a problem with the casting too. He objects to being played by a puppy. �That puppy looks nothing like me,� he says. �Look at him � he seems so depressed.�

The rust puppy who�s playing the monkey looks sad too, but only when he sees the red-rose rust puppy. Mark remembers how he looked so sad in the park when he was looking at the roses. Is it something about the colour that makes them sad? Something about the colour red?

Cyril is there too. Alfred wants to introduce him to someone. He says, �Cyril, I�d like you to meet Mrs. Shaw.�

They shake hands and Cyril says, �Nice to meet you.�

�It�s nice to meet you too.�

�Mrs. Shaw owns a canary,� Alfred says.

�Oh.�

�One other thing, Cryil. I got you a little present.� Alfred hands him a bowl with a goldfish in it. �His name is Jason.�

�Oh� Thanks.�

Alfred leaves with Mrs. Shaw and Cyril goes back to what he�d been doing earlier � staring at Amy. The meeting with Mrs. Shaw is just a way of getting the peacocks into the film � it�s not a huge jump from a canary to peacocks. That storyline of the peacocks and the meercat is looking very promising.

They didn�t have any dogs that were about to be put down in the animal home, so it�s a fairly big leap from a goldfish happily swimming in a bowl to an elk being shot with the aid of a laser target, but that will be just a minor part of the film anyway.

Amy notices that Cyril is staring at her. She�s playing her sister in this scene. She�s wearing a wig, and she realises that she must look more like Beatrice than ever now. She goes over to Emily and asks her to take Cyril inside and buy him a drink. Joe and Steve go inside with them.

They sit at the bar and talk about hedgehogs, but Cyril�s mind is far away. He stares at the goldfish on the bar in front of him. Then Steve sees someone coming into the pub and he looks for a place to hide. It�s Mickey Mouse. Steve looks down at the bar with his hand over the side of his face, but he�s expecting a tap on the shoulder any second now.

It�s Cyril who gets the tap on the shoulder instead. Or the hand on the shoulder pulling him off his bar stool. When Steve looks up, Cyril is on the ground and Mickey is sitting on top of him, hitting his head off the ground.

He�s not really hitting his head off the ground � he�s just trying to make it look that way. The man in the Mickey Mouse suit is a stunt man, and he�s used to doing this sort of thing. When Mickey leaves the pub, Joe and Steve help Cyril to his feet, and he�s not really injured, but he is badly shaken.

�I�m terribly sorry about this,� Steve says. �It�s really my fault. That was meant for me � he must have thought you were me. Let me make this up to you, Cyril. Come out for dinner with us this evening.�

�I� I don�t know.�

�It�ll be our treat. We�ll pay for everything.�

�Okay.�

Joe had brought Mark and Mr. Hollywood-Story Blanket along to the filming because he promised to take them to see the caretaker of the house where Jason�s girlfriend goes. Before they leave, Mark tells Alfred all about Jason hiding in the trees to spy on his girlfriend.

�That�s good,� Alfred says, �but we already have something like that with Goddy spying on Cyril and Beatrice. Where does Mr. Hollywood-Story Blanket see it going from here?�

�He thinks it�s going to get exciting.�

�Exciting?�

�Definitely exciting.�

�He�s right� He�s definitely right. We could do with a car chase.�

Joe and Mark leave to meet the caretaker. His name is Ted and he lives a few streets away from Joe. He�s watering the flowers in his garden when Joe and Mark get there. After talking about the weather and the garden, Joe says to Ted, �Are you still the caretaker in the Flynn�s house?�

�Well, �caretaker� is probably too strong a word. I just sweep the floors really. In the evenings and at night.�

�Oh right.�

�I like to think of myself more as a sweeper rather than a caretaker.�

�Do they run a business from that house?�

�Sort of. They live there.�

�Doesn�t the sweeping wake them up?�

�No, they only live there by day. And then they go home at night.�

�How do you mean, �live� there?�

�They watch TV and have lunch. People call in to see them. The usual sort of thing. They live there � that�s what they do for a living.�

�Oh right. So it�s not actually their home?�

�No, just their place of work. They go home in the evening.�

�Don�t they get confused about which place is their home?�

�Their home in the evenings feels much more like home, but they do feel very much at home in the living room of their place of work. There�s a sideboard there that they love. When they sit in their living room in the evenings, it just doesn�t feel like home because they don�t have the sideboard, so they often get their cook to stand in the spot where the sideboard would be and make a humming sound � it�s the sound they think the sideboard would make if it could talk. They feel more at home in the room with the cook making that sound.�

�So you just sweep the floors in the evening and night after they�ve gone home?�

�That�s all I do, yeah. I sweep.�

�It must get lonely.�

�It was lonely once, up to about two years ago. And to be honest, I wish it was lonely again, but about two years ago, women started appearing when I was sweeping. There were three or four of them at first. They were all in their early twenties. Now a lot of men would say that that�s their dream come true. And that�s what I said to myself at first, because it was getting a bit lonely, sweeping the empty house by night. But the women would talk to me about men. They�d tell me how good looking so-and-so is. I�d just try to get on with my sweeping and ignore them, but it never put them off. After a few months there was about twenty of them. They talk about men, laugh, and drink vodka and Red Bull. Sometimes it�s almost like a sleep-over, and then sometimes it�s more like a night out in the pub. But as soon as I stop sweeping, they go quiet. I can�t stop sweeping for long, because I don�t want to fall behind in my work. As soon as I start sweeping, they start up again. �So-and-so is an imbecile but he has a beautiful�� And so on.�

�What is it about the sweeping that attracts them?�

�I have no idea. I tried leaving rat poison out once, but they didn�t touch it.�

�And this has been going on for two years?�

�Every night they turn up. And there�s always more at the weekends.�

�Right,� Joe says. �I�ve never heard of anything like that before� Have you by any chance noticed some red things lying around the place?�

�Funny you should say that. Over the past few weeks I have noticed a few red things lying around the house and the gardens. And the thing about them all is, they�re all red. I was just wondering if there was something about the fact that they�re all red.�

�And this is just over the past few weeks?�

�Two weeks, I�d say. I have no idea where these red things are coming from.�

When they get home, Mark shows his uncle the box where he keeps the red things he�s found. When Joe sees the key ring and the strawberry, he makes a connection.

�Do y� know what I think these things are?� They�re all hedgehogs.�

Mark looks into the box. �Hedgehogs?�

�Yeah. The key ring and the strawberry are definitely hedgehogs. And I think some of these other things could be hedgehogs too. You find these things lying around in the grass, not moving. That�s what hedgehogs do � they don�t move. Maybe they�re leaving themselves in your path, so you�ll find them and bring them all together in this box. This could be like a hedgehog family reunion.�

Mr. Hollywood-Story Blanket is slightly dubious of this idea, but he doesn�t say anything.

�What about the elf?� Mark says. �He�s not a hedgehog.�

�No. You got me there� But then the elf is really just Jason smoking a cigarette� And I suppose if we�re going to be really technical about it, some of these hedgehogs are just strawberries and key rings and things� Cyril has a goldfish called Jason. I wonder if you could consider a goldfish to be a hedgehog.�

�I don�t know about that, but you could definitely consider a goldfish to be red.�

�That�s right. They�re more red than gold anyway.�

�Uncle Joe, do you think there�s any connection between the elks and the elves.�

�I wouldn�t be at all surprised if there is. They seem to spend a lot of time together� And Elvis too � there�s an Elvis impersonator who works in the supermarket, and he used to play snooker with Jason.�

�Is he red?�

�He does have a bit of a red head on him.�