Barry Loser and the Case of the Crumpled Carton. Jim Smith

      Granny Harumpadunk slipped the china pig into her handbag and shuffled over to look at the baby.

      ‘Ooh, you’re the loveliest thing since sliced bread, aren’t you!’ she cooed, and I wondered what was so amazing about sliced bread.

      ‘Mu-um,’ I squeaked in my babiest voice ever, seeing as that’s what she seems to like so much these days, ‘Dad said I could have some money for a Tears of Granny Laughter.’

      ‘Tears of Granny Laughter,’ murmured my mum, as if she’d heard the name somewhere before. ‘Isn’t that that terrible new drink Feeko’s have been making out of little old ladies?’

      ‘It’s not real, that’s just the advert!’ I groaned, because everyone knows Feeko’s doesn’t use ACTUAL granny tears to make Tears of Granny Laughter. But my mum wasn’t listening.

      ‘I’m not having you drinking that stuff, Barry,’ she said, taking Desmond off my dad and peering into his eyes the way I peer into my cuddly Future Ratboy’s.

      I clenched my fists and felt a Tear of Barry Annoyance start to work its way out of my eyehole.

      ‘But Mu-um, everyone at school drinks it!’ I wailed, which wasn’t comperleeterly true. Only Anton Mildew in my class had tried Tears of Granny Laughter so far.

      Anton Mildew is the editor of our school newspaper, The Daily Poo. Ever since he said that Tears of Granny Laughter was even tastier than Fronkle, all I’ve wanted to do is drink a carton.

      ‘PLEE-EEASE!’ I whined, but not in an annoying, whiney way.

      ‘QUIET, BARRY!’ said my mum, without even looking at me.

      I stuck my tongue out at Desmond and was just about to storm up to my bedroom, when Mr Hodgepodge heaved himself off the sofa and plodded over to where I was standing.

      He was wearing his sparkly bow tie, which he thinks makes him look like a magician.

      ‘What’s that in your ear, Barry?’ he grinned, reaching out his shaky hand, and a 50p coin appeared between his fingers.

      ‘You go enjoy your bottle of Grandma Pop!’ he winked, dropping the 50p in my palm, and I slid it into my pocket before my mum and dad could see. Not that they were looking. Because they were too busy staring at Desmond Loser the Second.

      It was the next day and I was skateboarding down the road to catch up with my best friends, Bunky and Nancy.

      ‘Mornkeels, Barry!’ said Bunky, as I skidded to a stop, trying to work out why he reminded me of Detective Manksniff all of a sudden. I looked him up and down and scratched my bum.

      ‘Hmmm, it’s not your voice,’ I said, thinking back to when Bunky had just said good morning to me. ‘Detective Manksniff’s voice is all deep and drawly. Yours sounds like a little old granny-dog’s yap,’ I smiled.

      Bunky scrunched his face up, not really knowing what in the keelness I was going on about.

      ‘It’s not your hat either,’ I mumbled. ‘Detective Manksniff wears a keel detective hat, and you don’t wear a hat at all,’ I said, flicking Bunky’s hair at the front, where it sticks up like a hand.

      Nancy sighed, half bored, half wondering if I’d gone stark raving bonkers.

      ‘It definitely isn’t your smile,’ I frowned, poking my nose right up to Bunky’s face. ‘When Detective Manksniff smiles, you know he knows something you don’t know,’ I said. ‘When YOU smile, you know you don’t know anything AT ALL.’

      Bunky bonked me on the nose and I made a noise like a car horn. ‘Thanks a lot, Barry!’ he said, chewing on a straw.

      My eyebrows did a waggle. ‘AH-HA, it’s that straw!’ I said, pointing at the straw, which was white with keel little pink tear shapes dotted all over it.

      ‘Whenever Detective Manksniff’s trying to solve one of his really hard mysteries, he pulls the straw out of his cocktail and starts chewing on it,’ I warbled. ‘That’s what’s making you look like him!’

      Bunky smiled his smile he smiles when he doesn’t really care about what I’m saying. Then he pointed the straw at me and blew.

      ‘OW-AH!’ I screamed, as the tiniest rolled-up ball of paper in the whole wide world amen shot out of the straw and hit me on the ear lobe.

      I snatched the straw off Bunky and snapped it in half, which isn’t easy, seeing as straws are bendy, not snappy.

      Bunky smiled, not in the keelest bit bothered about me snapping his straw. ‘Plenty more where that came from!’ he said, pointing at a poster for Tears of Granny Laughter right next to where we’d stopped.

      ‘You-you’ve tried it?’ I gasped, suddenly realising where he’d got the straw from.

      ‘Eeve keelse!’ smiled Bunky, which is how we’ve started saying ‘of course’, by the way. ‘My sister bought me a carton of Gertrude flavour last night,’ he said, and I wished I had an older sister who bought me cartons of Tears of Granny Laughter like Bunky, instead of a baby brother who stole my mum and dad.

      ‘Wh-what’s it taste like, Bunky?’ I warbled, leaning against Nancy so I didn’t fall over out of jealousy.

      ‘Alright I spose . . . Not as nice as Fronkle,’ he said, and he started waggling his legs around like the man in the Tears of Granny Laughter advert. ‘That reminds me, I haven’t weed it out yet . . .’ he giggled.

      My ears couldn’t believe themselves. How could a drink made out of old grannies’ tears not be the tastiest thing in the whole wide world amen?

      ‘What are you, NUTS?’ I said, which is what Detective Manksniff says when his ears can’t believe THEMselves. ‘Tears of Granny Laughter is the keelest thing since Future Ratboy!’

      Nancy rolled her eyes, picking up Bunky’s snapped-in-half straw and putting it in a bin.

      ‘A lot of people don’t