Copyright

  First published in Great Britain by HarperCollins Children’s Books in 2021

  Published in this ebook edition in 2021

  HarperCollins Children’s Books is a division of HarperCollinsPublishers Ltd,

  1 London Bridge Street

  London SE1 9GF

  www.harpercollins.co.uk

  Text copyright © David Walliams 2021

  Illustrations copyright © Tony Ross 2021

  Cover lettering of author’s name copyright © Quentin Blake 2010

  David Walliams and Tony Ross assert the moral right to be identified as the author and illustrator of the work respectively.

  This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, businesses, places, events, locales and incidents are either the products of the author's imagination or used in a fictitious manner. Apart from famous historical figures, any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, or actual events is purely coincidental.

  A catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library.

  All rights reserved under International and Pan-American Copyright Conventions. By payment of the required fees, you have been granted the non-exclusive, non-transferable right to access and read the text of this ebook onscreen. No part of this text may be reproduced, transmitted, downloaded, decompiled, reverse engineered, or stored in or introduced into any information storage and retrieval system, in any form or by any means, whether electronic or mechanical, now known or hereinafter invented, without the express written permission of HarperCollins.

  Source ISBN: 9780008262204

  Ebook Edition © November 2019 ISBN: 9780008530235

  Version: 2021-11-08

  For my wonderful mum,

  who is also a Gangsta Granny

  CONTENTS

  COVER

  TITLE PAGE

  COPYRIGHT

  DEDICATION

  THANK-YOUS

  MEET THE CHARACTERS IN THE STORY

  PART ONE RETURN OF THE CAT

  1 A BEAUTIFUL BOUQUET OF CABBAGES

  2 CLEVER CLOG

  3 PUDDLE OF TROUBLE

  4 A GALLOPING POSTBOX

  5 NUMBER-ONE PIN-UP

  6 BISCUIT TIN

  7 THE COOLEST KID IN THE WORLD

  8 LOW-SPEED CHASE

  9 GIANT FRUIT LOLLY

  10 DOUBLE BLUFF!

  11 TINY MOUSTACHE

  12 GROUNDED!

  13 NUMBER-ONE SUSPECT

  PART TWO DANCE INTO DANGER

  14 TWO LEFT FEET

  15 CLUELESS

  16 IDENTICAL STRANGERS

  17 MARCH OF THE BINS

  18 A DEEP SENSE OF DREAD

  19 PLUCKED TO PERFECTION

  20 ALL A BLUR

  21 BROKEN BUTTOCK

  22 A MYSTERIOUS FIGURE

  23 GIANT MUSHROOMS

  24 BONG!

  PART THREE THE SECRET OF ALL SECRETS

  25 DYNAMITE!

  26 BOG WATER

  27 USED TISSUE

  28 NASTIES

  29 THE RETURN OF FUDGE

  30 ABRA KEBABRA

  31 RAJ MEETS THE QUEEN

  32 TOP-SECRET MISSION

  33 SEVEN CORGIS SLEEPING

  34 YOU ARE ONLY OLD ONCE!

  35 WATER SLIDE

  36 TRESPASSERS

  37 PC RAJ

  38 A TRAP

  PART FOUR SHOWDOWN

  39 REVENGE OF THE OLDIES!

  40 DUMMY

  41 KINDA SPOOKY

  42 A PROPER GANGSTA

  43 A MUM-AND-DAD SANDWICH

  44 THE QUEEN’S SPEECH

  ALSO BY DAVID WALLIAMS

  ABOUT THE PUBLISHER

  It has been a year since Ben lost his beloved Gangsta Granny, but the legend of The Black Cat lives on!

  MEET THE

  CHARACTERS

  IN THE STORY

  BEN

  Our hero is an ordinary twelve-year-old boy, who has had the most extraordinary adventure. With the help of his granny, in her guise as The Black Cat, he very nearly stole the Crown Jewels from the Tower of London. However, his days as an international jewel thief are over. Ben is now focusing on his big dream: to become a plumber.

  MUM

  By day, Linda works at a nail salon. By night, she is a ballroom-dancing superfan. Her favourite TV show ever is Strictly Stars Dancing. There is one professional dancer she loves above all the rest. His name is Flavio Flavioli and the family home has become a shrine to him. Linda is desperate for her only child, Ben, to forget his plumbing dream and become a ballroom champion just like Flavio.

  DAD

  Dad works as a security guard at the local supermarket. Pete is not a fast runner – in the past ten years he has only caught one shoplifter, and that was an old man on a Zimmer frame who was escaping with tubs of margarine – but he too loves ballroom dancing. He caught the ballroom bug from his wife, and now the couple rehearse routines all over the house.

  RAJ

  Raj is the most loved store owner in town. He runs the famously messy Raj’s News, but everyone stops by to enjoy his crazy deals and out-of-date sweets. Raj has always been a good friend to Ben – they became closer when Ben lost his granny, and Raj is always there to cheer the boy up with a silly joke or some free chocolate.

  MR PARKER

  Mr Parker is a nosy neighbour. He is a retired major and now runs the local Neighbourhood Watch group, Lower Toddle branch. It is a collection of oldies who have joined forces to keep an eye out for burglars, but Mr Parker uses it as an excuse to spy on everyone. One person he has got his eye on particularly is Ben. The nosy neighbour had been convinced the boy and his granny had stolen the Crown Jewels, but nobody had believed him. Now Mr Parker is out for revenge!

  FLAVIO FLAVIOLI

  Flavio is the heart-throb of the wildly popular TV show Strictly Stars Dancing. The Italian king of the dance floor has a deep-mahogany spray tan, shiny slicked-back hair and the most dazzlingly white teeth you ever did see. He wears brightly coloured all-in-one dance outfits, and so he looks like a boiled sweet in a wrapper.

  EDNA

  Ben met Edna at Granny’s funeral. She is Granny’s cousin. Edna took a shine to Ben, and over the past year they have become friends. The boy pops round every Sunday to Edna’s old folk’s home for tea and cake, a game of Scrabble and a natter about the olden days.

  THE LIBRARIAN

  This lady has worked at the library all her life. She is suspicious about Ben, and whenever he visits the library she has her beady eyes on him.

  THE QUEEN

  The Queen needs no introduction. She met Ben and his granny the night they tried to steal HER Crown Jewels from the Tower of London. The Queen was so touched by their special bond that she pardoned the pair on the spot.

  PC FUDGE

  Ben and Granny met PC Fudge on the way to steal the Crown Jewels. The policeman stopped them when Granny drove her mobility scooter on the motorway. They managed to fool him, and he ended up giving them a lift to the Tower of London!

  BUTLER THE BUTLER

  Mr Butler is the conveniently named butler at Buckingham Palace. Impossibly old, he has loyally served the Queen ever since she was a little girl.

  MILLICENT

  Granny left her mobility scooter to Ben in her will, as she knew he loved it so much. Now he keeps it in the garage.

  THE BLACK CAT

  Cabbages?” came a voice from behind Ben.

  The boy was standing by his granny’s headstone in the churchyard. It had been a year since her passing, and Ben was placing a beautiful bouquet of cabbages there as a tribute.

  Ben turned round. It was a familiar face. Edna, a cousin of Granny’s. He’d met her at the funeral last Christmas time and they had struck up something of a friendship. Now, once a week, Ben popped round to her old folk’s home to have a chat, often about Granny, and to help with any plumbing problems, which made him super popular with everyone there.

  Edna was your textbook old lady.

  “Oh, hello, Edna,” replied Ben. “What are you doing here?”

  The old lady was holding a single red rose and wearing a sad smile.

  “Oh! You see, dear, I come here once a week to lay a rose on my late husband’s resting place. Why do you have a bouquet of cabbages?”

  “For Granny. She loved them so much.”

  Edna looked wistful. “Oh yes. I do remember the sound they made whenever she came over for tea.”

  “Cabbages don’t talk!”

  “No. I mean the sound of your granny’s bottom whoopsies after she’d eaten one. Like…”

  “A duck quacking!” exclaimed Ben.

  “I couldn’t have put it better, dear!”

  “QUACK! QUACK! QUACK!” he mimicked, trundling along the path, letting out a little quack with each step.

  The pair burst out laughing.

  “HA! HA!”

  A tear traced a path down his cheek. Ben wasn’t sure if it was a happy tear or a sad tear. Most likely it was a bit of both. Granny’s passing had hit Ben the hardest. Despite the age gap, they were closer than anyone in the family. When she died, Ben felt as if the world would stop turning. But it didn’t. It just carried on as normal. Ben had everyday things to do, like:

  brush his teeth…

  go to school…

  take a bath…

  do his homework…

  and read PLUMBING WEEKLY.

  But he always felt the loss. With Granny gone, it was as if a p

art of him were missing.

  “I don’t know why I’m crying,” he said, sniffing.

  Edna pulled her used tissue from her sleeve and dabbed Ben’s face with it.

  “Because you loved her. Feeling sad is the price you pay for love. And, ooh goodness me, you were the apple of her eye! She adored you, Ben. Never stopped talking about you!”

  The boy gazed up to the sky. “Is Granny looking down on us now?”

  “I’m sure she is,” replied Edna. “With great pride, I imagine, at what a kind young man you are growing up to be – looking after me and my plumbing so well.”

  “Granny was a very special lady. She wasn’t your average grandma. She was my…”

  Ben hesitated. He was about to say “Gangsta Granny”!

  “Your what, dear?” asked Edna.

  “Nothing,” muttered Ben. He needed to keep Granny’s secrets secret. Even from her best friend, Edna. No one else knew about Granny’s double life as an international jewel thief, going under the name of THE BLACK CAT. Well, no one else other than Her Majesty the Queen, who discovered them trying to steal her Crown Jewels that fateful night at the Tower of London.

  “You were about to tell me something, dear…”

  “Maybe one day,” replied Ben. “I’ll pop round and see you on Sunday, normal time.”

  “I’ll get the SCRABBLE out! And don’t forget the Murray Mints!”

  “I won’t!”

  As Ben walked out of the graveyard, Edna smiled and waved goodbye. Then she laid the single red rose down on her late husband’s grave.

  At that moment, Ben spotted a black cat slinking out from behind Granny’s headstone.

  It moved like a panther. The cat turned, looked straight at the boy and miaowed.

  “MIAOW!”

  Ben doubled back to stroke the cat, but as quickly as it had appeared it disappeared. It leaped up on to the stone wall that circled the graveyard.

  Then with one more spring

  the creature

  was gone.

  DING!

  The bell on the door rang as Ben waltzed into the newsagent’s shop.

  “Ah! Ben! My favourite customer!” announced the jolly man behind the counter. Raj was like a giant Jelly Baby, forever smiling and with a light dusting of sugar.

  “Hi, Raj!” replied Ben. “Have you got the new PLUMBING WEEKLY?”

  “Never mind about U-bends and cisterns and stopcocks!” he exclaimed. “Have you not seen the news?”

  “What news?”

  “The news news!”

  “What news news?”

  “The news news news!”

  “What news news news?”

  “The mask of Tutankhamun has been –” Raj left a dramatic pause – “stolen!”

  It was all there on the front page of the newspaper.

  “That mask must be worth millions!” exclaimed Ben.

  “Billions!”

  “Trillions?”

  “Squillions!”

  “Are squillions a real amount?” asked Ben.

  “I am not sure. But gazillions are.”

  DING! went the bell on the door again. Immediately, the pair looked over and saw that the door was open, but there was no one there.

  “Who was that?” hissed Ben.

  “No one,” replied Raj.

  “It can’t have been no one.”

  “I didn’t see anyone come in or out.”

  “Who was it, then?”

  “A freak gust of wind,” said Raj, walking over to the door and closing it.

  Meanwhile, Ben scanned the aisles of the shop, but he couldn’t spot anyone.

  He lowered his voice. “So, who stole Tutankhamun’s mask?”

  “No one knows. But the thief was so daring that they even left behind a clue.”

  “What kind of clue?”

  “According to the radio, the thief spelled out a clue in SCRABBLE letters at the scene of the crime.”

  The boy’s eyes widened. SCRABBLE had always been his grandma’s favourite game.

  “What did the SCRABBLE letters say?”

  “MIAOW.”

  “Miaow?”

  “Miaow! Like cats go – MIAOW!”

  Ben was stunned into silence. It sounded awfully like it was a clue to the identity of the thief.

  “Are you all right, Ben?” asked Raj.

  “I’m fine,” he lied.

  “You look faint!” Raj began running around his shop. “Here, have a sniff of an extra-strong mint. That will bring you round!”

  The man all but inserted the packet up the boy’s nose, and Ben took a long, minty snort.

  “It’s impossible,” muttered Ben.

  “What’s impossible?”

  “It can’t be true!”

  “It is true! Look! It’s all over the TV as well!”

  With that, Raj thumped the little black-and-white television he kept on a shelf behind the counter. A newsflash flickered into view.

  The newsreader announced, “We bring you some breaking news. There has been a dramatic development. The mask of Tutankhamun is –”

  “Oh, my word! They must have found it!” exclaimed Raj.

  “– still missing…”

  “I don’t know why they bother,” muttered Raj, turning off the television.

  Ben was lost in thought. The theft of a priceless artefact from a heavily guarded museum had the pawprints of THE BLACK CAT all over it. Who else other than a legendary international jewel thief could pull off such a daring heist? The SCRABBLE letters even spelled out. That was not a clue. It was a taunt that was telling the police, “You can’t catch me!”

  But, and it was a BIG BUT,* the thief couldn’t be his Gangsta Granny. She had been gone for a year.

  This was a GIANT PUZZLE Ben desperately wanted to solve.

  “Ben, do you remember a year ago there were all those priceless jewels left outside that charity shop?” asked Raj.

  “In the biscuit tin! Of course I remember,” replied the boy.

  They were the jewels he’d found one night in Granny’s kitchen. A discovery that had kick-started the whole adventure!

  Granny had sworn that they were all worthless costume jewels, that she hadn’t been THE BLACK CAT after all.

  But it had been a DOUBLE BLUFF!

  The jewels turned out to be worth millions. All the money went to help old people. Granny really had been a proper GANGSTA!

  “There were rumours flying around town that the jewels must have come from the haul of a world-famous thief!” said Raj. “A thief who no one knew the name of!”

  “Not that famous, then.”

  “All right, Clever Clog!”

  “It’s Clogs!”

  “No more special offers for you!”

  “The theft of King Tutankhamun’s mask couldn’t have been the work of the same thief, though.”

  “And how do you know that?” came a voice from behind Ben.

  The boy spun round in horror. Now he was nose to nose with his nosy nemesis.

  “Mr Parker!”

  he exclaimed.

  * Not a BIG BUTT. That is something entirely different and has no place in a children’s book.

  Mr Parker was the nosiest nosy parker there ever was. He was a retired army major, and now ran the local Neighbourhood Watch group, Lower Toddle branch. This was a collection of people who kept an eye out for burglars. But Mr Parker took it one step further. He spied on absolutely everyone.

  Mr Parker had very nearly landed Ben and his granny in a puddle of trouble when they’d tried to steal the Crown Jewels. That night, Mr Parker had ended up humiliated by the policemen who hadn’t believed his story. Ben and Granny had walked free, but Mr Parker had held a GIANT GRUDGE against the boy ever since. He was determined to one day finally see Ben unveiled as a criminal mastermind.

  “I said,” began the nosy neighbour in his nasal voice, “how do you know so much about the theft of Tutankhamun’s mask?”

 

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