I used to have a set of "Just William" audiobooks. One of these was about when William went out for the evening with his school choir or similar, and ended up going into somebody's house, the owner of which, who was almost deaf, thought the noise made by the choir was that of wolves and as a result, produced a gun and aimed it out of the window! What is this story?
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‘William Joins the Waits’ by Richmal Crompton, first published in William in Trouble (1927). In this story, William goes carol singing with the Sunday School choir:
Mr Solomon was the superindendant of the Sunday School, on which the Outlaws reluctantly shed the light of their presence every Sunday afternoon. […] ‘He’s going to take the elder boys out carol singing on Christmas Eve.’
They visit the house of Douglas’s Aunt Jane, who is hard of hearing:
They had been singing for nearly ten minutes, when Douglas stopped them with an imperious gesture.
‘I say,’ he said to William, ‘I forgot — she’s deaf.’
Jane mistakes the sound of the choir for the baying of wolves:
‘That sound,’ she went on. ‘It roused me from sleep; the roaring of wild animals, or — is it an air raid? Has some enemy attackd us?’
‘No,’ William hastened to assure her through the trumpet, ‘it’s not that.’
‘Animals, then,’ she want on, still excited; ‘it sounded to me like the baying of wolves. Did you see them?’
She produces a gun and points it out of the window at the choir:
Suddenly Aunt Jane left the room to reappear triumphantly a few minutes later carrying a large and old-fashioned gun.
‘It’s a long time since I used it,’ she said, ‘but I believe it might get one or two of them.’ […]
She clambered on to the table before the window and opened the window very slightly. Through the small aperture thus made she projected the muzzle of her gun. William watched her, paralysed with horror. Outside the medley of song rose higher and higher.
(This was easily found with a Google Books search for “just william wolves gun window”.)
answered Aug 5, 2019 at 8:01
