Grizzly's Grandcubs

Hanley Bear and I got back from a little holiday yesterday evening. Grizzly and Polar took us with them to visit Grizzly's grown-up cubs and his young grandcubs, who all live in the south of England. While we were staying at their house, Hanley and I sneaked into the living room at night and had lots of fun playing with the human cubs' toys and games.

We borrowed Polar's small camera too, and took pictures of ourselves with their train set and racing a Lego cart, but we made too much noise when we crashed that, which woke Polar up and she caught us.

'You mustn't play with toys that aren't yours without asking the owners first,' she told us crossly. 'You'll have to apologise to the boys tomorrow.'

I was very scared when she said that. I had already met Grizzly's cubs and grandcubs during my summer boat journey, when we were on the River Wey at Guildford, but I stayed very still and quiet and pretended not to be a real bear then, because I thought the grandcubs were fierce pirates!

Before they arrived, I watched as Polar polished some big brass coins to make them clean and shiny, then put them in a little metal box with a lid. She told Grizzly it was treasure, and that when the pirates arrived, they would try to find it. I saw her hide it, next to the coal bucket, before she and Grizzly went out to meet everybody.

'That's not very well-hidden!' I said to myself. 'If Polar and Grizzly have all their big, valuable coins taken away by pirates, they'll only have funny pieces of paper left in their wallets to swap for food.'
I couldn't imagine any shop-keepers wanting to swap a lovely tin of rice pudding for a small piece of paper, so I quickly dragged the treasure chest into my secret bear cave behind the settee, where I also kept my emergency food supplies of grapes and herby crackers, before climbing back onto my cushion and making myself go floppy and toy-like.

The pirates rushed in wearing black hats with skulls and crossed bones on them, black waistcoats and eye-patches but, no matter how hard they searched, they couldn't find our treasure. Even after a little boat journey and lunch, and more games on the boat, they still didn't find it. I was very proud of myself for hiding it so well.

I suddenly realised that I'd done such a good job that Polar and Grizzly wouldn't be able to find it either or, if they did, they would find my emergency bear food too. Remember that, back then, I hadn't actually told them that I was a real bear. I wondered what to do, but it was actually quite simple. When I saw Grizzly and Polar getting off the boat and saying goodbye to all their visitors, I quickly jumped down and dragged the box of treasure back to Polar's silly hiding place. She saw it there as soon as she came back in, picked it up and showed it to Grizzly.

'After all that polishing, the boys never did find their treasure,' said Polar. 'I thought it would be such fun for them.'

'Never mind, love,' said Grizzly. 'It was a nice idea.'

'Oh dear!' I thought. 'The money was for the human cubs and they were supposed to find it, but I've spoilt their fun. I'd better keep quiet about that after all.' So I decided not to tell Polar and Grizzly I was a real bear just then.

Now Hanley Bear and I were in trouble again. Polar showed Grizzly's grandcubs the pictures of us playing with their things. 'Aren't they naughty!' said the bigger human cub. He looked very cross with us.

'You are both very bad bears!' said the smaller human cub. He looked sad, and we felt so ashamed of ourselves that we nearly cried. We said we were very, very sorry not to have asked first. Polar explained that we had been very careful not to break anything and pointed out that, in fact, we had improved the layout of the railway tracks because we were quite clever bears. Both of the human cubs hugged us and we all played together, until it was time for their tea. We had to leave the next day and we thought the human cubs might miss us, so we built two Lego bears to be their friends.