典范英语8-16

key and the robot

Chapter one

Doohickey had just moved to a new town when he spotted a notice. It was stuck outside a big house at the end of his

street.

?That?s the job for me,? said Doohickey. ?I need some more pocket

-

money.?

He pushed the doorbell. Then he jumped.

Weeeeyow-weeeeyow-weeeeyow! Kaaabooooom!

A loud alarm sounded inside the house, followed by a terrific explosion.

A window flew open at the top of the house. A cloud of thick smoke billowed out.

?What do you want?? coughed a voice from inside the cloud. ?Can?t you see that I?m busy??

The smoke cleared. The professor?s face peered down at Doohickey.

?Excuse me,? said Doohickey. ?My name?s Doohickey. I?ve come about the job.?

?What job?? snapped the professor.

?As assistant,? said Doohickey. ?The notice says you need one.?

?Oh, absolutely!? said the professor, beginning to grin.

The notice had been up for over a year, but Doohickey was the first person to ask about it.

?Come on up!? said the professor. His head

disappeared.

A moment later, the front door sprang half-open.

Doohickey peered inside. A huge mountain of post had stopped the door from opening properly. But there was no

one there.

Doohickey felt sure that the door had opened for him, so he squeezed through into the hallway.

A buzzer sounded in Doohickey?s ear. He was surprised to see a little air

-ship bobbing in the hallway beside him.

Tiny propellers spun the ship around. Doohickey saw the words, ?FOLLOW ME? written in big red letters on its

side.

Chapter two

He

followed

the

ship

up

a

tall,

winding

staircase.

He

passed

room

after

room

stuffed

full

of

strange-looking

machines. Were they the professor?s inventions?

Doohickey knew that he was supposed to go straight up the stairs, but he could

n?t help himself. He popped into one

of the rooms to take a closer look.

The first thing Doohickey came across was a computer screen fixed to a huge metal cage. The cage seemed to be

stuffed full of straw.

Doohickey pushed his hand into it.

?Ouch!? h

e squealed, pulling it out again. A tiny needle was sticking out of his thumb.

There was a label fixed to the computer screen.

?Well, it didn?t find this one,? said Doohickey crossly, as he stuck the needle back into the straw.

The next machine had lots of electric fans fixed beneath a large metal funnel. There was sand all over the floor. The

label said:

?This looks like fun,? thought Doohickey. He switched it on.

Sand began trickling out of the funnel and the fans started spinning. Then the strangest thing happened.

The sand didn?t fall on to the floor. It hung in the air. And slowly, it shaped itself into a floating castle.

Doohickey walked slowly around the machine. He couldn?t believe what he was seeing.

Then all of a sudden, he bumped into someone else. When he saw who it was, he nearly jumped out of his skin.

The other person was him!

It was like looking in a mirror, except that there was no glass.

Doohickey reached out his hand and the other Doohickey did the same. Their fingers met in mid-air and he felt the

warmth of his own hand pressing back. It was too creepy.

?Ughhh!? shivered Doohickey. He stepped backwards straight into the floating sand

-castle.

The castle exploded and Doohickey found himself in the middle of a sandstorm. Sand blew everywhere, into his

eyes and up his nose.

Coughing and sneezing, he groped his way back to the switch and turned it off.

The sandstorm disappeared. And so had the other Doohickey!

Then Doohickey noticed a large metal plate on the floor. There was another label on it.

?Of course!? sighed Doohickey.

The metal plate was another of the professor?s inventions. It had

made the other Doohickey appear when he had

stepped on to it.

I won't try that again,

he thought.

It’

s a bit too spook

y.

A buzzer sounded. Doohickey saw the air-ship bobbing up and down in the doorway. It had come back to find him.

?I got lost,? said Doohickey. He couldn?t think of a better excuse.

The ship buzzed again crossly and glided back towards the stairs.

?Coming,? said Doohickey.

Chapter Three

They reached the top of the house.

The air-ship led Doohickey into a smoky attic. It was stuffed full of books, test tubes and lumps of tangled wiring.

A small shaggy dog peered out at him from beneath a workbench. A cat lay sunning itself on the window sill.

?What kept you?? asked the professor. He was hunched over a heap of metal in one corner.

?I was admiring some of your inventions,? said Doohickey.

?Oh, those old things,? said the professor. ?This,? he said, pointing to the twisted heap of metal, ?is my latest and

greatest invention.?

?What is it?? asked Doohickey. It didn?t look very exciting. He expected that it was a machine for getting blood from

a stone. Or for making omelettes without breaking eggs.

? It?s the RoBoffin 2000 Multi

-

Purpose Robot,? said the professor, proudly.

?What does it do?? asked Doohickey.

?Absolutely anything!? said the professor. ?Let me show you.?

The professor scribbled some words on to a scrap of paper. He fed th

e paper through the slot in the robot?s chest.

Then he pressed a big button and stepped back.

The robot hummed and whirred for a bit. Then it climbed slowly to its feet. It was enormous. Its head almost scraped

the attic ceiling.

The lights on the ro

bot?s face flickered on and off. It looked as if it was thinking about something.

And then… it painted a picture of the professor?s dog.

It played a piece of music on the test tubes.

And it discovered three new ways of splitting the atom.

?Pretty good, eh?? said the professor, when the robot had finished.

?Cool!? said Doohickey. He was really amazed. The huge, heavy robot had whizzed around the attic, and it hadn?t

disturbed so much as a paper clip.

?It can do anything I asked it to,? said the p

rofessor.

?Anything?? asked the Doohickey.