DAN’S

Stars

Of

Diminished

Stature!

The dwarfs looked at the van. Dan looked at the dwarfs. Dan and the dwarfs looked at the van. Dan’s eyesight wasn’t very good, and things might have gone on like that until night fell had Angry not said, “So, nothing strikes you as odd about the van?”

“No,” said Dan.

“Nothing at all?”

“Maybe the letters aren’t big enough. Is that it?”

“No, no, the letters are more than big enough. Too big, some might say. It’s more how they read that bothers me, so to speak.”

Dan looked again. He spelled out the words, moving his lips. He took a step back. He squinted.

He saw it.

“Oh,” he said.

“Yes, oh,” said Angry. “In fact, not just ‘Oh,’ but ‘Ess, Oh, Dee, Ess’. The side of our van reads ‘Dan’s SODS’!”

“That’s not good,” said Dan.

Definitely accurate, he thought, but not good.

• • •

The dwarfs and Dan sat in Dan’s office. They did not present a happy picture. The van was just the latest in a series of disasters. They had caused a major gas explosion, and they now owned a van that described them as sods.

Oh, and they had recently been dragged to Hell for a time. Let’s not forget that.

But their main problem at the moment was that, while they owned a talent agency, it didn’t have any real talent to promote.

“What about Wesley the Amazing Tightrope Walker?” said Dan. “We have him. He’s a genius! He can walk along a length of spiderweb without falling off.”

“He’s afraid of heights,” said Dozy. “It’s hard to get excited about a man who can only walk a tightrope that’s six inches off the ground. Even then he looks a bit nervous.”

“Jimmy the Juggler?” suggested Dan. “You’ve got to admit that the man can juggle.”

“He can juggle,” said Jolly. “He has a gift. He’d be better if he had two arms, though. Strictly speaking, he doesn’t juggle: he tosses.”

“Bobo the Clown?”

“He gets angry with children. It’s one thing throwing a bucket of confetti over them, but he’s not supposed to throw the bucket as well.”

“And then there’s, well, them,” said Dan.

“Them!” said Jolly, shaking his head.

“Them!” said Angry, casting his eyes to heaven.

“Them!” said Dozy, putting his head in his hands.

“Arble!” said Mumbles.

Which said it all, really.

• • •

They followed Dan down a steep set of stairs to the basement and walked along a hallway to a large padlocked door. Dan fumbled in his pocket for the key.

“Do you really need to keep them locked up?” asked Jolly.

“It’s for their own good,” said Dan. “They wander off if I don’t.”

“They were never very intelligent,” said Angry. “It’s a wonder they lasted as long as they did.”

“It’s sad, really,” said Dan. “You know, they wouldn’t survive a day in the wild.”

He placed the key in the lock and turned it.