James and the Giant Peach by Roald Dahl

look.
    In the distance and directly ahead of them, they now saw a most extraordinary sight. It was a kind of arch, a colossal curvy-shaped thing that reached high up into the sky and came down again at both ends. The ends were resting upon a huge flat cloud that was as big as a desert.
    ‘Now what in the world is that?’ asked James.
    ‘It’s a bridge!’
    ‘It’s an enormous hoop cut in half!’
    ‘It’s a giant horseshoe standing upside down!’
    ‘Stop me if I‘m wrong,’ murmured the Centipede, going white in the face, ‘but might those not be Cloud-Men climbing all over it?’
    There was a dreadful silence. The peach floated closer and closer.
    ‘They
are
Cloud-Men!’
    ‘There are hundreds of them!’
    ‘Thousands!’
    ‘Millions!’
    ‘I don’t want to hear about it!’ shrieked the poorblind Earthworm. ‘I’d rather be on the end of a fish hook and used as bait than come up against those terrible creatures again!’
    ‘I’d rather be fried alive and eaten by a Mexican!’ wailed the Old-Green-Grasshopper.
    ‘Please keep quiet,’ whispered James. ‘It’s our only hope.’
    They crouched very still on top of the peach, staring at the Cloud-Men. The whole surface of the cloud was literally
swarming
with them, and there were hundreds more up above climbing about on that monstrous crazy arch.
    ‘But what is that thing?’ whispered the Ladybird. ‘And what are they
doing
to it?’
    ‘I don’t care what they’re doing to it!’ the Centipede said, scuttling over to the tunnel entrance. ‘I‘m not staying up here! Good-bye!’
    But the rest of them were too frightened or too hypnotized by the whole affair to make a move.
    ‘Do you know what?’ James whispered.
    ‘What?’
they said.
‘What?’
    ‘That enormous arch – they seem to be
painting
it! They‘ve got pots of paint and big brushes! You look!’
    And he was quite right. The travellers were close enough now to see that this was exactly what the Cloud-Men were doing. They all had huge brushes in their hands and they were splashing the paint on to the great curvy arch in a frenzy of speed, so fast, in fact, that in a few minutes the whole of the arch became covered with the most glorious colours – reds,blues, greens, yellows, and purples.
    ‘It’s a rainbow!’ everyone said at once. ‘They are making a rainbow!’
    ‘Oh, isn’t it beautiful!’
    ‘Just look at those colours!’
    ‘Centipede!’ they shouted. ‘You
must
come up and see this!’ They were so enthralled by the beauty and brilliance of the rainbow that they forgot to keep their voices low any longer. The Centipede poked his head cautiously out of the tunnel entrance.
    ‘Well, well, well,’ he said. ‘I‘ve
always
wondered how those things were made. But why all the ropes? What are they doing with those ropes?’
    ‘Good heavens, they are pushing it off the cloud!’ cried James. ‘There it goes! They are lowering it down to the earth with ropes!’
    ‘And I’ll tell you something else,’ the Centipede said sharply. ‘If I‘m not greatly mistaken, we ourselves are going to bump right into it!’
    ‘Bless my soul, he’s right!’ the Old-Green-Grasshopper exclaimed.
    The rainbow was now dangling in the air below the cloud. The peach was also just below the level of the cloud, and it was heading directly towards the rainbow, travelling rather fast.
    ‘We are lost!’ Miss Spider cried, wringing her feet again. ‘The end has come!’
    ‘I can’t stand it!’ wailed the Earthworm. ‘Tell me what’s happening!’
    ‘We’re going to miss it!’ shouted the Ladybird.
    ‘No, we’re not!’
    ‘Yes, we are!’
    ‘Yes! – Yes! – No! – Oh, my heavens!’
    ‘Hold on, everybody!’ James called out, and suddenly there was a tremendous thud as the peach went crashing into the top of the rainbow. Thiswas followed by an awful splintering noise as the enormous rainbow snapped right across the middle and became two separate pieces.

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