Friday Barnes 2 (5 page)

When Friday finally ran out of excuses to avoid going to class, she was happy enough to go because it was third period, which meant English.

Mrs Cannon always encouraged them to spend the first twenty minutes of every lesson silently reading. She said this was to encourage the students' literacy, but really it was so she could have some peace and quiet to study the job ads. Mrs Cannon couldn't do this in the staffroom in case the head
of department caught her. But the children were much more understanding about her desire to get out of her career in education. In fact, sometimes she would interrupt their silent reading to ask the children's opinion.

‘Here's one,' Mrs Cannon said. ‘Chef wanted. Grilling skills essential. Must be available to work nights and weekends.'

‘But you have tango lessons on Thursday evenings,' said Melanie.

‘You're quite right,' agreed Mrs Cannon.

‘And you can't cook,' added Peterson.

‘No,' admitted Mrs Cannon. ‘But how hard can it be? It must be easier than being an English teacher.'

The children nodded. They would not like to have to teach themselves English either. Then they all went back to their quiet reading until another job would catch Mrs Cannon's eye.

‘How about this one, children?' Mrs Cannon would interrupt. ‘Nanny needed to work in Kuwait. Six days a week, room and board provided.'

‘But, Mrs Cannon,' called a boy, ‘you don't like children.'

‘True, very true,' agreed Mrs Cannon.

‘And you don't like sweating,' added another girl. Mrs Cannon was a large woman. ‘Kuwait is a very hot country. A job like that would be sure to involve sweating.'

‘Good point,' agreed Mrs Cannon.

This is how the lesson would continue until the last ten minutes when someone would point out that they didn't have long to go. Then Mrs Cannon would reluctantly put down her paper and launch into a literary discussion, which would always end up with her concluding that the author they were discussing, be it Jane Austen, Charles Dickens or Arundhati Roy, was extremely lazy for not including more gunfights, explosions and murder mysteries in their stories. And it was entirely the author's fault if students could not get through the first fifty pages of their books without falling asleep.

On this particular morning Friday arrived when the job adverts were unusually lacklustre, so Mrs Cannon was getting the class to help her with the crossword puzzle instead.

‘What's an eight-letter word for the fourth stomach of a cow?' asked Mrs Cannon.

‘Abomasum,' said Friday as she walked in through the door.

‘Well done,' said Mrs Cannon, filling in the squares. ‘You're not late because you've done something dreadful I have to punish you for, are you?'

‘No, Mrs Cannon,' said Friday. ‘I was helping the Headmaster.'

‘Very well,' said Mrs Cannon. ‘As long as I don't have to fill in any slips, or report you to anyone. It was so much easier back in the day when you could just cane a child and get on with your lesson plan. These days everything involves filling in paperwork.'

‘Did you really cane students back in the olden days?' asked a boy.

‘No,' admitted Mrs Cannon. ‘It seemed like such a lot of effort. For a start I'd have to stand up, and you know I dislike doing that. Then I'd have to catch them. And the wicked things children do always seem like exactly what I would do if I were in the same position, so my heart was never in it.'

Friday made her way to the back of the class. Melanie was sitting in her usual seat next to the window, staring out. Friday sat down beside her. The desks were arranged in a horseshoe pattern, so
Friday had her back to the window. Looking across she could see Ian smiling his usual smug smile, but then it transformed into a glare. It was an unexpectedly hateful glare. Friday was baffled until she heard a tapping sound behind her.

She turned around to see Christopher standing outside the window, waving to her. Friday glanced across at Mrs Cannon, who was concentrating hard on her crossword, so Friday slid her chair back towards the window.

Christopher raised the sash.

‘Hello,' he whispered. ‘Hello,' whispered Friday. She wasn't used to making small talk with boys, so she paused here.

‘Friday,' said Mrs Cannon, ‘if you are going to talk to your friend, please hold a book in front of your face while you do it, in case the Vice Principal walks in.'

Friday dutifully took her copy of Proust out of her bag and opened it to the page she was on.

‘Proust? Very impressive,' said Christopher.

‘Oh, I'm not reading Proust,' said Friday. ‘I just cut the cover off my copy of
Swann's Way
and stuck it over a book on forensic psychology. I wouldn't want Mrs Cannon to get in trouble if I was caught reading non-fiction in her class.'

‘I heard that you were the smartest girl in school,' said Christopher. ‘I was wondering if you could help me. I've got to try to catch up with the academic standard here, particularly in geography. Would you be able to meet me some time to give me a few pointers?'

‘Keeping up with Mr  Maclean's class isn't very hard,' said Friday. ‘He barely knows anything about geography himself.'

‘He's asking you out on a date,' said Melanie, turning away from the window.

Friday looked at Melanie, then at Christopher and then back at Melanie. ‘Don't be ridiculous,' she said. ‘What makes you say that?'

‘What boy would want to catch up with academic work?' asked Melanie.

Friday looked at Christopher. He smiled at her. Friday felt alarmed by this unforseen situation.

‘I'll get back to you,' said Friday.

‘Okay,' said Christopher with a smile.

Friday slid the window shut. ‘Do you think there's something wrong with him?' she whispered.

‘There definitely is,' said Ian from the far side of the room. ‘He's a smarmy git for a start. All that fake smiling, it's enough to make you sick.'

‘I would have thought that for you, it would be like looking in the mirror,' said Friday.

‘Good one,' chuckled Melanie. ‘They do both like to smoulder, don't they? Although Christopher has more of a twinkly smoulder, whereas Ian's smoulder is more broody.'

‘I'm not broody,' argued Ian.

‘I meant in a nice way – broody like Byron,' said Melanie, ‘not broody like a chicken.'

‘He's coming!' hissed Peregrine, the boy whose turn it was to sit by the window and watch out for the Vice Principal.

Mrs Cannon got to her feet and started speaking loudly, ‘And so through his use of assonance, alliteration and bottom humour, Chaucer teaches us of the dangers of … oh, good morning, Vice Principal Dean.'

The Vice Principal was standing in the doorway, watching the children suspiciously as they dutifully wrote notes in their books. ‘Is everyone behaving themselves here?' he asked.

‘Oh yes,' said Mrs Cannon. ‘Such a wonderful class. Great lovers of literature.'

The Vice Principal scanned the room. Everything was as it should be. Which was, of course, suspicious.

‘I've got my eye on you, Barnes,' said the Vice Principal.

‘Me, sir?' said Friday.

‘Yes, you,' said the Vice Principal. ‘Just because the police didn't have enough evidence, does not make you innocent in my eyes.'

‘You don't believe in the fundamental tenant of our judicial system – the presumption of innocence?' asked Friday.

‘Of course not!' said the Vice Principal. ‘This is an elite private school. Brutal arbitrary punishment is our tradition. That's the way it was in my day. And no-one was getting arrested for terrorism back then.'

‘Sir, since you're here and it is our English class you're interrupting,' said Friday, ‘could I ask you a literary question?'

‘Me?' asked the Vice Principal. ‘But I'm a maths teacher.'

‘Naturally,' said Friday. ‘Vice principals usually are. But I thought you could share your unique insight into the author of
The Curse of the Pirate
King
, since you were here at school the same time as E.M. Dowell. Weren't you in the year below him?'

The Vice Principal went bright red. It was hard to tell whether it was from embarrassment or anger, but it was probably a combination of both. ‘I never had anything to do with that wastrel,' he said. ‘Jumped-up little upstart. I don't know why everyone makes such a fuss of him.'

‘Really? I thought he was a lovely boy,' said Mrs Cannon. ‘Such a nice smile. Whereas all I remember of you, Vice Principal, was that you were terrible at spelling.'

It was a slow and boring week. Friday and Melanie actually found themselves attending classes and doing homework. Friday was sitting in her dorm room, learning the effects of platypus venom for biology, when the door opened and Trea Babcock walked in.

‘I need your help,' said Trea.

Friday turned and glared at her roommate. ‘I thought you said you locked the door.'

‘Did I?' said Melanie. ‘I probably thought I did at the time. That's the problem with having Attention Surfeit Disorder – it's hard to distinguish between what you know, what you think you know and simply what you think, I think.' Melanie went back to gazing at the ceiling. This was her second favourite pastime after sleeping.

Friday tipped back her green pork-pie hat and looked at her new client. Trea Babcock was a slim brunette in third form. She was not terribly nice. She never would have spoken to Friday under normal circumstances. Friday was curious. ‘How can I help you?' she asked.

‘I loaned Jacinta, my roommate, my calculator and she won't give it back,' said Trea, clearly distressed.

‘It's just a calculator. Why don't you buy another one?' asked Friday.

‘I don't want to say,' said Trea. ‘I don't want to incriminate myself.'

‘I'm not the police or the Headmaster,' said Friday. ‘You can tell me.'

‘The calculator's a model that is unacceptable under the school's anti-technology rules,' said Trea. ‘It's wi-fi capable. I can use it to shop online.'

‘Your calculator can do online shopping?' asked Friday.

‘It's quite handy,' said Trea. ‘You can tally up the purchases as you shop.'

‘So why not buy another one?' asked Friday.

‘Duh,' said Trea, ‘because I'd have to get it smuggled in via the swamp. That's how I got the last one in.'

‘And how is that problematic?' asked Friday.

‘Pedro, our family gardener, refuses to paddle Daddy's dingy into the swamp again,' said Trea. ‘He fell overboard last time. Then made such a fuss because he couldn't swim.'

‘He could have drowned,' said Friday.

‘I suppose,' said Trea. ‘But Mirabella Peterson's maid was smuggling in her hair-curling tongs on that same night. She pulled him out and knew all about CPR so he was fine.'

‘So why won't Jacinta give your calculator back?' asked Friday.

‘She says she doesn't have it,' said Trea. ‘I lent it to her last Thursday because she was doing her calculus homework and her calculator's battery had gone flat. But today when I asked for it back, she was so busy
doing her art project she didn't even look up. She just said, “Sorry I don't have it.”'

‘Then what did you say?' asked Friday.

‘Nothing,' said Trea. ‘Jacinta put her earbuds back in and kept doing her sculpture. So I did what any roommate would do.'

‘And what's that?' asked Friday. She was self-aware enough to know she did not think like a normal roommate.

‘I rifled through her things when she left for ballet class,' said Trea. ‘But I couldn't find it anywhere.'

‘Hmm,' said Friday, ‘I see.' She turned to where Melanie was lying in a deeply relaxed meditative state on the bed. ‘Melanie, snap out of it. We need to go and investigate the scene of the crime.'

‘Okay,' said Melanie. This was her response to most things, even when they clearly weren't okay.

Friday gathered her notebook and Melanie gathered her thoughts as they got ready to leave.

‘So you agree it is a crime scene?' said Trea excitedly. She was looking forward to an opportunity to denounce her roommate. She had three months' worth of irritation built up about everything, from the way Jacinta left her dirty socks on the floor to
the way she snored like a chainsaw when she had a cold.

‘We'll see,' said Friday.

‘I know she's still got it because Bronwyn Hanley saw Jacinta with it at lunchtime yesterday. She was in the library doing homework.'

‘That can't be right,' said Melanie.

‘What do you mean?' asked Friday.

‘Jacinta was at hockey practice at lunchtime yesterday,' said Melanie. ‘I was sitting in the dining room, staring out the window. I could see her running.'

‘Melly Pelly, you have a mind like a sieve,' said Trea dismissively. ‘You must have confused her with someone else.'

‘No, I distinctly remember,' said Melanie. ‘Because she fell in a hole on the field, and went over on her ankle, giving it a nasty twist.'

‘There was a hole in the field?' asked Friday.

‘Yes, quite a large one,' said Melanie. ‘Her foot completely disappeared up to the shin. It reminded me of that game you play when you're little, where you don't want to stand on the cracks in the pavement or a lion will get you.'

‘I always thought it was a crocodile,' said Friday.

‘Definitely something large that will eat your leg,' agreed Melanie. ‘Which is why Jacinta's leg suddenly disappearing before my eyes made me think of it. They had to carry her off crying. It was very sad. But a good cautionary example of why you should never play sport.'

Several minutes later, when they arrived at Trea's room, Jacinta wasn't there.

‘That's good,' said Trea. ‘You'll be able to search her things.'

‘I have no intention of doing that,' said Friday. ‘It would be an invasion of Jacinta's privacy.'

‘But I'm her roommate,' said Trea. ‘She has no privacy from me.'

‘Hmm,' said Friday, who did not particularly like her client, ‘go and stand by the door next to Melanie and be silent. If you find yourself unable to not speak, watch Melanie, she will show you how to do it.'

Melanie smiled at Trea silently, which was very kind of her because she didn't like Trea either.

Friday looked about the room. There was no actual line marked on the floor or walls, but there may as well have been because there was a clear difference between the two halves. Trea's half was very neat and all her possessions were pretty: feathery pens, love-heart-covered diaries and a pink quilt set.

The other half of the room was more dishevelled. There seemed to be a large amount of stuff shoved into the small space. There were school books, papers, sports equipment, clothes and a half-eaten chocolate bar lying on the middle of the desk. There was also an eclectic collection of fiction. Lots of classic romance novels by Jane Austen and the Brontë sisters, as well as lots of action adventure stories by Lee Child and Jo Nesb
ø
. Jacinta's music collection included retro country classics by Dolly Parton and moody alternative rock by The Cure. On the wall were two large posters, one of the great ballerina Darcy Bussell and one of the great female hockey player Luciana Aymar. There was also a framed picture of a middle-aged couple. Both looked large, proud and stout.

‘They're Jacinta's parents,' said Trea. ‘They're huge in the building industry. They met on a building site. Her dad was a bricklayer and her mum was a quantity
surveyor. Can you believe it? They let anyone into this school these days. No offence.'

Friday went over to Jacinta's desk, took out a magnifying glass and closely observed each item without touching it. ‘What's this?' she asked, pointing to a long pink elasticated bandage snaking its way out of a desk drawer.

‘I don't know,' said Trea. ‘A bandage, I suppose. She did sprain her ankle playing hockey, although I'm sure Melanie has her times wrong.'

At that moment a girl in a pink leotard and tutu walked in. To be strictly accurate, it was more as if she floated. Her movements were so graceful.

‘This is Jacinta,' glowered Trea.

‘Hello,' said Jacinta, not picking up on the tension in the room, because she immediately started looking through her voluminous ballet bag. ‘Trea, I just realised I've still got this.' Jacinta pulled out a big black calculator.

‘I knew you had it all along!' exclaimed Trea.

‘No, she didn't,' said Friday, looking shrewdly at Jacinta.

‘What do you mean?' asked Trea.

‘Jacinta – if Jacinta is her real name – knows what I mean,' said Friday mysteriously.

Jacinta looked nervous. ‘No, I don't.'

Trea was not interested anymore. ‘Well, that doesn't matter now because I've got my calculator back.' She smiled at Friday. ‘So I don't have to pay you, do I?' The smile teetered over into smugness. Trea left, bouncing out the door.

‘You should have a call-out fee, like plumbers,' said Melanie. ‘To stop people needlessly interrupting our homework.'

‘You were napping,' said Friday.

‘Which is an even greater crime to interrupt,' said Melanie.

Friday turned back to Jacinta and stared at her as if she were as fascinating as a bloodstained murder weapon.

‘Why are you here?' asked Jacinta.

‘I solve mysteries,' said Friday. ‘I enjoy it.'

‘I've returned the calculator, if that was the problem,' said Jacinta, defensively.

‘The calculator barely counted as a problem,' said Friday. ‘There is something much more interesting going on here.'

‘I don't know what you are talking about,' said Jacinta.

‘There's no point lying to me,' said Friday. ‘I  always  proceed on the assumption that everyone is  lying all the time, which allows me to discount everything they say.'

‘I'm not lying about anything,' protested Jacinta.

‘Yes, yes,' said Friday as she walked along with her ear pressed to the wall, rapping the dry wall with her knuckle. ‘As I said, I'm not listening to you.' She went over to the door and looked about in the corridor. ‘Is that a janitor's cupboard next to your room?'

‘Yes,' said Jacinta cautiously.

Friday went down the corridor and tried the door to the cupboard. It didn't budge. Not even the handle turned. ‘Someone has put glue in this lock,' said Friday.

‘Perhaps it was the janitor so he could get out of cleaning the floors?' guessed Melanie.

Friday came back into Trea and Jacinta's room and looked about. She went over to the built-in wardrobe. ‘You don't mind if I open this, do you?' she asked.

‘Well, actually …' began Jacinta.

But it was too late. Friday had slid open the door and pushed aside the hanging clothes. Then she did
the most unexpected thing. She stepped into the built-in wardrobe and disappeared.

‘Goodness,' said Melanie, ‘you haven't got an entrance into Narnia in your wardrobe, have you? I  was most disappointed when I was told that those books were fiction, so if it is in fact real I will be very pleased.'

Just then Friday stepped back out, but this time she was joined by another girl who looked exactly like Jacinta. The same height, the same hair colour, the same eye colour and the same petulant frown.

‘What's going on?' asked Melanie. ‘Is your ward robe a cloning machine? That's even more amazing than a doorway to Narnia.'

‘This is not a clone,' said Friday. ‘This is Jacinta's identical twin sister.'

‘Twins!' exclaimed Melanie. ‘Okay, I can see that is slightly more plausible than Narnia or a cloning machine. But it still does seem very strange.'

‘Which one of you is the real Jacinta?' asked Friday.

‘I am,' said the girl from the wardrobe.

‘I'm Abigail,' said the girl who they had previously thought was Jacinta.

‘So you're both here,' said Friday. ‘But you take it in turns going to classes and sleeping out here in the proper bed.'

‘Yes,' agreed the twins.

‘Why?' asked Friday.

‘Yes,' said Melanie. ‘Usually I'm not a curious person, but even I was thinking that.'

‘For the money,' explained Jacinta.

‘We figured out how to hack into our father's bank account and divert the payment for one of our school fees to our own bank account in the Cayman Islands,' explained Abigail. ‘That way only one of us would be enrolled. But Daddy would be paying for two.'

‘And also so we could ditch the boring classes,' added Jacinta.

‘Yes,' agreed Abigail. ‘I prefer science whereas Jacinta likes English and history. This way we just go to the classes we like.'

‘Who goes to maths class?' asked Friday

‘Yuck!' said both girls. ‘Neither of us like that. So we take turns.'

‘Wow, you only attend half the classes each,' said Melanie. ‘I think these girls might be even more brilliant than you, Friday.'

‘What are you going to do with us?' asked Jacinta.

‘Are you going to report us to the Headmaster?' asked Abigail.

‘Of course not,' continued Friday. ‘You've worked out a brilliant scheme. When I was trying to avoid applying to high school, I wish I'd thought up something as clever as this.'

The girls started to smile. ‘How did you figure us out?' asked Jacinta. ‘Surely it was more than just the calculator.'