How to Survive Summer Camp (10 page)

‘I’ve just about had enough of you, Stella Stebbings,’ she said wearily. ‘I don’t think it’s very funny. I don’t think the

Emeralds are going to find it very funny either when I take away yet another team point.’

‘That’s not fair,’ said Louise furiously. ‘Why should we keep losing team points just because Stella’s so stupid? Why can’t you just punish her? Make her do extra swimming or something, she hates that.’

‘Perhaps that’s a good idea, Louise,’ said Miss Hamer-Cotton.

‘But I do extra swimming already! You can’t make me do any more!’ I said, horrified.

‘Oh yes I can,’ said Miss Hamer-Cotton. ‘You can miss Art
altogether and do two swimming sessions a day until you can learn to behave yourself.’

Louise and Karen were grinning all over their faces. I couldn’t bear it.

‘I won’t! You can’t make me! You’re not even in charge. I want to see the Brigadier,’ I shouted.

‘All right then,’ said Miss Hamer-Cotton. ‘You come with me. You shall see the Brigadier.’

I
 was really scared. I’d only seen glimpses of the Brigadier so far, but that was enough. He was very tall and his hair was very short and he looked as if he could be very strict indeed. He’d shouted at some boys because they ran through a flower bed and he certainly sounded strict too.

‘I didn’t really mean it,’ I said, when we were out in the corridor.

But Miss Hamer-Cotton was still pink as a prawn with temper.

‘
I
meant it,’ she said. ‘Come on.’

She took hold of me and ushered me along the corridor.

‘I don’t want to be a nuisance and bother the Brigadier,’ I said.

‘You can’t seem to help being a nuisance, Stella. But perhaps father will be able to knock some sense into you.’

Knock some sense! Goodness, what was he going to do to me? I pictured the Brigadier in boxing gloves, pummelling me. No, he wouldn’t really hit me. It wouldn’t be allowed. But how could I stop him if he tried?

I wanted Mum. I even wanted Uncle Bill. I was in such a
state that when Miss Hamer-Cotton marched me down the forbidden right-hand corridor towards the tower I began to think she might really lock me up.

‘I’m sorry,’ I said. ‘I’m really sorry.’

‘So you should be,’ said Miss Hamer-Cotton grimly.

‘Can we go back now?’

‘No. You asked to see the Brigadier and see him you shall.’

Miss Hamer-Cotton opened a heavy wooden door marked Private at the end of the corridor. She pulled me through it and up a narrow flight of winding stairs. We were in the tower.

I wondered about trying to make a run for it. Princess Stellarina would have done. But I didn’t really know where to run to. I was trapped in the tower with Hag Hateful-Catty and any minute now I was going to be in the power of the dreaded Brigavampire himself.

Miss Hamer-Cotton paused at the top of the stairs and knocked at another big wooden door. She waited. I held my breath. She knocked again.

‘Are you there, father?’

I shut my eyes and made the biggest wish in the world that he wasn’t. But it was no use. I heard a terrifying rumble from behind the door.

Miss Hamer-Cotton opened it.

‘Stella Stebbings would like a word with you,’ she said, and she pushed me into the room.

It was a weird round dark room, rather like an old junk
shop, crammed with all sorts of books and bits. There were lots of things I’d have liked to look at properly but I was too frightened of the Brigadier to do anything but stand and stare at him. He stared back at me. He was sitting behind a big old desk, drumming his fingers on a leather blotting pad.

‘Well?’ he said.

I trod on the rubbery ends of my trainers and said nothing.

‘I believe you want to say something?’ he said.

‘Not really,’ I whispered.

‘Then why did you come to see me?’

‘Miss Hamer-Cotton sort of made me,’ I mumbled.

‘Aha. I gather you’re in some sort of trouble?’

‘Well. Mmm. Actually, yes.’

‘Would you care to elucidate?’

I wasn’t very sure what that meant, but I knew I didn’t really want to do it anyway, so I shook my head.

‘Which team are you in, Miss Stebbings?’

No one had ever called me Miss Stebbings before. It sounded most peculiar.

‘Emerald.’

‘Oh dear. I believe the Emeralds are flagging rather badly at the moment. They’re bottom, aren’t they?’

‘Mmm.’

‘Well, if you keep getting into trouble then you’ll lose a team point and the Emeralds will flag even more.’

I shifted about uncomfortably. His eyes narrowed.

‘Have you lost a team point already, Miss Stebbings?’

I nodded.

‘More than one?’

I nodded again.

‘A recalcitrant offender,’ said the Brigadier.

I didn’t know what that meant either.

‘So what are we going to do with you, hmm?’

There was a long pause.

‘Don’t you like it here?’ he said.

‘No.’ I said it before I could stop myself.

The Brigadier looked a bit taken aback.

‘No? Yet you wanted to come here, didn’t you?’

‘No. Mum made me. Because she’s having a honeymoon with Uncle Bill.’

‘Oh. I see.’

There was another pause. The Brigadier didn’t look as if he knew what to say next. He started fiddling with the bits on his desk. There were some toy soldiers and a jar of pens and a brass paper knife and some old
National
Geographic
magazines and lots of letters and a big photograph in a silver frame. It was of a very pretty lady. It certainly wasn’t Miss Hamer-Cotton.

‘Can’t you make the best of things now you’re here, Miss Stebbings?’

‘Mmm. Only … only it’s not fair.’

‘What isn’t?’

‘Swimming.’ Now I was started I couldn’t stop. ‘She makes me go swimming every single day even though I hate it, and
none of the others have to do it that much, she’s just picking on me and now she says I’ve got to do two rotten swimming sessions each day and it’s no
use
, I can’t swim, and I won’t ever be able to swim and Mum promised I wouldn’t have to, she wrote you a letter and—’

He lifted one long finger in the air and I managed to stop. I couldn’t quite believe I’d said it all. The little room still seemed full of the sound of my voice.

‘A letter, you say?’

‘Mmm, from my mother. And Mum had a word with her too, and she said—’

The finger went up again.

‘I take it you are referring to Miss Hamer-Cotton when you keep using the female pronoun?’

I guessed the female pronoun meant ‘she’. I knew grown-ups thought it rude to say ‘she’ although I’d never worked out why. I nodded and was about to start again but his finger went to his lips.

‘Let me find this letter first.’ He searched his desk and eventually found it beneath his blotter. I edged away while he was looking for it. I peered at the books on the shelves nearest me. They looked very boring, all about War and History and Geography.

‘Here we are. One letter. And yes, your mother does mention the fact that you are worried about swimming. Hmm.’ He moved a toy soldier around on his desk, almost as if he was taking him for a little walk.

‘So please, Mr Brigadier, do I have to go on having swimming lessons?’ I asked. I wanted to sound extra polite to try to get round him, but I knew by the expression on his face that I’d said something else wrong.

‘Don’t you want to learn to swim?’

I shook my head vigorously.

‘Supposing you fall in a river or a pond or whatever? Wouldn’t swimming prove to be a useful accomplishment?’

‘I’d sooner steer clear of all rivers and ponds.’

I wasn’t trying to be funny but he actually laughed. I cheered up because I thought he might be on my side now, but then he spoilt it all.

‘I think it would be a good idea if you kept up the swimming sessions all the same. One a day. Perhaps two might prove a bit too much—for Uncle Ron, if not for you.’

‘It’s not fair,’ I mumbled.

‘Life isn’t fair, Miss Stebbings,’ he said in that infuriating grown-up way.

But then he looked at his photograph.

‘Life isn’t fair,’ he repeated sadly.

I wondered if the lady was his wife. I guessed she was dead now. I went all hot and embarrassed, terrified that he might start talking about her or crying or something. I leaned against the books, trying to think of something to say.

‘Hey, watch those spines!’ he said in a very different sort of voice.

‘Oh. Sorry.’ I stopped lounging.

‘One should always treat books with respect,’ he said, still stern.

‘I know,’ I said. ‘I’ve got a book like that. An antiquarian book. It’s called
Fifty
Favourite
Fairy
Tales
, my mother bought it for me and it’s got masses of colour plates and—’ And I remembered what had happened to it.

‘And?’ said the Brigadier.

I looked down at my feet.

‘Nothing,’ I mumbled.

‘Fairy stories, eh?’

‘Mmm,’ I said, wishing I’d kept my mouth shut. What was I going to do if he asked to see it?

‘Were there any Fairy Godfathers in this fairy story book of yours?’ he asked.

I stared at him.

‘Not that I can think of. Fairy Godmothers. But you don’t get godfathers, not fairy ones.’

‘Don’t you?’ said the Brigadier. He opened a drawer of his desk and took out a book. An old blue leather book. I looked at the gold lettering.
Fifty
Favourite
Fairy
Tales
. My book! But it wasn’t ripped to pieces. The binding was perfect. It was as good as new.

The Brigadier held it out to me, smiling. I took the book, my hands trembling.

‘Is it mine? But it can’t be. It’s not torn any more. How did it happen?’

‘Magic?’

I wasn’t that daft. I looked very carefully at the spine. The leather was the same colour as the front and the back but it was softer and more supple and when I peered right up close I could see tiny join lines where someone had patiently matched the torn old leather with the new.

‘You mended it for me,’ I said.

‘Mrs Markham brought it straight to me.’ (Orange Overall/Purple Pinafore/Dotty Dress). ‘She told me the awful facts of the case and I decided to help as best I could.’

‘These awful facts,’ I said worriedly. ‘Does she know who spoilt my book?’

The Brigadier made an arch of his fingers and rested his chin on it.

‘I wouldn’t enquire further, if I were you. Just be thankful that the book is very nearly back to rights.’

‘Oh I am thankful. I’m ever so thankful,’ I said, beaming at him.

‘So how about doing something for me in return?’ said the Brigadier.

I looked at him.

‘Those swimming lessons,’ I said dolefully.

‘That’s my girl.’

I sighed.

‘Cheer up. It’s not as bad as all that. And there are all the other activities too.’

I wrinkled my nose. I didn’t mean him to see, but his eyes were too sharp.

‘Don’t you think much of them either?’

‘I don’t like judo. Or macramé.’

‘What
do
you like?’

There was another pause.

‘I like making up stories,’ I eventually decided.