A Thousand Water Bombs (12 page)

‘What’s your idea then . . .
boss
?’ Fifty was getting his own back.

Bee sighed. ‘We could get Flo to do it for us.’

‘Right,’ I said. ‘Flo, who never stops talking, likes pink and babies, is going to conduct police interviews with the (twenty-six kids take away the fifteen we’ve already
grilled) eleven kids we didn’t get round to? Don’t think so,’ I said. ‘She’d ask the questions
and
answer them.’

‘She’d make them swear on her dolly’s life,’ said some sound waves from somewhere near the telly. Copper Pie was watching football
and
listening to Tribe. I
don’t think any of us thought he was that clever.

‘I don’t think finding the thief is going to be that easy,’ said Jonno. ‘We should concentrate on trying to find the medals.’

‘Same,’ said Fifty.

‘But how?’ I asked.

‘Old-fashioned detective work,’ said Fifty. ‘Also known as searching thoroughly. I mean, do you really think the Year 3s looked properly? We could take sticks to poke down the
radiators, and a feather duster to swish out anything under the cupboards and on the high-up shelves.’

Copper Pie turned round, all the way this time, and said, ‘Waste of time. They’re probably in the bin,’ before turning back to the football.

Bee had had enough. She marched over to the telly and turned it off. ‘Last time I looked you were a Triber, like us. How about helping rather than shouting out rubbish, in between watching
mindless morons try and put a ball in a net so big even
I
could score?’

WOW! I wasn’t sure how Copper Pie was going to react. She’d insulted him, and worse, his great love – footie.

‘OK,’ said Copper Pie, standing up and looking down at Bee’s ponytail. ‘I can see you need help.’ (Ha ha.) ‘Let’s spread a rumour that we’re gonna
uncover the thief in the playground at lunch.’

‘And . . .?’

‘And, if it was me, I’d come and confess and beg you not to tell the whole school as long as I give back the medals.’

‘Top idea,’ said Jonno. ‘Football’s obviously good brain juice.’

I was stunned. Since when did my old friend, Tribe’s trusty thug, have ideas like that?

Copper Pie gave Bee a wide smile. She wanted to be miffed, I think, but she couldn’t help grinning back. ‘I like it,’ she said.

‘So how do we spread the rumour?’ said Fifty.

‘That’s easy,’ I said. ‘We tell Flo.’

‘Tell her what?’ said Fifty.

‘Tell her that we’ve found out who stole the medals and we’re going to announce it at lunch. She’ll be full of it. How Tribe discovered —’

‘So we lie to Flo?’ said Bee.

‘Well, we can’t tell her the truth – that it’s all a hoax. She’d let it slip. She has to believe it’s true if we expect her to blab to everyone.’ I
didn’t mind lying to Flo. It was in a good cause, after all.

Bee looked at each of us, checking. ‘OK.’ She shrugged. ‘It’s a plan. We tell Flo it’s all solved and we’re identifying the culprit at lunchtime.’ She
slapped her hand down and we did a Tribe handshake.

‘Flo’ll be really excited that we’ve solved the crime,’ said Fifty. ‘She was so upset about it, wasn’t she, Keener?’

I nodded, despite the fact that we hadn’t
actually
solved the crime yet. Fifty seemed to have forgotten that.

‘Will
you
tell Flo?’ said Bee.

I had a quick think. If I told Flo that we knew who had stolen the medals she would go on and on and on at me until I broke, like a tortured prisoner of war, and told her everything.

‘Why don’t you?’ I said.

‘Fine,’ said Bee. ‘I’ll tell her before the register.’

‘Sorted,’ said Jonno. He walked towards the door. ‘It’s probably time you were off.’ We’d only been at his for about twenty minutes! I hadn’t played on
his computer. We hadn’t had a snack. We hadn’t done anything. I looked at him. He looked kind of weird. ‘I’ll ask Mum if you can come another time. She doesn’t really
like having a lot of kids in the house when she’s studying.’

It was the first time I’d ever felt sorry for Jonno. Usually I want to
be
him.

The four of us trudged down the stairs. Jonno came to the door with us.

‘Are your friends leaving?’ came his mum’s voice from the kitchen.

‘Yes,’ shouted Jonno.

His mum came into the hall. ‘Bye, everyone.’ She smiled. I didn’t smile back. Jonno’s mum was a bit of a mystery herself. All nice on the outside, but . . .

‘See you tomorrow,’ I said to Jonno, and I made a fist. We banged knuckles in a fist of friendship. He shut the door and we headed up the road.

‘What was that all about?’ said Fifty.

‘If I didn’t know Jonno better, I’d say he was scared of his mum,’ said Bee.

‘No, that’s me,’ said Copper Pie. ‘My mum’s the scary one.’

‘Your mum’s not scary. She just shouts a lot,’ I said.

‘Same,’ said Fifty. ‘It’s my mum who’s the scary one. Always trying to have cosy chats so she
understands
me. I don’t want to be
understood
. I
want to be fed sugar.’

‘A t least your mum doesn’t cry,’ said Bee. ‘That’s scary.’

Seemed like I was the only one with a normal (ish) mum. I decided I’d better join in anyway. ‘What’s scary,’ I said, ‘is having a mum who sends you to school dosed
up on a deadly combination of pink, white and yellow medicine and wrapped in a vest, even though you’re only a whisper away from falling into a coma.’ I liked the way they all shut up
and listened. ‘A mum who thinks nothing of sending you out in all weathers with a throat that makes swallowing as painful as eating a . . . hedgehog.’ (Wished I’d picked a better
scratchy thing.)

‘Does she really make you wear a vest?’ said Fifty. I didn’t answer. I didn’t need to. They laughed all the way to where I turn off. I wished I’d shut up.

a friday feeling

‘What are you going to do next, Keener?’ said Flo at breakfast on Friday morning.

‘Nothing,’ I said.

‘But you promised to help.’

‘We tried,’ I said. ‘But the Head won’t let us carry on with the interrogations, so that’s it.’

‘Can’t you do something else?’ she said.

‘Nope.’ I wasn’t going to mention anything about the hoax planned for lunchtime. That was Bee’s job.

‘Can’t you look for the medals at school? They might be behind the radiator, or by the coats.’

‘They’re not likely to be though are they?’ I said. She’s quite thick, my sister. People think she’s bright but they’ve got her wrong. ‘Who would steal
something from your classroom and then hide it near where they took it from?’

‘Please,’ she said.

I was getting fed up with the medals business. ‘Why do you care about Jack’s medals if you don’t like him?’

Flo, the sister who always has something to say, the sister who is little but has a big mouth, said nothing. Her mouth made a few shapes that suggested something might come out, but no sound
followed. I had a revolting thought.
Maybe she’s in love with Jack. Maybe she wants to find the medals so she can give them back to him.

‘I never said I don’t like him,’ said Flo and burst into tears, which brought Mum. I got a version of the usual being-kind-to-your-sister lecture. Blah blah. It made no
difference to me. I am me. Flo is Flo. We will never be friends. I couldn’t remember why I’d tried to help her in the first place. I grabbed my bag and left.

Fifty and I caught up with Copper Pie, who was kicking a stone to school.

‘You’re early,’ he said. He’s usually first.

‘Keener had to escape from the evil eye of his evil sister,’ said Fifty.

‘You wait,’ I said. ‘One day soon Probably Rose will turn round and say she hates you.’ As soon as I’d said it I knew it was a mistake. Fifty’s face lost all
its bones and went all soggy. I wished I could take it back.

‘But she won’t mean it, because she’s really . . . great.’ I was going to say nice or kind but they didn’t sound good enough. Anyway, it worked, because Fifty gave
me a I’m-so-glad-you-like-her-too look (and Copper Pie gave me a sideways you’re-a-weirdo look) and we carried on to school.

Jonno was talking to Bee on our patch. They stopped when we got there.

Copper Pie clapped his hands together. ‘All set to catch the thief?’

‘We just need Flo,’ said Bee. (She doesn’t get to school until about half-past eight.) While we waited, Fifty, Copper Pie and I peeled the bark off our tree and compared
shapes. If you’re careful you can get great big bits. I managed to get Italy (a long boot) and a duck. Fifty cheated and made an F. Copper Pie made a shotgun and pretended to shoot me.
Remind me, why is he my friend?

‘Can’t you stop doing that?’ said Jonno. ‘Loads of creatures live under the bark.’

It’s no fun having your own Tribe entomologist.

‘She’s here anyway,’ said Fifty, pointing at my sister.

‘Off I go then.’ Bee flicked her black fringe out of the way – it falls straight back over her eyes but at least she gets to see for a second.

We watched Bee walk across the playground, avoid being hit by an out-of-control diabolo and miss a stray netball chucked by a Year 5 (who
must
need glasses) doing goal practice. Bee
tapped Flo on the shoulder and she swivelled round. I couldn’t hear what was said but I knew as soon as Bee left she’d be off, spreading the news.

Bee didn’t come straight back. She went over and spoke to Ed and Lily. I watched Flo to see how quickly she’d work her way round the Year 3s. Except she didn’t move. She stayed
where she was.

A funny feeling started growing inside. A sort of have-we-done-it-all-wrong-again? feeling. I don’t know why, because either the thief would confess, or he wouldn’t. What could be
simpler? I tried to push the worry away and replace it with one of Dad’s ‘Friday feelings’. Fridays are great because the weekend starts, and Dad comes home early. He says that
all day he has a holiday feeling. A holiday feeling sounded good to me.

‘Did she believe you? asked Jonno, when Bee finally made it back, thirty seconds before the bell.

‘I think so. But she didn’t look too happy about it. She said it would be kinder if we whispered in the robber’s ear. She said it was mean to tell the whole school.’

She’s right,
I thought.

‘What did you say to that, Bee?’ I asked.

‘I couldn’t agree, could I? So I said we were doing it because the thief needed to learn a lesson.’

The have-we-done-it-all-wrong-again? feeling rose up again, smothering the Friday feeling. It was going to go wrong. I just knew it.

the rest of friday

This is what happened.

All through break I waited for some Year 3 to come up, all tearful, maybe with a friend, and confess to the crime. All through lunch I kept scanning the hall to spot the kid, red-eyed and head
bent over, coming to find us – Tribe, the rooters-out of evil. But no one came. No one even looked a bit dodgy. In fact the only dodgy-looking people were the Tribers, who were all on high
alert waiting for the medal-nicker. Afternoon break followed the same pattern. Except that Flo came over to our area.

‘Have you done it?’ she said. ‘Have you said who’s the thief?’

I looked at Bee. It was her lie. So she needed to sort it out.

‘No, Flo. We . . . we might have made a mistake.’

She’d put all her faith in Tribe, but we’d failed. I knew she’d be disappointed.
Please don’t start sobbing again,
I thought.

But all she said was, ‘Oh.’

‘Sorry, Flo,’ said Fifty. ‘But we’ll keep trying, won’t we?’

Jonno nodded. His woolly hair bobbed up and down. I looked at the floor. The medals were turning into a pain in the neck. We were never going to get to the bottom of it.

a change of venue

It’s not a rule or anything but lately we’ve started meeting at the Tribehouse on Saturday afternoons as well as Wednesdays. When I arrived, Jonno was there
already.

‘Hi.’

‘Hi.’

The Tribe flap flapped and Bee arrived. Copper Pie came next.

‘Mum gave me some biscuits.’ He plonked them on the safe.

‘Why?’ said Bee.

‘Because the nursery kids didn’t like them.’

‘They must be bad then,’ said Bee. ‘I’ll pass.’

‘Suit yourself.’ Copper Pie took one – it was a biscuit sandwich with a layer of chocolate in the middle. I took one too.

‘Lush. How could anyone not like these?’ I said, reaching for a second.

‘Mum said that one of the children said it looked like nappy mess.’

I nearly gagged, but managed to tell my brain that I
was
eating chocolate spread, nothing worse.

Fifty shot in as though he’d been thrown out of a cannon. He’d smelt sugar, for sure.

‘Excellent,’ he said, eating one and holding a second ready for immediate digestion. He
loves
sweet things. Unfortunately his mum doesn’t
love him
having sweet
things. She says they’re mostly full of artificial sweeteners that will make today’s children really ill with lots of horrible diseases (whose names I can’t remember) when
they’re older.

‘Right,’ said Jonno. ‘Fist of friendship.’

We did the fist thing, a bit stickier than normal thanks to the biccies. I’d got the list I made on Wednesday with stuff for Tribe to do, and I was about to get it out but Jonno spoke
first. He’s done that to me so many times. I’m going to have to work out a way to get in before him or I’ll spend my life never saying what I want to.

‘I know we failed yesterday, but I feel like Tribe made a pledge to Flo to clear up the medal business. Surely we can think of something between us.’ He looked at us all in turn.

We couldn’t exactly say ‘no’ – it just wasn’t Tribish.

‘OK,’ I said. ‘But I haven’t got a clue what to do.’

‘All right,’ said Copper Pie.

‘Same,’ said Fifty.

Bee made an I’ll-go-along-with-the-rest-of-you face.

‘Come on then.’ Jonno headed out of the door.

Where’s he going?
I thought.

‘Where’s he going?’ said Copper Pie.

‘Search me,’ said Fifty.