Large quantities of books were simply stacked along the walls—obviously Henry didn’t think much of bookshelves. There was a guitar leaning against one of the stacks. A basketball hoop hung above the bed, and the ball that went with it was lying on the rug, a soft version of the British flag. Textbooks and paper covered with Henry’s handwriting towered up on the desk, and the music box I’d given him for Christmas stood there as well. He didn’t have any pictures hung on the walls, only an enormous bulletin board over the desk with notes, postcards, and photos on it. Including one of me and Henry at the last Autumn Ball. I stood up to take a closer look.
“There are clean sheets on the bed,” said Henry, reaching for my hand to pull me down on his lap.
My knees instantly went weak. Was this the time and the place to show Secrecy, Mom, and anyone else interested (me included) that they were wrong about my being sexually backward? Admittedly it was a great temptation, particularly as Henry’s smile had never been more seductive, but then I remembered those lucky cats that my unconscious had brought raining down just now. Suppose that bombardment was only the beginning? Who knew what else my unconscious would do to make me talk to Henry and clear up a few important points? I pushed him away from me and tried not to let the glint in his eyes distract me.
“Henry, I don’t want to know what your room looks like, or that your sheets have been changed,” I began. “Or rather—well, yes, but then it ought to be your real bed.… Anyway, it ought to be real if we…” No, I wasn’t getting anywhere this way. I stepped back and took a deep breath. “Why have I never been in your room for real? How come Grayson and Emily know about problems you’ve never mentioned to me? Why don’t I know all those people in your photos when I’m awake?”
Henry sighed. “But you’re here now.”
“That’s not the same!”
“Yes, it is,” said Henry. A pair of basketball shoes fell on the rug out of nowhere, and there was a rain of socks, six in all, distributed picturesquely around the room. A pot with a dried-up houseplant in it appeared on the windowsill. “It’s absolutely the same now.”
“No, it isn’t,” I said firmly. “Because this is still a dream. My dream, to be precise. We never meet at your place—why not?”
“If that’s the trouble, we can go there now.” Henry pointed at the green door. “I’ll show you all the photos, and you can tell me what your problem with the beckoning cat is.”
“I’m talking about the real—”
I was interrupted by a scream. Someone shouted Henry’s name. And at the same moment he disappeared, taking his room with him.
I was left alone with my green door on an enormous Union Jack flag, staring frustrated at the void.
TITTLE-TATTLE BLOG
The Frognal Academy Tittle-Tattle Blog, with all the latest gossip, the best rumors, and the hottest scandals from our school.
ABOUT ME:
My name is Secrecy—I’m right here among you, and I know all your secrets.
7 January
Welcome back to the treadmill. So here we are: This is the first school day at the Frognal Academy minus Jasper Grant. And instead the kids at the Lycée Baudelaire in the little town of Beauvais, France, are meeting a new student today. According to my research, there’s nothing at all interesting in Beauvais (apart from the wine they make with grapes from those parts. And the bus to Paris). The school doesn’t even have a basketball team. So there won’t be anything for Jasper to do but study.
Only joking. This is Jasper Grant we’re talking about, let loose among French schoolgirls. You lucky girls in Beauvais, cheer up. Beauvais may be a dump in the usual way, but it’s going to be a load of fun from now on.
However, it’s not as if nothing was going on here at the moment—even without Jasper, I have one or two items of news for you. First: Ever since Mrs. Lawrence got back from Lanzarote, she’s been throwing up every morning. And she’s been seen buying folic acid supplements at the pharmacy—so let’s congratulate her on her pregnancy, and we can assume that Mrs. Lawrence will soon be Mrs. Vanhagen. Well, as soon as Mr. Vanhagen is divorced from the present Mrs. Vanhagen.
Secondly—and if you ask me, this is much more of a scandal—vandals chopped down the big box-tree peacock in Elms Walk last night. I’m sure many of you knew it. It even had a name, Mr. Snuggles. Dear old Mr. Snuggles stands—sorry, stood—in Grayson and Florence Spencer’s grandmother’s front garden, and he’d won several prizes for topiary. I’ll give you links below to a couple of articles about him in gardening magazines. Wasn’t he a magnificent sight? But now he’s only a sad little heap of leaves and twigs. Rest in peace, Mr. Snuggles. And may whoever did that to you burn in Hell.
Right, now I must run or I’ll be late for lessons. And no, I’m not telling you what my next lesson is! ☺
See you soon!
Secrecy
10
WHEN MIA AND I appeared in the kitchen at seven the next morning, still sleepy, all the others were there already, and they seemed to be in a state of great agitation. Ernest was on the phone in the dining room next door, talking frantically, and Florence was sitting at the table in tears. Mom was patting her shoulder.
“What’s happened?” I asked in alarm. Maybe a much-loved family member had died. Or a nuclear power plant had blown up? Even Grayson was looking kind of upset.
Lottie was squeezing grapefruit juice as she did every morning, but she, too, had cheeks red with emotion. “Guess what?” she said to us. “Someone chopped down a tree in Mrs. Spencer’s garden last night.”
I stared at her incredulously for a moment. Not a much-loved family member, then, not a nuclear power plant. My eyes went to Florence’s face, which was wet with tears. Was she really crying over Mr. Snuggles?
Unobtrusively, I slipped past Lottie and over to the coffee machine, put the biggest cup I could find under it, and pressed the cappuccino button. Twice.
“A tree? But why?” asked Mia with a perfectly judged mixture of curiosity and mild surprise.
“No one knows,” said Lottie. “But Mrs. Spencer has already called in Scotland Yard. It was a very valuable tree.”
I almost laughed out loud. Yes, sure. I bet they had a special gardening squad to investigate such cases. Scotland Front Yard. Good day, my name is Inspector Griffin and I’m looking into the murder of Mr. Snuggles.
“Why is Florence crying?”
“She’s crying because she loved the tree so much,” said Mom.
For goodness’ sake—it hadn’t even been a proper tree, more of a bush. A bush forced into an unnatural shape.
“It wasn’t just any old tree. I’ve known Mr. Snuggles since I was a little girl.” Florence sniffed. Her eyes were red with crying. “We practically grew up together.”
Mia and I exchanged a quick glance. Oh God. I needed coffee, and fast! Was the machine really going slower than usual today?
“It really was a beautiful … er … example of topiary,” said Mom, stroking Florence’s hair. “I really do wonder what kind of people would do a thing like that.”
Well, people like you and me, I’d say.
“Horrible, nasty people who are envious of everything beautiful!” Florence gave a loud sob.
What? No, we weren’t envious. And we’d have turned Mr. Snuggles into a beautiful skunk if he hadn’t been so darned awkward about it. I quickly looked past Mia at the kitchen scissors hanging on their hook on the wall. Had all that butchery blunted them? Maybe they even had notches in the blades. I glanced surreptitiously at the palms of my hands for welts and blisters. Yes, that sore place on my forefinger was new.
My double cappuccino was ready at last. I gulped it so greedily that I burned my tongue.
“It was probably some young louts on their way home from a party,” said Ernest, coming in from the next room with the telephone. “Although Mother suspects an envious neighbor.”
“Has she really called in Scotland Yard?” asked Mia.
Ernest smiled. “A
friend of hers used to work there—you met him yesterday, the man with the big beard.”
“The Admiral?”
Ernest nodded. “Mother is in such a state that she asked him to turn to his former colleagues. But I really don’t see what they can do about it.”
So I should hope. I drank some more coffee and wondered whether we’d left footprints in the flower bed, and they’d put the forensic department on our trail. Or fibers from our jackets … No, nonsense! First, the earth all around the clipped box bushes was completely covered with fine mulch, and second, Scotland Yard wasn’t about to send its forensic experts out for a clipped box tree, Admiral or no Admiral. Why was he called Admiral, anyway, if he’d been in the police?
Someone touched my shoulder, and I jumped. But it was only Grayson moving me aside on his way to the coffee machine.
“Everything okay, Liv?” he asked.
“Yes. Yes, why?” I replied, quickly hiding my hand with the suspicious sore place on it behind my back and almost dropping my cup as I did so. “I had a wonderful night’s sleep. Long, deep sleep.”
Mia clicked her tongue warningly, and I stopped at once, before I could sound even more suspicious. There was nothing left of yesterday’s wonderful elation when I’d felt like Zorro. I was feeling like a criminal instead. Here in England maybe they sent you to prison for what we’d done. Particularly as Mr. Snuggles had obviously been no ordinary bush but some kind of local celebrity.
But the full extent of it became clear to me only when we arrived at Frognal Academy. Everyone there seemed to know Mr. Snuggles as well. And they all knew about his demise because Secrecy had put it in her blog first thing this morning.
Or so I heard at the school entrance from my friend Persephone Porter-Peregrin. I took her smartphone from her hand and read the blog entry. Rest in peace, Mr. Snuggles. An obituary for a topiary peacock. In a school gossip blog. Would you believe it?
Even more incredible, how on earth had Secrecy come by her information so soon? It was positively uncanny. I looked around for Mia, but she had already disappeared into the crowd. Florence’s tears hadn’t made her feel guilty, unlike me. I even got the impression that she rather enjoyed all the fuss. I wished I could feel the same, but Secrecy’s obituary of Mr. Snuggles only made it worse. If even someone as fundamentally nasty as Secrecy was claiming the moral high ground …
Stupid gossipmonger! Suppose she lived in Elms Walk, and that was why she’d been able to take a look at the Boker’s front garden so early in the morning? At least that would explain it. We’d have to check the addresses of the people on Mia’s list of suspects as soon as we could.
A red-haired girl smiled at me in passing and said, “Don’t let it bother you, Liv. I’m waiting until my wedding night too!”
Baffled, I stared as she walked away. Who on earth was she?
“Look, here’s the link Secrecy gave to a report in a gardening magazine—wasn’t Mr. Smithers just amazing?” Persephone had taken her smartphone back and was batting her long lashes dramatically. “He was even on a list of protected plants of the British Isles.…”
“Mr. Snuggles,” I corrected her.
“Yes, that’s what I said.” She linked arms with me. “You really have to wonder who’d do a thing like that, don’t you? They must be terribly disturbed!”
“Hmm,” I said. “Maybe they had good reasons. If there was more than one of them, I mean.”
“Hey, Liv! I think it’s really mean the way they keep going on at you,” said a girl I didn’t know from Adam, or rather Eve. Persephone piloted us around her as if she were a pillar or something.
“It’s typical—they always blame the woman. Whereas it could just as well be Henry’s fault,” said the unknown girl. “Just wanted to let you know I’m on your side.”
“Er, thanks, very nice of you,” I said.
“You’re welcome. We girls have to stick together, and Secrecy’s a slag and a disgrace to feminism.”
Okay. This was getting stranger all the time. “Do you know her?” I whispered to Persephone, but my friend’s thoughts were still dwelling on Mr. Snuggles.
“What good reason could anyone have to murder an innocent tree?” She shook her head.
“Murder sounds so … well, excessive, don’t you think? I mean, even if Mr. Snuggles were a person—which he isn’t, he’s a plant—then it would only be a case of injury because he still has his roots, so he can always grow again.”
“A plant is a living creature too,” said Persephone quietly.
Oh God. That made me a murderess.
“I thought Mr. Smithers—”
“Snuggles!”
“—was so cute. When I was little and we went to the park on Sundays, we always passed him, and he looked a little different every time.” She heaved a melancholy sigh.
This was unbearable. So were all the curious glances cast at me even up on the next floor. And all the whispering. Persephone didn’t notice. Her mind was entirely on Mr. Snuggles.
“Obviously nothing in this wicked world is safe from vandalism,” she wailed.
I decided to change the subject. “I wonder how Jasper’s getting along? On his own with all those French kids. And he never got good marks for French. I bet he can’t even ask the way to the toilet, poor thing.”
Guess what, my tactics worked. The mention of Jasper’s name made Persephone forget Mr. Snuggles right away. “Yes, but that has its good points—he won’t be able to chat up the pretty French girls,” she said cheerfully. “I mean, it’ll be difficult for him to flirt in a language he doesn’t know.”
Yes and no—intelligent conversation wasn’t exactly Jasper’s strong point, so his attempts at flirtation might actually be more successful if he just gave a dazzling smile, whereupon they’d probably overlook his language problems. But I didn’t say so to Persephone. I was just relieved that we’d stopped talking about that silly box tree.
However, my relief lasted only until the lunch break. Even on the way to the cafeteria, I had a sinking feeling, and not just because everyone was staring at me again. It was as if there was something in the air, something nasty (and I don’t mean the smell of steamed cabbage, which was on the menu for lunch today). The sinking feeling got even worse when a text from Mia arrived. Mia never usually texted me. Texting on the ancient numerical keypads of our phones was pure torture. It took you a full minute to type in Hello. Four twice, two once, five six times running but with a little pause in between them, then six three times. And too bad if you made a mistake, because then you had to begin again at the beginning.
Mia’s text had only two words in it: giy aaat. I stared at the display, frowning. Giy aaat? What was that supposed to tell me? Was it an abbreviation? A secret code? Or had she just hit the wrong keys? I thought of texting her back, but given the time it would take me to type What do you mean? and send the text, I could just as well go over to the lower school canteen and ask her in person. Only, I didn’t feel like it. I was so close to my own cafeteria now that I could smell the food, and I was hungry. Also I wanted to see Henry. I’d better simply call her.
“Hey, Liv!” A couple barred my way. “Is it true?” asked the girl. I knew her—she was one of Persephone’s friends. Itsy. Unfortunately that wasn’t her real name any more than her best friend’s real name was Bitsy, but for reasons I didn’t understand, I could never remember what they were actually called. So I just said, “Hi!” in a friendly voice. “Is what true?” I added.
The boy with Itsy on his arm was Emily’s brother, Sam. He and Itsy had been a happy couple since the Autumn Ball.
“Is what Secrecy writes true?” asked Sam. He didn’t like me because last year Emily had made him ask me to go to the ball with him and I’d said no.
“You read Secrecy’s Tittle-Tattle blog?” Even worse: Was he interested in my sex life? But maybe Sam and Itsy themselves were in a similar situation and were unsettled by the whole discussion. In which case, they just wanted my advice, which
was … well, kind of nice. So I looked first Sam and then Itsy straight in the eye and said, “Yes, it’s true. But it makes no difference at all. There isn’t a set time for these things. Everyone can make up their own minds when and whether to do it. So don’t let other people influence you—you just go your own way, never mind what anyone else thinks.” That was the stuff to give them! I ought to be a speechwriter. Or a pastor. Stand by what you think is right! Dare to be yourselves!
But obviously Sam didn’t agree. “You ought to be ashamed of yourself,” he said, and Itsy added, “I’d never have thought it! Shame on you. Come along, Sam.”
Shame on me? What was the matter with them? I turned back to my cell phone and almost collided with Arthur. Like me, he’d been staring at the display of his own phone.
With great presence of mind, I put on my enemy-general expression and raised my chin. “Arthur.”
Oddly enough, Arthur’s expression wasn’t as cool and superior as usual, but almost a bit … could it be sympathetic? “Oh, hell, Liv,” he said. “Maybe you’d better not go in there.”
I raised my chin if anything a little higher. “First, I couldn’t care less what other people say about me, and second, I’m hungry.” And third, I can do without your sympathy, thanks very much.
Shaking my head, I pushed past him into the cafeteria. Henry was sitting there at the back, at our usual window table, along with Grayson, Florence, Emily, and a friend of Florence’s called Callum Caspers. A plate of selections from the salad buffet stood at the empty place next to Henry, which meant that there was ground beef Wellington to go with the cabbage today. I hadn’t been able to stomach the school’s ground beef since I found a fingernail clipping in it one day, as Henry knew, so he had thoughtfully chosen me a plate of mixed salad in advance. That was really nice of him. I’d almost reached the table when the cell phone I was holding rang. Now Henry, Grayson, Emily, Callum, and Florence noticed me, too, and fell silent.