Out in the playground, they crowded round Spike, looking hopefully at him and waiting for him to pronounce judgement on their efforts.
‘Well? How’d we do?’ Al asked for all of them.
He frowned. ‘Well, apart from Alex’s little dig at Miss Palmer right at the beginning of the lesson—’
‘Hey, it had to be done.’
‘—I think you did very well. All of you. You will observe that Miss Palmer seemed surprised at your not disrupting her lesson for a change. That’s a start and a good one.’
‘Yeah, we didn’t exactly go over the top, did we?’ said Jon. ‘Just gave her a little lip an’ stuff.’
‘Well, now I think about it, you probably do have to keep up the cheek and back-answering. Lose those and she’ll likely start to wonder what’s going on.’
‘I’m all for that,’ said Al. ‘An’ what about what we made? Was that okay, do you reckon?’
‘Actually,’ said Spike, ‘I have to say I was most impressed by your efforts.’
‘Yeah?’
‘Indeed. Even Edward managed to produce something that did not turn out with the consistency of a house brick.’
‘It weren’t nothin’,’ said Eddie sheepishly. ‘I just did what Miss told us.’
‘Even so, if I didn’t know any better, I’d have said you were all accomplished students of your art.’
They shuffled about uneasily, embarrassed by these unaccustomed words of praise.
‘So, that’s that part of the plan up and running,’ said Al, wanting to change the subject. ‘We’ve got the sewing part of it going. We know what we’re going to put in the rats—’
‘Do we?’ said Jon.
‘—Yeah, we do. Mince, remember?’
‘When did we decide that?’
‘Miss told us we’re going to be doing something with mince next week and to come prepared. Weren’t you listening?’
‘Sorry, old habits die hard.’
‘I can dig that,’ said Al. ‘So she teaches us how to cook mince an’ we do just what she wants us to. Then we use it against her—yeah?’
‘You know,’ said Spike, ‘there’s a certain delicious irony in that.’
‘You said it. Okay, what else?—Oh yeah, I remember! Spike, we’re doing okay with the rats’ bodies an’ that but what about the legs and eyes? What are we gonna use for those?’
‘I had already given the matter due consideration. For the eyes, you’ll be using small shiny buttons; for the legs, small pipe cleaners suitably bent into shape.’
‘Buttons!’ Tony groaned. ‘Oh God, not another trip to that department store! If my sister ever finds out—’
‘Fear not,’ said Spike, ‘I can bring some from my mother’s supply. She’s rather fond of sewing, herself. She won’t notice if a few suddenly vanish. As for the pipe cleaners, we can get those from most corner shops.
‘Excellent stuff,’ said Al. ‘Okay, is there anything else we haven’t thought about?’
‘I’ve been wondering something,’ said Eddie. ‘When we do this for real, how are we gonna slip our rats into our dishes without her noticing? Nobody’s said anything about that yet.’
‘I’ve been thinking about that,’ said Al. ‘The way I see it is we’ve got to distract her in some way, maybe even find some way of getting her out of the classroom for a few minutes. Any ideas?’
‘One of us could have some sort of accident,’ Jon offered.
‘I’ve already thought about that one. Trouble is, which one of us should it be? I mean, whoever’s gonna have this “accident” will be taken to the secretary’s office for treatment—you know what this school’s like for covering itself—an’ then they’ll miss out on all the fun.’
‘True enough,’ said Jon, ‘but I don’t see any other way.’
‘Well, are you gonna be the one?’
‘Uh…no.’
‘Exactly!’ Al looked at Tony and Eddie. ‘What about you guys?’
A shaking of heads was all the answer he needed.
‘So, no takers and I don’t blame any of you. Like I said, good idea but out of the running.’
‘If I might be permitted to interject at this juncture,’ said Spike, ‘you seem to have overlooked one major possibility.’
‘Yeah?’ said Al. ‘Who?’
‘Me! Perhaps it should be me to be the one to have this little “accident”.’
‘You? Are you serious?’
‘Why not? After all, it’s not exactly fraught with danger and she’d probably suspect something if it was one of you.’
‘You mean she’d smell a rat,’ said Eddie brightly, and they fell about laughing.
‘Well, if you’re sure,’ said Al. ‘I didn’t ask you ’cos I didn’t want to get you in any deeper than you needed to be, you being on this exchange thing an’ all that.’
‘I rather think, actually, that I’m already in this little escapade up to my neck and beyond,’ said Spike. ‘And as the saying goes, one might as well be hung for stealing a sheep as a lamb.’
‘Okay,’ Al shrugged, ‘I guess that’s sorted, then. Now, anything else?’
No one answered. There should have been more to discuss but everyone was silent, silent and looking over Al’s shoulder at something behind him. He spun round, expecting to see a teacher standing there eavesdropping. But it wasn’t a teacher, it was someone else, someone to make him almost wish it was a teacher.
‘Oh, hi, Max!’ he said. But Max didn’t answer. Max just pointed angrily at Spike.
‘I thought I told you lot to bring ’im to me!’ he said.
‘Him? Oh yeah, so you did. Sorry, we sort of forgot.’
‘I bet you did. Well, maybe I should give you summink to make you remember in future, then.’
Suddenly, Max was advancing on him, Al backing away with every step. He needed help. And it came. But from the unlikeliest of quarters.
‘Please introduce us,’ Spike was saying brightly. ‘Always a pleasure to make the acquaintance of your compatriots.’
Mad Max stopped advancing to look Spike up and down. ‘Wot’d you say?’ he said blankly.
‘I said I’d be delighted to make your acquaintance. Any friend of Alex must surely be a worthy addition to one’s social circle.’
‘Wot?’
‘He says he’s pleased to meet you,’ said Al, seizing on this lifeline his friend had thrown him.
‘Then why didn’t ’e just say so?’ Max turned to face Spike squarely, to tower over him threateningly. ‘You got a lot o’ fancy talk in you, mate, you know that?’
‘Do you really think so?’ said Spike, affecting innocent surprise. ‘Well, my verbosity may surpass the norm for this educational establishment, I’ll grant, but not to any marked degree. I mean, one makes oneself understood, surely.’
Mad Max didn’t answer, just stood there trying to make sense of something, but whether of Spike or merely what he was saying, they couldn’t tell.
‘So,’ he went on, ‘may I introduce myself. The name’s Pike, Sebastian Pike, though everyone seems to call me Spike—a sobriquet much more to my liking, be it added.’
He held out his hand. Max took it tentatively, as had the others before him. And like those others, he seemed unsure what to do with it.
‘Yerr an’ I’m—I’m Max,’ he said uncertainly.
‘I take it that that is not your given name,’ said Spike.
‘Nah, I got others. I don’t use ’em, though.’
‘Indeed. Max and Spike—one might almost say we have something in common, ours names being perverted thus.’
‘’Oo are you callin’ perverted?’ Max shouted. He stepped forward, fists clenched.
‘No offence, old boy,’ said Spike, standing his ground and not looking in the least bit intimidated. ‘Just a figure of speech and all that.’
‘Yeah?…Well, don’t you go doin’ any more figurin’, okay? I don’t like it.’
‘A shame,’ said Spike. ‘I was so enjoying our conversation, too.
’
‘Uh...you was?’ said Max. This was something new to him, someone actually wanting to speak to him.
‘Indeed. I mean to say, it isn’t every day one encounters such a masterly command of the English language.’
‘Uh?’
‘Oh yes! Such barbarous desolation of structure, such economy of use of even the most basic tenets of grammar—a veritable feast to the auricular senses.’
‘D’yer really fink so?’ said Max, sounding as though he was thoroughly enjoying all this apparent flattery. Then he was hesitating, was stepping forward again, his fists clenched as before. ‘’Ere, you ain’t takin’ the piss, are you?’
‘As though that were a wise move,’ said Spike. ‘No, be assured you have the eloquence of Philistine.’
Max stopped, his fists relaxing, his face lighting up.
‘Cor, fanks, mate!’ he said. ‘See yer later.’
He walked off, an unusual spring in his step. The others crowded round Spike, unable to believe what they had just witnessed.
‘He fell for it!’ said Jon. ‘He actually fell for it!’
‘Yes,’ said Spike, ‘it’s remarkable what a few well-placed words can achieve in an unpleasant situation.’
‘Do you suppose he knows what a Philistine actually is?’ said Al.
‘I doubt it. I frankly doubt that he’d even know his own name without checking the nametag in his underpants from time to time. Strange friends you have.’
‘He’s no friend of ours,’ said Tony.
‘No friend of anyone’s, come to that,’ said Al.
‘Which probably explains why he is the way he is.’
‘Talking of friends,’ said Al, ‘didn’t you say we’d be meeting yours some time?’
‘So I did! How are you all fixed for Saturday?’
‘I think we’re okay,’ said Al, glancing at the others. ‘Can you arrange it?’
‘I can arrange it. Saturday it is.’
TEN