Charm School (4 page)

‘That’s right, dear.’

Amethyst flicked her hair again, pleased.

‘
Well
,’ said Mrs Opalene, twinkling with enthusiasm. ‘Some
very
clever person has worked out that, while you’re sitting with your elbows in your lemon halves, you could be doing something inordinately useful at the same time.’

She gazed around at them. ‘Can anybody guess what that might be?’

It seemed an easy enough question. ‘Reading a good book?’ suggested Bonny.

Mrs Opalene waved a beringed hand. ‘Do try not to be silly, dear. This is seriou—’ She
broke
off, inspecting Bonny properly for the first time. ‘You look a little …’ She paused, puzzled, as she eyed this newcomer to her class up and down from plain old top to plain old toe. ‘Dear, you don’t seem quite …’Again, she stopped, and peered even more closely. ‘Are you
supposed
to be here?’

‘Yes,’ Bonny said, fingering the ticket in her pocket. She was about to explain when Cindy-Lou called out from her side of the circle.

‘She’s here to help Maura with the sound and the lighting.’

At once, she was the most popular person in the universe and everyone was calling out.

‘Oh, please! May I just tell you something?’

‘I have to explain to you exactly what I need.’

‘Listen, there’s a bit in my music where—’

‘When Maura gets to the lighting for my bit—’

‘You see, I have this problem with—’

‘Girls! Girls!’ Mrs Opalene clapped to hush them. ‘Everyone will get their turn to visit the back room.’ She turned back to Bonny. ‘Well, dear,’ she said. ‘You do look awfully young to be dealing with expensive equipment.
But
I suppose if Maura thinks it’s all right—’ She gazed around. ‘Has anyone seen Maura this morning?’

Most of the faces looked blank, though one framed by a mass of midnight blue ribbons began to crease, as if some worrying, half-remembered message was drifting to mind.

‘Don’t screw your face up, dear,’ Mrs Opalene reproved her. ‘It will only encourage early wrinkling.’ And then, as if this reminded her of all she had to get through that morning, she impatiently waved Bonny out of the circle. ‘All right, dear. Off you go.’

And Bonny, equally reminded of all she wanted to miss, sprang to her feet, delighted at this chance to flee from all their drippy lectures about bleached elbows and natural hair oils. The tea boy was right. They were ridiculous, perched in a circle on their little chairs, like fairies waiting for some wonderland party.

But Miss Stardust had jumped to her feet as well.

‘Oh, please let me go with her,’ she begged Mrs Opalene. ‘Just so I can explain about my flashing lights.’

‘Not yet, dear, because I’m sure Miss—’

She stopped and peered at Bonny, waiting for a name.

‘“Sparky”,’ bossy Cristalle insisted, nodding her puffy hair. ‘You always call electricians “Sparky”. It’s a theatre rule.’

‘
Miss
Sparky,’ reproved Mrs Opalene. ‘I’m sure we don’t
ever
want to forget our manners.’ She turned back to Bonny, still peering, and started rooting in her bag. Bonny was sure that she was searching for her spectacles, and when she put them on she’d see at once that, even for somebody’s helper, Bonny was terribly young – no older than everyone round her.

But then Miss Stardust started up again. ‘About my flashing lights—’

‘No!’ said Mrs Opalene. ‘Right now we’re busy with our Handy Helping Hints. And since no-one’s seen Maura yet, Miss Sparky had better start getting everything set up and ready for our rehearsals for the Curls and Purls Show.’

Bonny was horrified. What she’d been hoping to do was sneak away to find her mother. Vanish and never come back. Mum might have given her that stern look over her spectacles, and ordered her back with a
lecture
on not wasting money – warmly applauded, probably, Bonny thought bitterly, by all the other people in Bookkeeping (Advanced). But even then she could have spent the day lurking in some cupboard, out of sight.

But now they were expecting her to walk the other way – to the door at the back of the room. And then start up lights and music by herself! She was no expert in anything like that. She knew how to use her own music equipment, of course. And she was as good as anyone else at flicking on a light switch. But running the sound and lighting for the rehearsals for a Curls and Purls Show – even making things flash for Miss Stardust – well, that was different.

Better confess that she was really here, like all the rest, to listen to the Handy Hints.

But just at that moment Mrs Opalene spoke up again.

‘So, dears. Back to all this time we have to spare, sitting with our elbows in our lemons. What are we going to do with it? Well, one quite
brilliant
idea is to make sure our feet are busy soaking in a bucket of perfumed water to soften all that nasty hard skin that
gathers
at the back of our poor heels!’

Bonny looked round. No-one was sniggering. No-one was rolling their eyes. No-one was even making a face of mock astonishment. They were all diligently taking notes.

Bonny turned round and set off determinedly for the back room.

Better Miss Sparky than Miss Twink.

C
HAPTER
T
WO

THE SMALL BACK
room looked like the cockpit of an airplane. There were switches everywhere. Switches to the right of her, switches to the left, and switches on the panel under the glass window through which she could see Mrs Opalene lecturing everyone on how to cope with all that nasty hard skin at the back of their heels.

And watching her.

Should she just sit there pretending? When Maura turned up, she could just say that she’d been looking for a phone or some water, and slip away.

Or should she have a go? After all, Maura might be very late. Or she might even have forgotten she was supposed to be there at all.

Bonny looked up. There on the panel right above her head was one big red master switch, labelled
POWER.

No point in being chicken, Bonny thought. She flicked it down. At once, a hundred lights began to blink at her, red, white and green.

‘Oh, excellent!’ she breathed. ‘Oh, yes! That’s power!’

Taking the swivel seat, she whirled around. Best to get going. She might as well start with the panel in front of her. Just like any kitchen or toolshed, the things that were closest were probably the most useful.

Choosing a switch, she slid it gently up its track. Instantly, from the loudspeaker on the wall behind, she heard Mrs Opalene’s voice, clear as a bell.

‘So I certainly hope I don’t have to remind anyone here—’

Bonny slid up the next switch. Mrs Opalene’s voice turned deep and resonant. Almost booming.

‘—that they should never,
ever
miss the chance of putting slices of fresh cucumber—’

Bonny slid the switch down again and pushed up the one on the other side. The voice went high and tinny.

‘—on their eyelids. It isn’t just refreshing—’

So that was the bass and the treble sorted out. Bonny switched Mrs Opalene’s voice back to normal.

‘—it also makes the
world
of difference.’

For heaven’s sake! thought Bonny. There it was again, that silly claim, ‘It makes the world of difference’. What was the matter
with
them all? Did they have maggots for brains? When did you ever bump into someone on the street, and think, Oh, look at those eyes! She must have been lying under cucumber slices? Distracted as she was by all the switches she was pushing up and down, still Bonny couldn’t help muttering sarcastically, ‘Oh, yes! Spit in my eye and then tell me it’s raining!’

They heard it in there, she could tell. Everyone’s face swivelled to stare at her through the huge glass window.

‘Sorry!’ called Bonny, switching off the blinking light labelled
SOUND OUT
.

She left
SOUND IN
still blinking.

So, for all the embarrassment, at least that was one more of Maura’s little tricks under her belt. She turned to the buttons beside her. The first ones she pressed lit up the stage in dazzling circles.

‘Spotlights!’

She tried more. This time, the whole front apron of the stage was bathed in a silver glow.

‘Floodlights,’ muttered Bonny.

She pressed a few more buttons and watched as huge, spotty red and green
explosions
bounced off the drapes on each side of the stage. On the backcloth behind, a waterfall appeared from nowhere, rippling down to a pool of foaming water.

‘Special effects!’

She looked down. Inside the boxes at her feet were discs of every colour. And stencils, too. Some were cut into shapes she recognized, like windows or trees, and others were just cut into the strangest patterns. She picked out two and stared at them, trying to imagine what they would look like cast up on the back of the stage, lit up and enormous.

‘Oh, yes! This one’s a snowstorm! And this one is clouds.’

She was just peering through the next one – creepy forest branches? – when she was startled by a whisper from a loudspeaker overhead.

‘Oh, no! Oh, no!’ The voice was aghast. ‘I ate it! I just ate it!’

Bonny spun round to look through the glass. Beside one of the microphones she must have left switched on, there were two latecomers she hadn’t noticed. They’d stopped to stare at one another in the middle of changing their shoes.

‘Oh, Cooki! You didn’t!’

‘I did, Lulu! One minute it was in my hand, and the next it was gone. I must have eaten it. I
must
.’

Poor thing! thought Bonny, remembering all too clearly how she’d felt when Herbie Stott slid a dead ant into the icing on her fairy cake and didn’t tell her till she’d finished it. And when she’d gone to take the second bite of that apple Granny gave her, and saw the maggot hole – one swallow too late.

Lulu was looking horrified. ‘You never ate the whole thing. Not
the whole thing
.’

‘I must have, without noticing.’

‘Cooki, how
could
you? They’re
enormous
. How could you not even notice you were gobbling a whole biscuit?’