Gargoylz Get Up to Mischief (10 page)

“Dangling drainpipes!” exclaimed Toby. “Can’t wait. I love water and bubblz.”

He stuck the sponge on his arrow-shaped tail, grabbed a plate in each front paw and scrubbed them clean.

“Awesome!” cried Max. “Two in one go. Wish I had a tail.”

They soon had everything washed and piled in a wobbly tower on the draining board.

“Great work!” said Max, impressed. “And we only broke a plate and three glasses.”

There was a noise from the hall. Toby jumped into the breadbin as Dad came in.

“Good job, Max.” He patted him on the shoulder. “Go off and play now. I’ll do the drying up.”

“Thanks, Dad,” said Max. He sidled round towards where Toby was hidden. Somehow he had to get him out of the room without Dad seeing. He opened the breadbin a crack. There was Toby, tucking into a large crusty loaf.

“You can’t do that!” Max whispered. “That’s breakfast.”

“Max, why are you talking to the breadbin?” Dad asked, puzzled.

“I saw a mouse in there,” said Max. He made a grab for Toby and stuffed him up his jumper. “It’s OK. I’ve got it. I’ll take it away.”

He slipped out of the kitchen and dashed up to his bedroom, leaving Dad staring at the bread and the large, gargoyle-shaped teeth marks in it.

“Right!” Max said, shaking Toby out onto the bed and snatching up his Game Boy. “It’s your turn now.”

Toby gave a huge yawn. “Too tired,” he said in a sleepy voice. “Bedtime.”

He scrambled up into the wardrobe and made himself comfortable, hanging upside-down from a coat hanger. Soon Max could hear rumbling snores.

That’ll keep him out of trouble, he thought in relief, until I get him back to school in the morning. Then he can play all the tricks he wants!

4. Science and Snakes

BRRRRRRRING!
THE BELL
rang for the end of school. Everyone in Year Four jostled out of Oldacre Primary and rushed home. Everyone except Max and Ben. They were mooching along the corridor to Science Club.

“It’s not fair!” moaned Max, dragging his feet. “Why should Miss Bleet force us to go to a stupid club after school? It’s taking up valuable gargoyle time. We haven’t seen Toby and his friends all day.”

“It’s not like we did anything wrong,” agreed Ben. “We only put sherbet in Miss Bleet’s coffee to see what would happen. It bubbled up really nicely. I’d have thought that was enough science for one week.”

Max opened the classroom door. His spy radar immediately picked up on someone in the front row: skinny, knobbly knees, ponytail. Max knew what that meant. It was Enemy Agent Lucinda Tellingly, codename: Bossy Boots. She was sitting smugly with her friend Tiffany. She stuck her tongue out at him. “I thought things couldn’t get any worse,” he muttered.

He and Ben sidled in to take their places at the back of the classroom and Max’s spy radar whirred into action again: tall, bald, glasses on the end of his nose. It was Enemy Agent Mr Widget, codename: Boffin.

Mr Widget gulped as he saw them arrive. “Now we’re all here at last,” he said, rubbing his hands together nervously. “We’re going to have such a good time!”

“I bet!” groaned Max under his breath.

“We are going outside to collect worms for a new wormery,” Mr Widget continued.

Max let out a deafening whoop of joy and did a high-five with Ben. Maybe Science Club wouldn’t be so bad after all.

“Glad you’re so keen, boys.” Mr Widget beamed, wiping his forehead with relief. “Now get into pairs, take one of these buckets of soapy water each – and follow me.”

“Yuck!” came a disgusted muttering from Lucinda. “Why can’t we pick flowers like we did last week?”

The Science Club kids marched out of school and over to the sports field, which was hidden behind a row of trees. They tried not to spill the contents of their red plastic buckets on the way.

“I wonder what this is for,” said Max as he and Ben slopped along, leaving a trail of soapy water behind them. “Worms don’t need washing, do they?” Science Club arrived at the field. The far end was covered in sports equipment. The whole school had been practising for Sports Day. There were boxes of beanbags and balls, hoops and sacks.

Netting and long plastic tubes had been laid out for the obstacle course, there was a sandpit ready for the long jump, and in the far corner was a huge trampoline.

Mr Widget gathered the club around a patch of football pitch where the grass had been marked out in squares with string. “Our first task is to find out how many worms there are in the football pitch,” he said.

“That’s a silly idea, sir!” gasped Ben. “It’ll take all night to dig them up.”

“And then we won’t be able to use the pitch for football,” added Max, aghast.

“We won’t be digging up the pitch,” explained their teacher patiently. “We just pour the soapy water on these
squares
of ground and – hey presto! – the worms pop up. They always come up for soapy water. Then we count them and find the average number of worms in each square. We multiply that by the number of squares that are marked out which gives us the number of worms in a quarter of the pitch, then we multiply that by four and – hey presto! – we find out how many worms there are in the whole pitch. Couldn’t be simpler.”