Labradoodle on the Loose (16 page)

‘Walrus told me you got caught with red paint on your sweatshirt,' said Bee.

‘So?' said Callum.

‘So, I've been thinking, and I don't think you were writing, I think you might have been cleaning it off.' There was a long silence. I was busy thinking that Bee's idea sounded quite believable. Callum seemed to be busy deciding what to say. Everyone else was either busy waiting, or watching the moving mouths on the telly.

‘What if I was?' said Callum eventually.

‘Why would you let everyone believe you're guilty if you're not?' said Bee.

‘Unless you're protecting someone else,' said Jonno. (It was like watching Sherlock Holmes and Doctor Watson in action.)

‘What if I am?' said Callum.

‘We know it's Jamie,' said Bee. (There isn't exactly a long list of people Callum could call friends.)

‘What if it is?'

‘It's not fair for you to take the blame,' said Jonno.

Callum used a sarcastic voice. ‘So the Tribe think I should tell on him, do they?' It was a good question. We wouldn't tell on each other so why should Callum tell on Jamie? No one had the answer.

Bee went off in another direction with her interrogation. ‘Why did he do it?'

‘He hates Miss Walsh. And she hates him.'

‘Are you sure that's all?' Bee moved her fringe – always a sign that things are getting serious. ‘Is there something else?' Callum didn't look like he was about to speak so she carried on. ‘There must be a reason why he gets told off every day for years and one day, that's no worse than loads of others, he storms out of class and writes something on the whiteboard with red paint.'

‘Ask him,' said Callum.

I heard a key in the lock. ‘Hello!' shouted someone that I assumed was Callum's mum. She came in and smiled at us. She didn't look anything like our mums. She was wearing a dark trouser suit and a shirt and looked
like a newsreader. And she had a briefcase.

‘Hello,' said Jonno. ‘I'm Jonno . . . from school.'

‘Come to see the graffiti artist, have you?' She tutted.

We did some nodding. There was an awkward gap. Fifty filled it.

‘We came to see how he was.' It sounded like Callum was ill.

‘I expect he's bored having spent all day at home,' said his mum. ‘Anyway, I need to get changed and then I'm nipping round to Karen's.' She headed out of the door. ‘You can all stay for tea if you like. Cheer him up.'

‘They're going,' said Callum.

Too right, tea with the enemy was out of the question
.

‘You can come with me then, Callum,' his mum shouted from the staircase. ‘Karen's not so good, the latest treatment's knocked her for six, so I may as well make Jamie and Katy their tea and you can eat with them.'

‘OK,' said Callum.

‘We'd better go,' said Bee. We followed our leader out of the room, except Copper Pie who was glued to the mute telly. Fifty grabbed his elbow and pulled him along. Bee opened the front door and we all trooped past her and started heading back the way we'd come, but she stayed where she was.

‘Are you coming?' said Fifty.

‘You go on,' she shouted. ‘I'll catch up.' I could tell that she was on to something. We waited to hear the latest from the Tribe detective.

We hung around at the end of the alley waiting for Bee.

‘So how come you changed your mind and came to Callum's, Copper Pie?' said Fifty.

‘Jonno made me,' said Copper Pie. He flashed Jonno a mean look. I laughed. Jonno couldn't make C.P. do anything.

‘How exactly did he make you?' said Fifty. ‘Chinese burn?'

Copper Pie kicked some imaginary dirt on the pavement. Jonno was smiling, waiting to hear what he was going to say. Copper Pie spoke to the floor. ‘Jonno said I owed it to you for what happened at the summer fair.'

I would never have dared mention Copper Pie going off with Callum to do the football stall at the summer fair. That was all in the past. Thankfully Bee wasn't long. I didn't want
to go over the whole episode that threatened Tribe's existence ever again.

‘I guessed right,' she said. (There's a surprise.) ‘It wasn't Callum. It was Jamie. But there's nothing we can do about it.'

‘Did Callum actually say it was Jamie?' asked Fifty.

‘He didn't need to. I know it was Jamie, and I know why he did it, and I know why Callum's covering up for him.' Bee is
such
a know-all.

‘Tell us then,' said Fifty.

‘Miss Walsh telling him off was the last straw for Jamie, because he's really upset. His mum's got cancer.' She paused to make sure we knew that was bad. ‘That's why Callum doesn't want to land him in it. That's why Callum tried to rub off the writing before anyone found out. That's how he got his sweatshirt covered in paint. And that's where he and his mum are going now. To Jamie's.'

‘How do you know?' I asked.

‘Jamie's sister's called Katy, so I knew it was his mum that isn't well. And did you notice Callum's mum said “treatment”? Everyone knows what that means.'

‘In our house it would mean Mum's gone for a pedicure,' said Jonno.

‘It would be physio in mine,' I said.

Fifty made the my-mum's-a-loony face. ‘And we'd be meditating in mine, with joss sticks.'

We all looked at Copper Pie. ‘A telling off. Definitely.'

‘Well, in Jamie's house it means cancer treatment,' said
Bee. ‘I asked Callum straight out and he nodded, but he'd promised Jamie he wouldn't tell anyone. Jamie doesn't want anyone to know. And neither does his mum.'

Bee put her fist out for the fist of friendship. We knew what that meant – keep the secret.

‘So . . . Callum's innocent, but unless he dumps Jamie in it he's got no way of proving it.'

‘Exactly,' said Bee. ‘So what do we do?'

‘Nothing,' said Copper Pie. ‘It's not our problem.' I was about to agree but . . .

‘That's so mean,' said Bee. ‘We may not like him but Callum can't stay off school forever for something he didn't do.'

‘Has he told his mum the truth?' I asked. ‘Surely she could sort it out with Miss Walsh or the Head.' My solutions usually rely on other people. I like it that way.

‘He can't have done, can he? Didn't you hear her call him a “graffiti artist”?' Bee was right, as usual.

I had another try. ‘Why can't we just tell Miss Walsh the truth? She's not going to come down hard on Jamie when she knows about the . . . you know.'

‘It's called cancer, Keener. You can't catch it by saying it.'

‘I know,' I said.

Jonno pushed his springy hair off his face, and it sprang back to where it started. ‘The thing is, if we say Jamie did it, even if he doesn't get suspended it'll make everything much worse for him.'

‘Much worse for his mum,' said Bee. ‘If she feels rubbish already, how will she feel if she knows Jamie's going around spraying insults all over school.'

‘One whiteboard, Bee. Not all over school,' I said. She ignored me.

‘There must be a way we can get Callum in the clear without dropping anyone else in it,' said Jonno.

‘This is mad,' said Copper Pie. ‘We hate Hog.'

‘It's not about Callum,' said Jonno. Seemed to me that it was, but I waited to hear what Jonno thought. ‘It's about what's fair.'

I hate it when people say things like ‘fair' or ‘right'. It always means we have to do something we don't want to.

‘And it's about us as well,' said Bee. ‘About being Tribe. We don't go around not caring about the rest of the world, do we?' There was a bit of reluctant nodding from me and Fifty, and agreeing-type nodding from Jonno, and a completely still head from Copper Pie, which Bee pretended not to notice.

‘OK. We've agreed that we're getting Callum off the hook. All we need is a plan that doesn't involve Jamie. Thinking caps on.'

Copper Pie:
Let's say someone else did it.

Bee:
We can't dump on some poor innocent kid.

Fifty:
We could say we saw who did it but didn't recognise him.

Keener:
We could say we know Callum didn't do it but we don't know who did.

Jonno:
But in that case how would they know Callum's telling the truth?

Keener:
We know he's telling the truth. Bee said.

Jonno:
We know, but how does Miss Walsh or whoever know?

Bee:
It's no good just saying Callum's innocent. We need evidence.

Fifty:
Let's give him an alibi.

Bee:
But we don't know when it happened.

Fifty:
A long alibi then. From the end of art until bedtime.

Copper Pie:
No one would believe that.

Jonno:
What about using the right to remain silent?

Keener:
What's that?

Fifty:
It's what filthy rich criminals do. They refuse to answer questions.

Jonno:
And they get their lawyers to get them off.

Bee:
How does that help us?

Jonno:
We say we know who did it but we can't tell anyone.

Fifty:
Can you see the Head letting us get away with that?

Keener:
Even worse, she'd think it was a Triber.

Bee:
She can think what she likes. We're not covered in red paint.

Jonno:
OK. Unless someone comes up with something better —

Bee:
Before break tomorrow.

Jonno:
We're choosing to use our right to remain silent.

Bee:
Only partly silent.

Fifty:
And partly loud.

Keener:
Partly very annoying, to Miss Walsh.

Copper Pie:
Totally mad.

Jonno:
And completely Tribish.

I was still awake when Dad got home from Timbuctoo or wherever it is he goes to work. He poked his head in, which he says he always does but as I'm asleep I've never known if he was telling the truth or not.

‘Hi, Dad,' I said, quietly.

He came and sat on the edge of my bed. ‘How's things?' he whispered back.

‘OK.'

‘Something keeping you awake?'

‘Sort of.'

‘Anything you want to share?'

I thought for a second before I decided to tell Dad everything. If it was Mum who had asked I'd have kept it to myself because she might have made me tell on Jamie
but I was pretty sure Dad wouldn't. He listened to the story from the beginning – pink whiteboard and missing Callum – through the middle – Walrus and Bee, Bee and Jamie, Tribe and Callum – to the finale – telling Miss Walsh it wasn't Callum but refusing to tell her how we knew or who the real graffiti artist was. Dad took it all in.

‘Whose idea was it to use the right to remain silent?'

‘Jonno's,' I said.

‘That figures,' said Dad. ‘Smart boy.' Everyone likes Jonno.

‘Do you think it will work?'

‘Depends what you mean,' said Dad. ‘I think they'll have to listen to you, and they'll probably believe you because you're no friend of Callum's so you wouldn't be sticking up for him out of loyalty.' There was a pause. I helped Dad along.

‘But?'

‘But I think they'll insist you name the guilty party.'

‘They can't make us.' I sounded braver than I felt. I wasn't keen on the word ‘insist'.

‘Hold onto that thought,' said Dad. ‘They can't make you. And I won't either. Seems like Jamie and his mum have got enough to deal with.' Dad got up to leave, but stopped at the door.

‘It wouldn't hurt to let Jamie know you've figured it all out, but you're not going to rat on him. It won't help anyone if he takes what's happening with his mum out on people at school.'

‘OK,' I said. ‘Thanks, Dad.' I didn't want to forget what Dad said so I hopped out of bed and wrote down the important bits.

They can't make us tell on Jamie
.

But we need to tell Jamie we know
.

I overslept on Friday. Oversleeping in our house isn't normally possible because there are five of us and three of them set alarms. But Dad switched his off because he was working from home, which meant he didn't have to get up and out by seven. The one on Mum's side of the bed went off extra early because she was going on a course, but she didn't wake up Flo and me because she'd asked Amy to get us up. Amy uses her iPhone and she forgot that she'd put it on silent because spotty boyfriend's been calling her all the time – he's changed his mind and wants her back.
Don't do it, Amy
. So, Dad came charging in at eight-thirty, ripped my duvet off and yelled in my ear.

I yelled too.
Waaaaagh!
Not because I was late, because I was frightened.

Dad drove us all to school. I'd missed registration.

‘Sorry I'm late, miss.'

I had a quick check. Callum wasn't there. So the showdown was still set for break. I repeated in my head the main bits of my chat with Dad. All I had to do was keep my gob shut when Miss Walsh demanded to know who the poison-painter was.

Time whizzed by. The bell went and instead of legging it outside, the others stayed in the classroom so I did too. I wished I'd been in on the discussions before school. I didn't know what the plan was.

‘Miss Walsh, can we talk to you please?' said Bee.

Miss Walsh bundled her books up. ‘Not now, Bee. See me after break.' She left.

Bee sat back on one of the desks. ‘Great!'

‘It doesn't matter. We'll tell her after break,' said Jonno.