Lula Does the Hula (24 page)

Down on the water Mr VDM left us girls to get on with it as he sped alongside the boys, bellowing at them through a rusty loudhailer. The ‘Pond’ as it was called was really a long twisty stretch of dammed water that flowed from hills and mountains even further up than Hambledon all the way down to the coast. The Pond was about fifty miles from the ocean, and the stretch of river where we would be racing, five minutes before it hit the sea at Port Albert, was salty and rough and a challenge to race on.

After three sessions out on the water thus far I knew enough to be afraid of rough, salty challenges.

‘Aaand . . . take it down,’ came Michelle’s voice through a speaker just up the boat. ‘Watch your speed, Tatty – you’re rushing.’

‘Sorry,’ I mumbled, concentrating on following Hilary’s speed up the slide.

Our boat glided to a stop, the water hissing gently beneath our feet, blades resting lightly on the water. Everyone reached for their water bottles between their runners and I did the same.

I heard Matilda say something to Michelle, then
Michelle’s voice came over the speaker again. ‘Pull hard, bow, the boys are coming down.’

I dropped my water and moved into position to take a stroke. Bow was me, and I did what I was told.

Only just in time.

The boys’ boat came hissing to a halt alongside ours.

‘What the hell,’ shrieked Michelle. She still had her mike on. We all winced as her voice echoed across the water. ‘Could you not see us resting here, Billy, you dumbass?’

‘Er, actually no,’ said Billy, cowed. ‘Sorry.’

There was general muttering. The boys’ boat had slipped further down, and now Arns was beside me.

‘Hello,’ he said, taking a pull on his water bottle.

I sighed. ‘Hello, Arnold,’ I said, and also had a drink. ‘Where’s VD?’

‘Gone to get more petrol for his boat,’ said Boris. ‘Told us to wait down here for him.’

‘He’d better hurry the hell up,’ said Sinead O’Connelly. ‘It’s getting dark.’

‘Maybe we should turn round,’ said Thor from the water behind me. ‘Be ready to race back to the jetty.’

‘He wants to race back?’ asked Dionysia. ‘That’s not safe. It’s too narrow round these bends, especially in the dark. Someone’s going to get whacked.’

A low laugh came from the guy sitting in front of Arns: Ivor Markman, one of Hambledon’s studliest studmuffins.
‘No one’s going to get whacked,’ he murmured. ‘No way.’

‘Excuse me?’ said Matilda, twisting round in her seat. ‘What do you mean by that, Ivor Markman?’

‘Ivor,’ warned Arns.

‘Like, you girls really think you can keep up with us round the bends?’ Ivor laughed out loud. ‘We’re gonna leave you lot bleating at the start. You and your puny bow!’

Matilda whacked her blade hard into the water. It splashed up a whale of water all over Ivor. Arns ducked down and to the side, rocking the boat madly, but he also got wet.

‘Bloody hell,’ complained Arns. ‘You asked for that, Ive. And, just for the record, that bow is not so puny.’

‘Not so puny at all,’ confirmed Boris. ‘Watch it, man.’

Ivor slid alongside me as the coxes got us turning the boats. ‘Hmm,’ said Ivor, tugging gently at his blade as he looked across at me in the twilight. ‘I’m watching all right.’

I saw the glint of his teeth as he smiled, and it made me shudder.

Mr VDM took ages to refill his tank. By then Arns and I had had a good yak. The girls were mostly talking amongst themselves, and Ivor was talking strategy with Billy Diggle.

‘You wanna hear what I came to tell you in the café?’ asked Arns. I flushed. ‘And what I was trying to tell you at art?’

‘Go on, then.’

Arns stared at me for a beat, then grinned. His curly hair was still short and tufty, the way I’d cut it, but water had darkened it past auburn. I wasn’t close enough to see the flecks of green in his hazel eyes, but I knew they were sparkling at me right now. He’d be teasing me mercilessly if it weren’t for everyone else out here on the water.

‘You’re gonna owe me,’ he said.

I sighed, and raised my eyebrows.

He laughed. ‘Okay, so Mum says the lab came back about trace from Parcel Brewster’s body.’

‘Oh, yeah?’ I sat up and leaned out towards him.

‘In the boat, Tatty!’ yelled Michelle. ‘Otherwise we’re all in the water!’

‘Sorry!’ I called back.

‘They found hairs, but they’re synthetic, like a wig. So no DNA.’

‘That’s it?’ I said to Arns, incredulous.

‘Well, yes,’ said Arns uncertainly.

‘That’s pathetic. Synthetic hairs could be anything. I owe you nothing.’

‘You do so!’ said Arns. He dropped his voice. ‘Who helped you with your coat last night at the café, huh? Who?’

‘I could have helped myself!’ I hissed back.

‘Yeah, yeah,’ said Arns, and I could hear him smiling. Then he said, suddenly serious, talking quickly before the
others stopped their banter about Ivor’s latest conquest, ‘One other thing that you’re not going to like.’ I kept quiet. ‘Arthur Cluny. Mum’s looking into that angle.’

‘Right,’ I said. I shifted uncomfortably and the boat wobbled again, causing outrage from my crewmates. I didn’t like to think of Helen’s dad implicated in something like this. He was a scary man, but not that kind of scary. Not bad scary. But the sale of that land would mean money, and money was always a powerful motivator, especially if you were desperate.

The sound of a boat engine cut into my thoughts.

‘Who’s ready to race?’ called Mr van der Merwe, revving the throttle. ‘Boys against girls!
On your marks . . .!
’

VD surged up to the jetty with a roar, and cut his engine, leaping out nimbly to tie his boat to a pole at the shore. ‘Good racing, boys and girls,’ he shouted. ‘Boys out first, please, and in the bus after changing.’

‘Can’t we just go straight home?’ asked Michelle, steering carefully to the right of the jetty.

‘Nuh-uh,’ said Ivor, holding on to his rigging, his blade held high. ‘Us athletes have got to get warm.’

‘Athletes, my butt,’ said Matilda. ‘We would have had you at the western bend if it wasn’t for Boris. Without him you lot are just –’

‘Oi-oi!’ interrupted Arns. ‘Steady on! We won the regatta last year against six other crews!’

‘Whatever,’ muttered Matilda.

Michelle climbed out of the boat and held it against the jetty while the rest of us unclipped our blades from the rigging and untied our feet from the footboards. She shot a look up at Ivor, but I noticed it was an
I’ll keep you warm
kind of look and not an
oh go to hell, you arrogant pig
kind of look.

Interesting.

*

By the time we’d finally got our boat on the rack, it seemed the boys were mostly in the bus already. The O’Connellys, Hilary and I stood shivering outside the changing room.

‘Where’s Michelle?’ I asked.

‘She stayed dry,’ said Siobhan. ‘Probably already on the bus.’

‘Hurry up, you guys!’ called Sinead to the girls in the changing room. ‘We’re gonna catch our death out here!’

‘Specially if there are wild animals in this park,’ called Kelly Sheridan from safely inside. She did a hollow laugh, then Matilda did a leopard noise while Jessica asked what rhinos sounded like.

I got to my feet and paced up and down, my eyes staring into the shadows. ‘Our parents are going to be worried!’ I fretted. ‘It’s really late!’

‘You can call your mum from my mobile,’ suggested Hilary. ‘Go to the far door for better reception. Don’t worry about the leopard, Tatty. Leopards are shy, solitary creatures and are hardly going to come down to a noisy boathouse, yeah?’

‘Yeah,’ I said uncertainly. I knew I should believe her because they wouldn’t let us roam around if it wasn’t safe but still . . . I took the phone from her with a thank you and felt my way down the boathouse in the dark. ‘They need lights in here,’ I grumbled to myself. On the other side
of the building it seemed darker than ever, an old rowboat only just visible in the shadows. I looked around nervously for vicious animals, though I wouldn’t have been able to see an elephant in this light.

I pressed a button on the phone and it made a little
blip
noise in the night air. Then suddenly the boat beneath me was rocking wildly. I spun in fright, dropping the phone to the ground and saw two pairs of eyes staring back at me in the pitch black night.

‘AAAAAAAAAAARGH!’ I yelled, frozen to the spot. ‘AAAAAAAAAAARGH!’

The two pairs of eyes winked back and went, ‘AAAARGH!’ and, ‘EEEEE!’ in total terror.

The sound of thundering feet came from all directions.

‘Oh, geez!’ I squeaked, staring into the boat. ‘
Who is that?
You scared the crap out of me!’

‘
WHAT IS GOING ON OUT HERE?
’ roared Mr VDW, skidding to a halt beside me.

He had a powerful torch in his hand, and swung the beam into the rowboat.

I gasped.

He gasped.

Michelle Wong (virtually naked) gasped.

Ivor Markman (like, totally naked) gasped.

The whole girls’ crew now at our sides gasped.

‘Oh, frik!’ I said.

*

Mr van der Merwe was apoplectic with rage. We were in the minibus and he was yelling about the youth of today, trust, teamwork and the evils of the pleasures of the flesh. He was threatening to report Michelle Wong and Ivor Markman to their respective principals for lascivious behaviour.

‘Why the hell did you have to go yelling your head off?’ hissed Kelly Sheridan to me. ‘Are any of us having a good time now, huh?
Any of us?
’

‘You think I did this for a
good time
?’ I hissed back, outraged. ‘I was genuinely terrified out there! You didn’t see their eyes! Staring at me in the dark like wild animals!’

‘Wild animals,’ mused Fat Angus. ‘Michelle Wong and Ivor Markman. Who would have thought.’

‘Did anyone see that coming?’ I asked. ‘Is this, like, a rowing thing?’

‘
No one
saw that coming,’ whispered Hilary. ‘She’s the smallest girl in our school and he’s got to be the biggest in theirs.’

‘We rowers have standards,’ said Jessica primly. ‘And boy rowers do NOT come up to scratch.’

‘Hn,’ said Arns.

I looked over at him. He looked back at me. Nobody said anything. Nobody said anything the whole way home.

‘What’s wrong, Lu?’ asked Carrie, bumping me with her hip as we walked down the corridor. ‘We’ve got a free period right now! An hour to chat in the library!’

‘She’s bummed because the whole rowing squad hates her, and the Port Albert Regatta is on Sunday and they have no cox,’ explained Alex.

‘Are you being rude?’ asked Tam.

‘Rude how?’ Alex looked confused.

‘Cox, Tam. C O X,’ I spelled out. ‘The person who yells instructions and steers the boat.’

‘Ohhh!’ said Tam. ‘I thought little Shelli Wong was your steerer.’

‘
Was
,’ I said.

‘Till Lu bust her and Studly Ivor making out after dark at the boathouse last Friday,’ chipped in Alex.

Carrie sighed. ‘Didn’t know he was a rower. So fit . . . Tatty, you sure none of those rowers is boyfriend material for, like, me, yes?’

‘Extra specially doubly sure,’ I said, my eyes big with the emphasis. ‘Don’t go there, Carrie. Don’t go there, anyone.’

‘Easy for you to say,’ sighed Tam. ‘You with big handsome Jack.’

‘I don’t feel like I am
with
him,’ I replied.

‘Nooo!’ said the girls in unison as we swung into the library.

‘Find yourselves a desk, please, girls, and I want to see you doing your book reports, not chatting,’ called Miss Fitzroy.

‘Back corner,’ said Alex out of the corner of her mouth. ‘But don’t run.’

We hustled and got the best desk for nattering.

‘How’s it going with Gavin Healey?’ I asked Alex. ‘You never talk about him.’

‘Huh,’ said Carrie. ‘They probably never talk to each other. What
have
you two got in common?’

‘An interest in crime scenes, for one,’ said Alex, arching an eyebrow and pulling out her pencil case. ‘He has to wear this kind of special suit if he’s doing crime-scene clean-ups, just like in the movies, and –’

‘I get it,’ said Carrie. ‘No one can resist a man in uniform.’

We snorted with laughter, even Alex, at a boiler suit being even remotely attractive.

‘I like the fact that he goes sailing,’ said Alex, twinkling, ‘even though that’s totally pretentious of me.’

‘It is,’ said Carrie definitely. ‘Does he go down to Port Albert?’

‘No, actually,’ said Alex, thinking. ‘Though that’s weird. They’ve got a boathouse down at Saddler’s Pond . . .’

‘Prime property,’ I noted. ‘And I should know.’

‘Hmm,’ said Tam, eyeing Alex. ‘I bet the real attraction is that your mum would rather you were dating a boy
from St Alban’s instead of someone who does crime-scene clean-ups.’

Alex squirmed and we laughed at her discomfit.

‘And what’s with Jack?’ Tam asked me. ‘You don’t sound convinced, but you two are perfect together.’