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  Anne Fine was born and educated in the Midlands, and now lives in County Durham. She has written numerous highly acclaimed and prize-winning books jor children and adults.

  Her novel The Tulip Touch won the Whitbread Children’s Book of the Year Award; Goggle-Eyes won the Guardian Children’s Fiction Award and the Carnegie Medal, and was adapted for television by the BBC; Flour Babies won the Carnegie Medal and the Whitbread Children’s Book of the Year Award; Bill’s New Frock won a Smarties Prize, and Madame Doubtfire has become a major feature film.

  Anne Fine was named Children’s Laureate in 2001.

  Other books by Anne Fine

  Books for younger readers

  Care of Henry

  Countdown

  Design-a-Pram

  The Diary of a Killer Cat

  The Haunting of Pip Parker

  Jennifer’s Diary

  Loudmouth Louis

  Notso Hotso

  Only a Show

  Press Play

  The Return of the Killer Cat

  Roll Over Roly

  The Same Old Story Every Year

  Scaredy-Cat

  Stranger Danger?

  The Worst Child I Ever Had

  Books for middle-range readers

  The Angel of Nitshill Road

  Anneii the Art Hater

  Bill’s New Frock

  The Chicken Gave it to Me

  The Country Pancake

  Crummy Mummy and Me

  How to Write Really Badly

  A Pack of Liars

  A Sudden Glow of Gold

  A Sudden Puff of Glittering Smoke

  A Sudden Swirl of Icy Wind

  Books for older readers

  Book of the Banshee

  Goggle-Eyes

  The Granny Project

  Madame Doubtfire

  The Other Darker Ned

  Round Behind the Ice-house

  Step by Wicked Step

  The Stone Menagerie

  The Summer House Loon

  The Tulip Touch

  ANNE FINE

  flour babies

  PUFFIN BOOKS

  To every thing there is a season, and a time to every purpose under the heaven.

  Ecclesiastes 3:1

  PUFFIN BOOKS

  Published by the Penguin Group

  Penguin Books Ltd, 80 Strand, London WC2R 0RL, England

  Penguin Putnam Inc., 375 Hudson Street, New York, New York 10014, USA

  Penguin Books Australia Ltd, 250 Camberwell Road, Camberwell, Victoria 3124, Australia

  Penguin Books Canada Ltd, 10 Alcorn Avenue, Toronto, Ontario, Canada M4V 3B2

  Penguin Books India Pvt Ltd, 11 Community Centre, Panchsheel Park, New Delhi – 110 017, India

  Penguin Group (NZ), Cnr Rosedale and Airborne Roads, Albany, Auckland, New Zealand

  Penguin Books (South Africa) (Pty) Ltd, 24 Sturdee Avenue, Rosebank, 2196, South Africa

  Penguin Books Ltd, Registered Offices: 80 Strand, London WC2R 0RL, England

  www.penguin.com

  First published in Hamish Hamilton Ltd 1992

  Published in Puffin Books 1994

  40

  Copyright © Anne Fine, 1992

  All rights reserved

  The moral right of the author has been asserted

  Except in the United States of America, this book is sold subject to the condition that it shall not, by way of trade or otherwise, be lent, re-sold, hired out, or otherwise circulated without the publisher’s prior consent in any jorm of binding or cover other than that in which it is published and without a similar condition including this condition being imposed on the subsequent purchaser

  British Library Cataloguing in Publication Data

  A CIP catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library

  ISBN: 978-0-14-193612-3

  1

  Mr Cartright swung his legs to and fro under the desk, and raised his voice over the waves of bad-tempered muttering.

  ‘Don’t worry if you feel you can’t give this your full attention now, 4C,’ he said to his new class. ‘I’ll be delighted to go over it again in your break-time.’

  Some of them visibly made a bit of an effort. A few pens were pulled out of a few mouths. One or two of the boys swivelled their heads back from the riveting sight of the janitor painting large white numbers on the dustbins. But, on the whole, the improvement was pitiful. Half of them looked as if they’d left their brains at home. The other half looked as if they didn’t have any.

  This year’s 4C. What a shower! Mr Cartright knew most of them well enough already – the Sads and the Bads, the ones who had been despaired of most loudly and often in the staffroom over the last couple of years. Anyone halfway normal (these were called the Lads) had been bagged, as usual, by Mr King or Mr Henderson. And Dr Feltham always snaffled up the Boffins. So far, no one had ever fetched up in 4C by accident.

  The only boy new to the school what was his name, Martin Simon? – was sitting reading quietly at the back. Mr Cartright cheered up a bit. That was a start, then. One of them could read. He must have had worse classes in his time.

  ‘Buck up,’ he told them. ‘This shouldn’t take all day. I’ll run through the choices one last time, and then you’ll have to vote. You can carry on eating your voting paper, George Spalder, but I’m not giving you another. Now pay attention, everyone.’

  Shifting his vast bottom round, he tapped the blackboard on which, five minutes earlier, he’d chalked up the options Dr Feltham had given 4C for their contribution to the school Science Fair,

  textiles

  nutrition

  domestic economy

  child development

  consumer studies

  reciting them aloud again, for those who had trouble with reading.

  A swell of grumbling rose over the fidgets and whispers and shuffling feet, and the creak of chairs being tipped back dangerously on two of their four legs.

  ‘It isn’t fair, sir.’

  ‘Boring!’

  ‘You can’t call that lot Science. It’s not right.’

  ‘I don’t even know what half of them mean.’

  To oblige Russ Mould, Mr Cartright read them off again, this time translating as he went along,

  sewing

  food

  housekeeping

  babies and so forth

  thrift

  Russ Mould was as baffled as ever.

  ‘Frift? What’s frift?’

  Mr Cartright chose to ignore him.

  ‘For God’s sake, 4C,’ he said. ‘Pull yourselves together. I know most of you have the boredom thresholds of brain-damaged gnats, but surely one of these topics must interest you more than the others. Whichever it is, copy it down on the paper. And do try to get the letters more or less in the right order, Russ Mould, so I can read it. I’m coming round now to collect them.’

  Another mutinous wave rose up to greet him.

  ‘Stupid!’

  ‘Just trying to pick on us…’

  ‘Sewing! Housekeeping!’

  ‘Excuse me. We’re Table 14 in the Science Fair. Come and look at our nice sewed-on buttons.’

  ‘Dead interesting. Oh, yes!’

  ‘I bet you’ve never seen a sewed-on button before.’

  ‘What’s the point in doing things if anyone can do them?’

  ‘Frift!’

  It was Sajid Mahmoud who voiced the general complaint in the most coherent fashion.

  ‘It isn’t fair. They’re not real Science, are they? None of them. Why can’t we do the exploding custard tins?’

  Instantly, it was as if the whole lot of them had been let out of a cage.

  ‘Yes! They were great!’

 
‘Dead brilliant.’

  ‘Hooper’s brother nearly burned his hand off.’

  ‘Chop lost an eyebrow.’

  ‘Grew back different.’

  Rick Tullis was leaning so far over his desk, it was likely to topple over.

  ‘Or making soap, sir!’

  ‘Yes! The soap factory!’

  ‘Fuller ate his lump for a dare.’

  ‘Sick eight times.’

  ‘We had a good laugh.’

  ‘Should have seen his face. Pale as a maggot!’

  At this, Philip Brewster unleashed a fresh hue and cry round the room.

  ‘Yes! Maggots!’

  ‘Maggot farm!’

  ‘Yes! Why can’t we do the maggot farm?’

  ‘There was one last year. And the year before.’

  ‘My mum wouldn’t even look at it. She said it was disgusting.’

  ‘That bully Fletcher was put in charge of running it.’

  ‘He practically had the maggots trained by the last day!’

  Mr Cartright shook his head. It saddened him to have to dampen enthusiasm in any educational sphere. But facts are facts, especially in a school.

  ‘May I invade your privacy for a moment, Sajid, to ask if you happened to pass the Physics exam at the end of last term?’

  Sajid scowled horribly.

  ‘No, I didn’t, sir.’

  ‘And you, Rick. Did you pass Chemistry?’

  Rick Tullis laughed. And so did everyone who’d been in last year’s Chemistry class along with Rick Tullis.

  Mr Cartright turned to Philip, who was still bright-eyed at the thought of running the Maggot Farm.

  ‘Philip? Any luck with Biology?’

  Philip’s expression soured.

  ‘I didn’t even bother to come in and take it, sir. No point.’

  Mr Cartright sighed.

  ‘Well, there you have it in a nutshell, I’m afraid, 4C. No one is here by accident.’

  At the back, suddenly, the new boy, Martin Simon, spoke up for the first time.

  ‘I think I might be, sir.’

  But Mr Cartright, in full flow, ignored the interruption.

  ‘And therein lies the explanation of why, sadly, this class can’t do the Exploding Custard Tins. In the absence of total confidence in your skills and commitment, Dr Feltham has entrusted us only with nice, safe and easy topics. Exploding Custard Tins have been reserved for those who passed Physics at the end of last year.’

  His eye roved over eighteen sullen faces and one rather intrigued one.

  ‘Did anyone here pass Physics?’

  The new boy raised his hand. Otherwise, no one stirred. And since Martin Simon was pretty well out of everyone’s line of sight, in the back row, Mr Cartright chose not to let his one waving arm detract from the dramatics of the occasion.

  ‘Anyone pass Chemistry?’

  Again, Martin Simon’s hand shot up in the air, to be totally ignored by Mr Cartright. Otherwise, nothing much happened.

  ‘Goodbye, Soap Factory,’ Mr Cartright said. ‘How was our record in Biology? Anyone have any luck there?’

  Martin Simon’s arm waved, a lone reed over the silt of the rest of 4C’s academic hopes. For the third time, Mr Cartright pretended not to see it.

  ‘So,’ he said flatly. ‘No Maggot Farm for us.’

  He spread his huge chalky hands.

  ‘You can’t say you weren’t warned,’ he told them. ‘I fetch my coffee from the staffroom. I have ears. Mr Spencer, Mr Harris, Mr Dupasque, Miss Arnott. They all said it, more than once. “I’ve warned them over and over,” they all said. “If they don’t work, they’ll end up in 4C.” And here you are.’

  ‘You can’t help it if you’re stupid,’ George Spalder argued.

  ‘If you were stupid enough to be in 4C, you’d be on a life-support system,’ said Mr Cartright tartly.

  ‘So what are we doing here?’

  Mr Cartright turned biblical.

  ‘You’re reaping as ye sowed. And, speaking of sewing, will you please get on and vote. What’s it to be? Textiles, nutrition, domestic economy, child development or consumer studies?’

  ‘I’m not voting for none of them,’ said Gwyn Phillips. “They’re all stupid.’

  Having a sneaking sympathy for this point of view, Mr Cartright said nothing. But when George Spalder added,

  ‘Girls’ things, that’s what they are!’ he felt obliged to put 4C right.

  ‘Don’t kid yourselves. While you lot are sitting here grumbling, girls all over the country are making soap,farming maggots and exploding custard tins. They’re studying Chemistry, Biology and Physics. To the Victor the Spoils now. And they passed exams.’

  Then, tiring suddenly of the whole boiling, he started striding up and down the rows of desks, chivvying them into voting. ‘Get on with it, Robin Foster. Hurry up, Rick. What difference is it going to make to you? According to Miss Arnott, you hardly ever come to school anyway. Thank you, Tariq. Everyone look at Tariq. He is an example to you all. He chose. He wrote it down, not neatly exactly, but clear enough to read. And now he’s dropped his voting slip in my tub. Thank you, Tariq. Thank you. And thank you, Henry. No need to flick it in. Thank you, Russ. Thank you. Thank you, Martin, and I hope you’ll be very happy wi –’

  Mr Cartright broke off. For it was clear the new boy wasn’t even listening. As Mr Cartright’s shadow fell across his desk, he’d simply pulled the forefinger of his right hand out of that ear for a moment, picked up his neatly written vote, and dropped it in the plastic tub. At no point had he so much as glanced up from his book.

  Mr Cartright was mystified. Gently, he prised Martin Simon’s fingers out of his ears, and asked him:

  ‘What are you doing?’

  Now the boy was equally confused.

  ‘Reading, sir.’

  ‘Reading? Reading what?’

  ‘Baudelaire.’

  Mr Cartright’s eyes widened.

  ‘Baudelaire?’

  He glanced round the room, hoping for one mad moment that none of his other pupils had heard the exchange. Fat chance of that. They were all sitting, ears on stalks.

  ‘In French or English?’ Mr Cartright asked, thinking to diffuse the tension with a joke.

  Young Martin Simon flushed.

  Mr Cartright swivelled the book round on the desk.

  ‘French!’

  ‘Sorry,’ said Martin Simon automatically.

  Mr Cartright sighed.

  ‘So am I, lad. So am I.’

  There was a pause. Then Mr Cartright said:

  ‘Well? What are you waiting for? Pack your book bag. Off you go.’

  Martin Simon looked up in astonishment.

  ‘Go where, sir?’

  ‘Anywhere. I should think a lad like you could take your pick. You could try Mr King’s class. Or Mr Henderson’s. I bet either of them would be happy to have you.’

  ‘But why?’

  Mr Cartright settled his huge rear end companion-ably on Martin Simon’s desk. For an intelligent lad, he thought, he wasn’t acting too bright.

  ‘Look at it this way,’ he told him. ‘You can’t stay here. For one thing, you can read. You’ll be right out of place here from that alone. Then there’s the other problem. You read French.’

  He waved a hand airily round the room, to draw in the others who were sitting there staring.

  ‘I expect there’ll be quite a lot of language in this classroom,’ he explained. ‘I, for one, have a temper. Then there’s the colourful patois of our local housing scheme to be contended with. And Tariq here, I’m told,swears in three separate sub-continental dialects. But no one speaks French.’

  He shifted on the desk.

  ‘No,’ he said. ‘I’m afraid you’ll have to go.’

  A thought struck him.

  ‘With all those science exams you passed, you could even try Dr Feltham. He might have you.’

  At last Martin Simon seemed to grasp the point. Rising to his feet, he start
ed shovelling the few possessions he’d unpacked back into his book bag.

  Mr Cartright caught the rather regretful expression on the boy’s face.

  ‘I’m sorry about it too, lad,’ he said. ‘But, believe me, it’s for the best. You wouldn’t fit in here. There’s been some mistake.’

  Martin Simon nodded.

  ‘Ask at the office,’ Mr Cartright advised, walking him to the door. ‘Tell them they’ve got it all wrong, and you can’t come back here. I won’t have you. You don’t belong.’

  He saw him off on the long trek down the green corridor.

  ‘Goodbye, lad,’ he called out wistfully after him. ‘Good luck!’

  He swung the door closed and turned to face the rest with iron determination.

  ‘Right!’ he said. ‘Put that scarf away, Sajid. Are you eating, Luis Pereira? Spit it out in the bin. Look how much time we’ve wasted. I warn you, I’m getting this finished before the bell rings.’

  With any other class, he might have managed it. But what with two of the tellers he chose not being all that good at counting, and the constant delays as people

  criticized each way of tallying (‘You can’t count Rick’s vote, sir! He’s never here!’), there wasn’t time to do it properly. Even before the third recount was complete, Robin Foster and Wayne Driscoll were eyeing him with their imaginary stop-watches raised, and lips pursed round their non-existent whistles.

  It was almost Time…

  Mr Cartright slid his vast bulk off the desk on to his feet. Not for nothing was he called Old Carthorse behind his back.

  ‘Hush up!’ he bellowed, cutting directly through all the layers of noise at once. ‘That’s it! I’ve had enough! The bell’s about to ring, and we’re wrapping this up one way or another. I warn you, 4C, the very next boy responsible for any noise in this room – any noise at all – will have to dip his hand in this tub and take out a voting slip, and whatever it says on that goes.’

  The silence was instant and total. High fliers they might not be, but every one of them was bright enough not to fancy the idea of being blamed by all the rest for three solid weeks of work on some project cruelly designed by Dr Feltham to bring out the latent interest of things like sewing or cooking or housekeeping.

  It seemed no one dared breathe. Mr Cartright could even hear the warble of a songbird outside on the guttering.