a lot of fuss you’re making about probably nothing. It’s most likely a homeless person. You stay here and I’ll go and see. He won’t want a whole Tribe staring at him.’ That was so typical of Fifty’s mum. My mum would have called the police, or my dad at least, but Fifty’s mum is the sort who’ll invite anyone in. She disappeared down the garden.
We waited. We waited for really quite a long time. I was starting to worry about her. Maybe . . .
‘Maybe he’s a murderer. Mum wouldn’t stand a chance,’ said Fifty. He looked like he might cry.
One of us should do something, I thought. Then I changed my thought to: One of the others should do something. I looked at Jonno – surely he would announce a plan to storm the Tribehouse and rescue Fifty’s mum. Shame Copper Pie wasn’t with us – we could have sent him.
At last, voices! They were coming up the path to the house. The tramp had obviously been invited in, as predicted.
‘Dad! What are you doing here?’ shouted Bee.
Curiouser and curiouser. The tramp was Bee’s dad. I don’t know who was most embarrassed – Bee, who was hiding behind her long black fringe, or her dad, who was stuck to the doormat looking like he might reverse straight back out.
‘Why don’t you go back to the Tribehouse while we have a chat?’ said Fifty’s mum.
Fine by us. Me, Fifty and Jonno made it out but . . .
‘Not you, Bee. I think your dad has something he’d like to say to you.’
Back in the Tribehouse, Fifty sat on the safe – his favourite spot.
‘Where do you think he’s been since Wednesday?’ said Jonno.
‘Maybe he’s been here all the time?’ said Fifty.
‘It’ll all be fine now anyway,’ I said.
They both made a how-do-you-know? face.
‘Fifty, your mum earns a living sorting people out, doesn’t she?
He nodded.
‘So, she’ll sort out Bee’s family. That’s what she does.’
And of course she did. When we went back up to the house, Bee had gone home with her dad. I was glad the drama was over because it was only six days till the fair and there was work to do. To organise a successful swap stall and fill and sell one thousand water bombs was going to take all five of us.
five days to prepare the arsenal
My lips were bleeding. So were Fifty’s. They looked dark red, like we’d been kissing vampires – Callum’s description.
The water bombs arrived before I left for school, so we had five days to prepare a thousand. Fifty and me spent morning break and lunch break (apart from the eating part) filling them in the art room. We found a good way to tie the neck of the balloons but it involved forcing the end through the knot and then grabbing it with our teeth and yanking. The combination of the rubber and the water had, after a hundred bombs or more, made our lips raw. By afternoon break we’d had enough. When we got to our patch under the trees, Jonno was on the floor studying the creepy crawlies that he thinks are his friends, Bee was standing cross-armed and Copper Pie (who should have been helping) was messing about with a football.
‘Get in here, Copper Pie,’ Bee yelled, so loudly that the teachers in the staff room probably dropped their coffee cups.
‘Right, Tribers. Today’s Monday. The summer fair’s on Saturday. I asked the Head if we could make posters and she said, “We can’t have everyone plastering the walls of the school in posters, can we?” Is she mad? The Give and Take’ (Bee had adopted my dad’s suggestion) ‘is the only environmentally responsible stall at the whole fair. Exactly how committed is she to the planet?’
Phew! Bee was in motormode.
‘But it won’t work if we don’t let everyone know in advance – they won’t bring anything to swap,’ said Jonno.
‘Exactly,’ said Bee. ‘So what do we do?’
‘Spread the word in the playground,’ said Jonno.
‘Too random,’ said Bee. ‘It’ll be like Chinese Whispers.’
I wasn’t that interested. (And talking hurt my lips too much anyway.) Neither were Copper Pie and Fifty. We let Bee and Jonno rabbit on about how to advertise the swap stall.
‘I’ve got to find someone with slimy lip stuff,’ said Fifty. ‘Any ideas?’
‘You can ask Flo,’ I said. ‘She brings all sorts of pink pots to school.’
Fifty went off, and Copper Pie sloped away too. It wasn’t like him to be so quiet but I wasn’t worried about it. I should have been, but I wasn’t.
four days till the bombs drop
It was all coming together nicely. Bribery was the answer. (But not the sort of bribery that got us in trouble over School Council elections.) No way could me and Fifty fill and tie a thousand water bombs, so we brought in some help. It was his idea. One free water bomb on the day of the fair for each ten filled, tied and put in the bucket. We were giving away the profits but who cared? There were six Year 5s in the art room with us and they worked while we watched.
Fifty’s brain must have been working overtime because he said he’d also solved the swap stall problem. I didn’t get a chance to find out how because Callum poked his head in.
‘What do you want?’ said Fifty.
‘I want to know why you’re playing with the little kids.’ He meant our Year 5 workers.
‘It’s teamwork. Not something you’d know anything about, Hog.’
‘Hog’ is Copper Pie’s name for Callum, because he hogs the ball in football.
‘Looks like a sweat shop,’ said Callum, before he disappeared along the corridor.
‘So how have you solved the swap stall problem?’ I asked.
‘You’ll find out soon enough.’
‘Tell me, now.’
Bee and Jonno poked their heads round the door to see how we were getting on.
‘Tell us what?’ said Bee. She forced the idea out of him.
‘You know the class list?’ said Fifty.
We all nodded. Each class has one. It’s emailed to the parents and has name, address, phone number and email address of everyone in your class so your parents can invite the whole lot to your birthday party even though (in my case) you only like four people.
‘I emailed all the kids in our class who have
