of a steel mesh. Here Freddy switched on a light.
Pete never felt comfortable in Freddy’s “office”. When you looked at your feet on the steel mesh you could see a gaping black chasm that was at least seven stories deep. And there was always an updraft.
“The weirdest thing happened today!” Pete said when they were both seated on the cushions Freddy had put there.
“Weirder than the rat in your schoolbag?”
“Far weirder than that!”
Pete told his friend in detail what had happened that afternoon in Maggie’s shop. Freddy asked questions about the exact moment that the doughnuts changed into butterflies, about whether there was any sound associated with the changing process, and so on. When Pete had finished, he thought for a while.
“Cool. Well, either there’s a sound scientific explanation (which I can’t figure out) for this phenomenon, or there isn’t. If there isn’t, then it must either be psychokinesis or magic.”
“Psycho what?” As usual, Freddy had lost Pete along the way.
“Psychokinesis. Like that guy who bends the forks and spoons by just looking at them. A load of claptrap. Camera tricks.”
Pete couldn’t believe his ears. “So it must be magic, right?”
“Sure,” said Freddy. “Why not? Let me show you my latest project!”
Pete was a bit disappointed by Freddy’s apparent lack of interest in his story. Did he really believe in magic?
Freddy was always tinkering with some project. Most of them didn’t work, but every now and then he accomplished amazing things. Like the computer he built from a lot of old stuff the bank threw away. For a twelve-year-old it was a pretty neat thing to do, even if he were a genius. The home-made computer sat on a stand in a corner of the office. It looked like a chicken coop full of wires, with a big fan at the back to stop it from overheating. Freddy switched it on. The ancient screen flickered a few times and came to life. It cast a spooky glow on the two boys in the pipe shaft. But Pete still had other pressing matters to discuss.
“Schiz is going to tell the school board to expel me,” he said.
“Bummer,” said Freddy. “What’re you going to do?”
“Don’t know …”
“Why don’t you fire old Schiz? The best form of defence is to attack.”
“Are you crazy? I can’t fire him!”
“Why not? School’s a waste of time anyway.”
Freddy only went to school because everyone expected it of him. He read brainy books on physics and philosophy while he sat on the loo. He even wrote a letter to the New Scientist and it was published.
Pete shook his head.
“Look, you can go to any other public school,” said Freddy. “Just write him a letter and tell him that he’s fired. If you withdraw from his school, he can’t have you expelled.”
He started typing:
Dear Mr Schulz, As the result of recent reports of unprofessional behaviour by you and your staff, and since there have been numerous reports of emotional abuse of pupils in your care (“That should get him thinking,” said Freddy), I have decided to terminate my family’s association with your institution with immediate effect. I’m considering lodging a formal complaint with the Department of Education and will be speaking to other families (“That means me,” said Freddy) about this. If we find enough support, we will demand that you be removed from your post.
Kind regards.
“What’s your dad’s name?” he asked.
“Peter,” said Pete.
“Good, then we don’t have to lie. We’ll write the letter in your name and Schiz will assume it’s from your dad.”
On the bottom line he typed: Peter Smith.
Pete was impressed. “Wow, that’s so cool!”
“I’ll make sure that it’s delivered to him tomorrow – by registered mail,” said Freddy. “The midterm break starts on Monday anyway, so you have two full weeks to find a new school!”
When Pete came home, his father wasn’t there yet. The flat was dark and cold, and the big double bed in the corner was empty.
The remains of the morning’s breakfast were still on the table by the window.
It started to rain, and the gargoyle outside the window spewed a stream of water into the gutter under the roof.
Pete took the newspaper clipping Mrs Burton had given him and carefully placed it in his scrapbook, which he hid in a secret compartment in the bottom of his drawer.
Later, as he lay in his bed looking at the gargoyle outside, he thought about how unusual the day had been. He had actually had first-hand experience of real honest-to-goodness magic. (If Freddy said so, who was he to disagree?) And he was going to be the first kid in known history to fire his school.
Pete smiled, and he was sure the gargoyle smiled back at him.
3
Murder
The wail of police sirens and the high-pitched screech of tyres on asphalt woke Pete rudely at about nine the next morning. Earlier, he had switched off the alarm of his clock, turned over, and gone back to sleep. Freddy had promised to have his letter delivered to Schiz by registered mail, so he didn’t need to go to school.
The morning was dark, the sky low and grey, and a soft drizzle sifted down on the city. His father hadn’t come home the previous night; his bed hadn’t been slept in.
Something was going on outside. Pete opened the window to get a better view of the pavement below. The flashing blue lights of a squad of police cars reflected in the wet shop windows. A crowd of people stood around an ambulance that was parked right in front of the bicycle shop, its back door open. Two men emerged from the shop. They carried a stretcher with a long, white bag on it and eased it into the ambulance.
It was as if a rope had been wound around Pete’s neck, strangling him. Someone had died in the bicycle shop.
It had to be Mr Humperdinck.
Pete ran down the stairs and out into the rain. The feeling of the rope around his neck became worse. He was choking and could hardly breathe.
After the ambulance and the police had left, Pete spent the rest of the day wandering the streets, his brain disconnected from his body and senses. His ears heard the noise of the city traffic around him, his eyes saw the crowds of faceless people on the pavements, his skin was cold and wet from the rain, but these impulses didn’t pass on to his mind.
He was only aware of the immense grief burning in his chest.
Mr Humperdinck was dead.
When
