open his new graphic novel, Snoozer. The stories were ridiculous but very entertaining and Clancy felt an affinity with the main character, who was a bit of an underdog.
Clancy wasn’t surprised when the school bell rang and still there was no sign of his friend. She would never be entered for any punctuality contest, and if she was, well then she would doubtless miss the start.
Ruby finally strolled into her form room just as Mrs Drisco called, ‘Redfort?’
‘Present,’ Ruby called back, as she slid into her seat.
‘Barely,’ muttered Mrs Drisco, pen hovering over the absent box.
But Mrs Drisco wasn’t in the mood to have a long drawn out back-and-forth with Ruby Redfort. It was the first day of a new school year and she didn’t want to start it on a losing streak.
When the bell went for class the students spilled out of their form rooms into the corridor.
‘You look awful tired,’ said Clancy. ‘Something keep you awake?’
‘You could say that,’ yawned Ruby. ‘I’m trying to figure out something, something to do with the window thief.’
‘There are clues?’ asked Clancy.
‘There are always clues,’ said Ruby, ‘it’s just a matter of spotting them and then putting them together. I had a kinda brainwave at four o’clock this morning.’
‘This morning?’ said Clancy. ‘Before school?’
‘Impressive huh?’
‘For you, yeah,’ said Clancy, ‘morning isn’t really your time of day.’
‘Which is why I zonked out on the bench outside Marty’s.’
‘You were sleeping rough?’
‘Clance, falling asleep on a bench for two hours does not constitute sleeping rough.’
‘You feel like hanging out later?’ asked Clancy.
‘Yeah but nah, I have to get into Spectrum, work on my theory.’
‘So what’s the theory?’
‘I’ll tell you when I prove myself right,’ said Ruby. ‘Let’s just say it came to me in a flash.’
Clancy was in a good mood all morning – he had so far been assigned all his favourite teachers and no Madame Loup. He felt there was something about this year that was going to be good – better than the last one anyway. At lunchtime, he queued up in the canteen and managed to get the very last slice of pecan pie. Yes, there was no doubt that this was going to be a good year for him.
He took his tray of food outside to one of the wooden tables arranged under the trees.
‘Hey,’ said Del, ‘I haven’t seen you in a while. You been away?’
‘Nah,’ said Clancy, ‘just laying low.’
‘You need to lay low?’ asked Red. ‘Are you in trouble?’
‘No, nothing like that – more of a lifestyle choice,’ replied Clancy.
Mouse looked at him. ‘I thought your dad didn’t approve of laying low.’
‘Or choices for that matter,’ said Del.
‘Yeah, well, normally no, but he felt I deserved some downtime since I passed my French exam and rescued those Wichitino kids from the forest fire.’
‘Quite the little hero,’ said Del, ‘did you get a medal?’
‘No, but my dad got me a bell for my bicycle,’ said Clancy. ‘He even had it engraved.’
‘Boy, he must have been really proud!’ she said. ‘What do you think he would have given you if you had saved a bunch of puppies as well as just those kids?’
‘Probably one of those little windmill things that you can attach to the handle bars,’ said Clancy.
‘Hey, you never said what you were doing out there in the first place,’ said Mouse.
Clancy was knocked off his guard for only a second before he came back with a convincing enough answer. ‘Ah, it was just a coincidence really. I was mad at my dad and so I biked out to Little Bear Mountain, I was going to camp out, get some space to myself – I have five sisters, you know what I’m saying, but then the fire hit.’ It was part of the truth but not the whole truth, yet they all swallowed it, because why not?
Ruby and Elliot arrived, sat down and the six of them chatted on about vacations and heat-waves and anything else that came up.
‘So we should check out some of these film festival movies, huh?’ said Ruby.
‘Yeah,’ said Clancy. ‘I wanna see the Claw again, I mean it’s a classic, right.’
‘I think it’s lame,’ said Elliot. ‘The Sea of Fish Devils is the one to catch.’
‘Are you crazy, man?’ said Del.
This was a conversation they’d all had over and over since the Twinford Film Festival programme had been announced. In fact, they were still in this exact same conversation as they approached the school gates at the end of the day when something quite unexpected happened. Elliot watched Clancy Crew’s face change from relaxed and kind of cheery to a mask of something approaching horror. He followed his friend’s gaze and instantly knew what the problem was. His eyes flicked back from the object of Clancy’s concern to Clancy. Neither of them said anything and no one else saw, not even Ruby who was busy rootling in her satchel.
‘You know what guys,’ said Clancy, ‘go ahead without me, I think I must have left my table-tennis bat in my locker.’
‘You’re holding it duhbrain,’ said Del.
‘Ah, no, not this one, my good one, I mean I thought I had picked up my good one but this is not it.’ Clancy was beginning to sweat. ‘See you tomorrow,’ he called as he ran back towards the school.
‘That is one seriously mixed-up kid,’ said Del.
Ruby registered precisely none of this; she was far more concerned about making it back to Spectrum so she could test out her new theory.
WHEN CLANCY FINALLY DARED TO WALK OUT OF THE TWINFORD JUNIOR HIGH GATES, everyone had long gone. He took the bus back home and went straight up to his room. He sat down on his bed and took a deep, deep breath. What are you going to do about this Clance?
He jumped when the phone rang. ‘Hullo Elliot.’ He knew it had to be Elliot, he had probably rung about twenty-five times already.
‘Hey,
