The Butterfly Club Read online

  She was only joking, but Alistair shut up quick. I carried on writing word after word until the very last one – finished!

  ‘There, Tina. I’m glad you attempted each and every one. Hand me your workbook and I’ll check them through at lunch time. Now, everyone, let’s turn to arithmetical matters. Multiplication and division!’

  They were two of my spelling words. I thought I knew how to spell them properly now, but I still struggled terribly doing multiplication and division, and I definitely needed Alistair’s help.

  ‘There were some truly awesomely difficult spellings on that list,’ he said. ‘I think I might have struggled with one or two.’

  ‘One or two!’ said Mick. ‘I could hardly do any.’

  ‘How many do you think you got right, Tina?’ Peter asked.

  ‘Bet you hardly got any right – you’re a hopeless speller,’ said Kayleigh nastily.

  Selma said nothing at all. She wouldn’t even look at me. It was as if I didn’t exist any more. I noticed she wasn’t wearing the special bracelet I’d made for her.

  The moment the bell went for lunch she rushed out of the classroom. But we rushed too – Phil and Maddie and me. She was much quicker than me, but Phil nearly caught her up – and Maddie went charging past and cornered her.

  ‘Now listen here, Selma. You’ve got our Tina’s Baby and you’ve jolly well got to give her back!’ said Maddie.

  ‘Don’t know what you’re talking about,’ she said.

  ‘Yes you do!’ Phil puffed. ‘Tina saw you holding her little china doll.’

  ‘That was my one. I flushed her little dolly down the toilet,’ said Selma.

  ‘It was my Baby, Selma – I saw where I’d crayoned on her. I know she was mine,’ I said.

  ‘Yeah, but you also know I threw her away. So make up your mind, stupid Little Bug,’ said Selma, and she suddenly dodged round Maddie and ran for it down the corridor.

  ‘It was Baby, I know it was,’ I said sadly.

  ‘We could go after her and bash her,’ said Maddie.

  ‘No we can’t. You know we can’t hit people – and besides, Selma might hit back even harder,’ said Phil. ‘Oh dear, poor Tina. Still, at least you’ve got New Baby now.’

  ‘And New Baby has real clothes. She’s much more fun to play with,’ said Maddie.

  ‘Yes,’ I agreed. Privately I didn’t think New Baby was a patch on my old Baby, but I couldn’t say that as they’d bought her for me as a special Christmas present. And I didn’t really want to think about any Babies, old or new. I was too worried about the results of my spelling test.

  ‘I’m scared I haven’t got any of the words right,’ I said in a tiny voice.

  ‘Of course you have. I bet you get nearly all of them right,’ said Phil. ‘You did ever so well in our tests.’

  ‘Yes, but Miss Lovejoy muddled up the list. I didn’t know where I was. And I couldn’t sing the spellings out loud – it wasn’t the same doing them inside my head. What if I’ve got them all wrong?’

  ‘You must have got some of them right,’ said Maddie. ‘You’re such a worry-pot, Tina.’

  ‘I just so want to get compost and plants for the butterfly garden,’ I said.

  ‘You’ve already got heaps of money from the cake sale and the Christmas fete. And you know Grandad will give you money even if you don’t get any spellings right,’ said Maddie.

  I was so worried about it that I could hardly eat any of my lunch, even though Mum had put in little red cheeses and a tiny bunch of grapes and a banana sandwich and baby pots of strawberry yoghurt as special going-back-to-school treats.

  Miss Lovejoy had said she’d mark my spellings at lunch time, but when we went back into the classroom for afternoon school she didn’t even mention them! She just got stuck into lessons immediately.

  I could barely concentrate. I wondered about sticking my hand up and asking her outright, but I couldn’t summon the courage. I just sat there miserably, with all the spelling songs jangling around in my head.

  But ten minutes before the bell was due to go for the end of school Miss Lovejoy suddenly clapped her hands. ‘Right, put your books away, children, and sit up straight. I have an announcement to make.’

  We all did as we were told, wondering what was going on.

  ‘Now, I don’t expect you’ve failed to notice that Tina Maynard here is rather keen to establish a butterfly garden at school,’ said Miss Lovejoy.

  There were a few giggles and groans.

  ‘Tina and Selma have worked very hard digging up the patch of earth at the end of the playground,’ she went on.

  I glanced at Selma. Her head was bent. Perhaps she wasn’t even listening.

  ‘They’ve raised a considerable sum of money already. I decided to help Tina by sponsoring her in a spelling test. Tina has always found spelling rather a challenge . . .’

  I bent my head now too. Perhaps I’d done really badly and Miss Lovejoy was about to brandish my workbook with numerous red crosses and the whole class would laugh at me. I longed to be sitting in between Phil and Maddie so they could hold my hands.

  ‘Tina sat the spelling test this morning and now I have marked it. I want you all to guess how many spellings she has got right,’ said Miss Lovejoy.

  ‘None!’ said Kayleigh.

  ‘I’m sure she’s got at least half right, maybe more,’ said Phil.

  ‘She should have got lots and lots right – she worked so hard at it all holiday,’ said Maddie.

  ‘Perhaps she got seventy-five per cent correct?’ suggested Alistair.

  ‘I’m afraid you’re all one hundred per cent wrong,’ said Miss Lovejoy, ‘because Tina has got one hundred per cent of her spellings right!’

  I looked up, a little dazed. I wasn’t totally sure what she meant. She didn’t mean . . . she couldn’t mean . . .

  ‘Yes, Tina! You got every single spelling right, all fifty words!’ she said.

  Everyone gasped and clapped. Phil and Maddie cheered.

  ‘I feel like cheering too,’ said Miss Lovejoy. ‘You’ve done extremely well. I’ve shown your workbook to all the other teachers. They’ve felt inspired to sponsor you too. My handbag is quite weighed down with all their donations. And I am going to keep my word. Fifty correct spellings equals a whole twenty-five pounds!’

  Chapter Twenty-One

  I CONFERRED WITH Miss Lovejoy. We decided to spend most of the generously donated money on compost as it was still too early in the year to buy plants. She went to the garden centre straight after school and bought ten big sacks, and then, the next day, parked her car beside the garden so we didn’t have to drag the heavy sacks too far. There was no sign of Selma in the playground. Miss Lovejoy had to get some of the big boys to unload the sacks.

  ‘We’ll start digging in the compost at lunch time,’ she said.

  ‘Thank you soooo much, Miss Lovejoy,’ I said.

  When the bell rang for lunch, Selma rushed off with the others.

  ‘Selma!’ Miss Lovejoy called. ‘Where are you going?’

  ‘I don’t think she wants to do the garden any more,’ I said, ‘but it’s all right. I’ll do all the digging, I don’t mind.’

  ‘Did you hear that, Selma?’ said Miss Lovejoy. ‘Do you think Tina will manage the digging by herself?’

  Selma shrugged. ‘You’ll help her, miss.’

  ‘Miss Lovejoy. I’ll only be able to dig for a little while. My back’s still playing up and I have to be very cautious. You’re the expert digger, Selma. So strong. Ten times stronger than little Tina here. Don’t you want to help her?’

  ‘She don’t want me to,’ said Selma.

  ‘Don’t be silly, of course she does. And I want you to dig too. So come along.’

  The three of us went out to the garden and started digging the compost in, bag by bag. It was long, slow, heavy, messy work. I had to rest every few minutes so I didn’t get too tired. Selma did most of the digging, getting so hot she had to take off her coat an