The Butterfly Club Read online

  ‘Baby!’ I gasped, terrified that she’d break.

  Selma ran fast. She bent down and grabbed Baby. ‘What’s this then?’ she asked, peering at poor Baby. ‘Oh, it’s a little dolly-wolly. Still play with dolls, do you, Little Bug?’

  ‘She’s not a doll, she’s an ornament,’ I said. ‘And watch out, she’s china – she breaks very, very easily. Now give her back!’

  I tried to snatch Baby, but Selma held her up high, miles out of my reach.

  ‘Oh, little diddums wants her dolly-wolly,’ she said, sneering at me. ‘Well, you’re not going to get her! She’s mine now.’

  ‘No she’s not! She’s mine! My gran gave her to me! Give her back!’ I wailed.

  ‘I don’t really want this silly little doll. I think I’ll just throw her away,’ said Selma, taking aim.

  ‘No, don’t!’ I screamed.

  Selma could throw far and make balls bounce really hard.

  If she did that to Baby, she really would shatter.

  ‘You can’t stop me!’ she said, laughing.

  ‘Phil! Maddie!’ I shouted at the top of my voice.

  ‘Your precious sisters aren’t here, are they?’ said Selma. ‘It’s just you and me and funny little dolly.’

  ‘Please don’t throw her!’ I begged, starting to cry.

  ‘Oh, little diddums cry-baby! All right, I won’t throw her.’

  ‘You won’t?’ I said, snivelling.

  ‘No, I won’t. I’ll flush her down the toilet instead!’

  Selma ran into a toilet, slammed the door shut, and then I heard the chain being pulled.

  ‘No no no!’ I screamed.

  ‘Yes yes yes!’ said Selma, coming out of the toilet, grinning.

  ‘You didn’t!’ I cried.

  ‘Oh yes, I did!’

  I rushed into the toilet and stared, hoping to see poor Baby bobbing up and down in the water. But there was no sign of her. Unless . . .

  ‘You’ve just hidden her!’ I said, running out again.

  ‘Oh yeah?’ said Selma. ‘Where?’ She opened both hands. She pulled out her pockets. She opened up her satchel and shook out the contents. She unzipped her pencil case. No Baby anywhere!

  I threw myself down on the cold floor of the girls’ toilets and howled. ‘I’ll tell!’ I wailed.

  ‘Tell all you like. I don’t care,’ said Selma, and she sauntered off, still smiling.

  I stayed where I was, crying. Then I heard hurried footsteps.

  ‘Tina!’ It was Maddie.

  ‘Oh, Tina, what’s wrong?’ gasped Phil, running after her.

  ‘We’ve been looking for you everywhere,’ said Maddie.

  ‘What’s happened?’ Phil squatted down on the floor and put her arm round me.

  ‘Is it that Selma?’ asked Maddie, sitting beside me too. ‘Has she hurt you? We saw her in the corridor and she had this weird smile on her face.’

  ‘She did the most terrible thing ever,’ I sobbed. ‘She flushed Baby down the toilet!’

  ‘She didn’t! Are you sure? Even Selma couldn’t be that hateful!’ said Phil.

  ‘She did, she did, she did!’ I wailed.

  ‘Which toilet?’ said Maddie. ‘I’ll see if I can rescue her!’

  ‘Oh, Maddie, don’t, you’ll get all germy,’ said Phil.

  But brave Maddie risked everything and stuck her hand right down the toilet. ‘She’s not there. She must have been flushed away and down the pipes,’ she said, emerging with a dripping hand.

  ‘Wash your hands! Wash them again and again! And then, when we get home, scrub them even more and dab some Dettol on them,’ said Phil. ‘And you’d better wash your face, Tina, it’s all snivelly. Oh dear, Mum will be starting to worry, wondering where we are.’

  ‘Wait till Mum hears what Selma’s done!’ said Maddie, washing fiercely.

  ‘We can’t tell Mum,’ I cried. ‘She told and told me not to take Baby to school. I’ll get in so much trouble if I tell.’

  Maddie and Phil pondered.

  ‘Yes, I think Mum would be very cross. Perhaps we could tell Miss Lovejoy . . .’ Phil suggested uncertainly.

  ‘She’d be cross too,’ said Maddie. ‘Look how narked she got when Harry brought his football game to school. She confiscated it for a whole week.’

  ‘Well, she can’t confiscate Baby because she’s been flushed away,’ said Phil.

  I started howling all over again, thinking about poor Baby swimming in the sewers.

  ‘Ssh now, Tina. Come on,’ said Phil, washing my face for me. ‘You’d better wash your hands one more time, Maddie. Wash right up your arms and under your nails too.’

  ‘I’ve washed so much they’re getting sore!’ Maddie complained.

  When we ran out across the playground at last, Mum was looking really worried.

  ‘Why are you so late, girls? Everyone else came out a good ten minutes ago.’ She looked at me. ‘Oh, Tina, you’ve been crying!’

  ‘No she hasn’t, Mum. She’s just had her face washed, that’s all,’ Phil said quickly.

  ‘Yes, we’ve all been washing. Look at my hands!’ said Maddie.

  ‘How did you get them so dirty?’ asked Mum.

  ‘We . . . did painting at school. So we got all painty,’ said Phil.

  Mum looked at us all very closely. Her eyes were almost as beady as Miss Lovejoy’s. ‘Something’s happened,’ she said. ‘Did you get into trouble with Miss Lovejoy today?’

  ‘No, Mum!’ we said in unison.

  ‘Then was it Selma again? Is she still picking on you, Tina?’

  I was still a bit too sobby to risk speaking, but I nodded my head.

  ‘Poor Teeny Weeny,’ said Mum, picking me up. ‘Never mind. It’s Saturday tomorrow and you’re going out with Gran and Grandad. You can forget all about school and Selma for a little while. But then, on Monday, I’ll have to have another word with Miss Lovejoy. Oh dear!’

  Chapter Seven

  I WAS SOOOO worried that Gran would want to see our dolls on Saturday. Mum hadn’t yet noticed that Baby was missing, but Gran might. Rosebud’s lap looked very empty.

  ‘I know what we’ll do,’ said Phil. ‘I’ll take one of Rosa’s roses and put it in Rosebud’s hand. Yes – this little one that looks like a rosebud. Then it will look as if that’s what she was holding all the time. Gran will forget that she used to hold a little china baby.’

  ‘She might not forget,’ I said.

  ‘Well, tell you what, let’s put Nibbles and Speedy and Cheesepuff right in front of the dolls,’ said Maddie. ‘They won’t mind us moving their cage. They’d probably like a change of view. And you know how weird Gran is about hamsters. She won’t come anywhere near them, so she won’t be close enough to look at the dolls.’

  ‘Good plan, Maddie!’ said Phil.

  So we carefully moved the hamsters’ cage over to the window, propping it up on top of our old doll’s house.

  ‘There!’ said Maddie triumphantly.

  ‘Brilliant!’ said Phil.

  ‘Squeak, squeak, squeak – we like our slight change of address!’ said Nibbles and Speedy and Cheesepuff.

  ‘But Mum will still notice,’ I pointed out.

  ‘Well . . . not yet,’ said Phil.

  ‘And she’ll be very cross,’ I added.

  ‘Then you’ll just have to cry lots, and she’ll pick you up and give you a cuddle and stop being cross,’ said Maddie. ‘You know how to do it. You’re the World Champion at stopping people being cross.’

  ‘I’ll say!’ said Phil. ‘So cheer up, Tina.’

  I tried hard, but I couldn’t quite manage it. I missed Baby so. Every time I thought of her my eyes went prickly and I couldn’t swallow properly.

  Gran and Grandad arrived and had a cup of coffee with Mum. (Poor Dad has to work at the supermarket most Saturdays.) We had to act as waitresses. Phil carried the tray of coffee because she has the steadiest hands. Maddie carried our juices, because her hands are almost as steady. I carried the p