Elspeth Hart and the School for Show-offs

by Sarah Forbes

  Elspeth cleaned all the other floors in the school, finishing with the Great Grand Hall. Finally, she made her way down to the nasty mouse-infested cellar to put away her cleaning things. When she went in she had to hold her nose. The cellar smelled even worse than usual, which meant that Miss Crabb’s assistant, Gladys Goulash, must have been in there recently. Gladys Goulash was even dirtier than Miss Crabb. She only took a bath once a year, just before the annual Look at Us! show.

  Elspeth raced back up the stairs and breathed in clean air in relief. Even though she’d had to do loads of horrible work, it hadn’t been a bad day at all so far. She hadn’t seen evil Tatiana Firensky once.

  But unfortunately for Elspeth, Tatiana Firensky had seen HER.

  Tatiana Firensky was having a tantrum. If you were having a tantrum, dear reader, other people would probably know all about it. You might turn pink or get a bit spluttery, or perhaps, if you were feeling brave, you might do a bit of shouting. But Tatiana’s tantrums were not like anyone else’s.

  On the surface, she stayed very, very calm and kept a fixed smile on her pretty mouth. But inside she was scheming and plotting and coming up with all kinds of evil plans.

  Tatiana was with her two best friends, Octavia Ornamento and Esmerelda Higginsbot, in the Great Grand Hall. She was perched on the best chair she could find, which looked a bit like a throne. Octavia was studying her face in a mirror. Esmerelda was doing the splits and plaiting her long glossy hair at the same time.

  Tatiana cleared her throat, and Octavia and Esmerelda jumped to attention.

  “I have had quite enough,” Tatiana began in her high, clear voice. “I have had enough of that little snot rag poking around our classrooms, dirtying our books with her filthy thumbs.”

  “Do you mean Professor Bombast?” asked Octavia Ornamento, her blue eyes wide. Octavia was not a very bright girl.

  “She means Elspeth Hart,” Esmerelda hissed out of the corner of her mouth.

  “Oh.” Octavia’s eyelashes fluttered as she tried to process this information in her slow-moving brain. “Yes. What are we going to do about her?”

  “That,” said Tatiana from behind gritted teeth, “is why I have called you both here, you useless idiot. We are going to have to stop her in her tracks. I saw her spying on Tim Fitzgibbons earlier. When he was trying to rehearse! Who does she think she is? I wanted to spy on him and she BEAT ME TO IT!”

  “I saw her sneaking into the library last week,” said Esmerelda. “I thought she was supposed to be a kitchen assistant. She’s obviously got ideas above her station.”

  “I think,” said Tatiana, her mouth curling into an evil smile, “that if the little ratbag imagines she can be one of us, we will have to teach her otherwise!” She rapped her long fingernails on the edge of the chair. “And I’ve got the perfect plan. We’ll set a trap in that stinking library. Something that she can’t resist. We’ll give her such a fright that she’ll run away and never come back ever again!”

  Esmerelda gave a little snort, then darted her eyes towards Tatiana to check if she was allowed to laugh. Tatiana stared back at her sternly, then broke into chilling cackles. Octavia joined in, although she still didn’t have a clue what was going on.

  Just then Madame Chi-chi appeared, wearing an enormous purple cloak and even more lipstick than usual.

  “You are all-a supposed-a to be in my Creating a Scene-a class!” she shouted. “Come at once-a!” She hauled Esmerelda and Octavia up by their ears. But she didn’t dare touch Tatiana Firensky. None of the teachers did.

  Tatiana’s father was so important that she could have anyone fired in a flash. She had one of the caretakers sacked last year after he polished the floor and put a rug down in the Great Grand Hall, causing Tatiana to skid across the hall and fall on her bottom.

  Tatiana had simply pulled herself to her feet, given everyone a fearsome look and phoned her father, asking him to file an Official Filthy Rich Complaint on special pink paper. Very soon after, the caretaker disappeared and was never seen again. Nobody messed with Tatiana Firensky. You could never tell when she might strike.

  The next day, it was Elspeth’s job to help out in the classrooms. She had to be in Professor Bombast’s class first thing, but she hid under the stage until the very last minute and then sprinted up the stairs when the bell rang. This meant the show-offs had less time to pick on her. It also meant Elspeth had pink cheeks and sticky-uppy hair from racing to the classroom. But as you know, dear reader, there are much more important things in life than having perfect hair.

  “Late again, you little varmint!” shrilled Miss Crabb from the kitchen, lobbing a rotten potato at Elspeth as she passed.

  Elspeth ducked out of the way just in time and kept running. In her dirty old dress, she stood out among all the show-offs strolling down the corridors in their fancy school uniform. The uniform even had a school crest on the blazer, which was a picture of some frilly pants.

  Elspeth whirled into the classroom so fast she tripped on a bit of sticking-up carpet, making all the show-offs point and laugh.

  “Stupid carpet!” Elspeth muttered under her breath, picking herself up. The carpet looked expensive, but it hadn’t been stuck down properly, because Professor Bombast wanted to save money.

  The whole school was the same. The bits on display, like the Great Grand Hall and the theatre, were beautiful and expensive-looking. That was so the show-offs’ rich parents would be dazzled when they came to visit. But behind the scenes, the showers were full of insects, the kitchens were disgusting and the dormitories were poky and cold. None of the show-offs complained though, because they were all so desperate to be famous.

  “Aha! THERE YOU ARE!” shouted Professor Bombast, striding towards Elspeth. He was a very tall man, almost twice the height of Elspeth, and about one and a half times the height of you, dear reader. Professor Bombast had a shock of curly-wurly black hair and he didn’t like to sit still even for a moment. His pet pit bull, Cutie-pie, didn’t like to sit still, either. He trotted along at Professor Bombast’s ankles wherever he went.

  Like the school, Professor Bombast was a fake. He wasn’t really a professor at all. He had just bought a certificate online saying he was.

  “HAND OUT THESE ESSAYS, WILL YOU, ELSPETH?” he boomed.

  Elspeth nodded and went over to take the pile of papers Professor Bombast was waving at her.

  None of the show-offs paid any attention. Two of them were practising a ballet scene from The Nutcracker. One was crying because he thought a stuffed owl was staring at him. And three of them had started acting out scenes from Mary Poppins in a corner of the classroom. They were all making a terrible noise trying to outdo each other.

  “PAY ATTENTION!” shouted Professor Bombast.

  He marched around the children, giving them all a flick on the ear as he passed.

  They were so shocked that they settled down immediately, although there was a lot of quiet sniffling as Elspeth gave out the papers.

  There was hardly any homework at the Pandora Pants School for Show-offs, but everyone had to write one essay a year. The topic was always “Why Being Famous Is the Best Thing Ever”.

  Elspeth handed Esmerelda Higginsbot her essay. Esmerelda glanced at her mark and didn’t look happy. She pouted at Tim Fitzgibbons.

  Tim Fitzgibbons gave Esmerelda a sympathetic pat on the shoulder, and Tatiana Firensky narrowed her eyes. Elspeth could tell Tatiana got annoyed every time Tim Fitzgibbons was nice to Esmerelda. Elspeth thought it was funny, but she didn’t dare laugh. At least, not in front of Tatiana.

  “Rory Snitter!” Elspeth called out.

  “Here,” mumbled Rory, taking his essay from Elspeth without looking at her. They’d got used to pretending they weren’t friends in front of the others.

  Sometimes Elspeth wondered why Rory was even at the school. He seemed too normal, even a bit shy. She guessed his parents really wanted him to be famous.

  “Octavia Ornamento!”

 
“I am HERE,” declared Octavia. She gave a dramatic bow, and snatched the paper quickly from Elspeth’s hand.

  When Elspeth handed Tatiana Firensky her essay, Tatiana took one look at the paper and shrieked in horror.

  “B! I always get As! Always, always, ALWAYS!” Tatiana shrilled. She tossed back her mane of blonde hair and stepped right up to Elspeth, making her stumble backwards into some bookshelves. “I bet you had something to do with this,” she said. “You’ve changed my mark!”

  Elspeth’s stomach tightened into a knot. She was backed up against the shelves with nowhere to go. Before she could duck out of the way, Tatiana gave Elspeth a shove and one of Professor Bombast’s biggest, oldest, dustiest books fell from the top shelf and…

  GU-DUMPH!

  …whacked her hard on the head.

  The world went black.

  When Elspeth woke up, she was lying on the ground with a circle of curious faces peering down at her. Professor Bombast was prodding her on the arm.

  “Jolly good, she’s still alive!” he said, giving a nervous laugh. “Tatiana, play more … gently in future, won’t you?”

  Tatiana smirked. “Yes, Professor Bombast.”

  Elspeth felt dizzy. She opened her mouth to speak, but no words came out. Instead, as she lay there waiting for the room to stop spinning, a strange tune ran through her head. She hummed it to herself as Rory Snitter and Tim Fitzgibbons pulled her to her feet.

  “One is for sugar, two is for…” Elspeth sang softly. Then she realized the show-offs were watching her and nudging one another.

  “Oh dear! Looks like scribbly-shoe girl’s lost the plot!” Tatiana said loudly, making all the others snigger.

  Elspeth ignored them. She stopped singing out loud and let the tune run through her head instead. Then she tried to look normal before anyone paid more attention to her, but she felt very strange. If you have ever had a bump on the head, dear reader, you will know exactly how she felt.

  By lunchtime, the bump on Elspeth’s head had become enormous – and it was turning a nasty yellowish-purple. People were staring at her. Some children were even whispering and pointing as she walked past. Elspeth hated it. It was very hard to be invisible when everyone was looking at her and talking about her. And to make things even worse, the mysterious tune was still in her head.

  Elspeth wished both the bump and the tune would go away. She rubbed her head nervously as she walked towards Madame Chi-chi’s classroom to prepare for the next lesson – Attention Seeking in General. The problem with Madame Chi-chi was that she had violent mood swings. This meant you never knew whether she was going to hug you or throw something at you.

  Madame Chi-chi had been a famous actress and one of the biggest show-offs of all time during her career. She had starred in Italy’s famous hospital drama, Mamma Mia, Ouchy Ouchy! There were rumours that once she threw a co-star from a speeding train. Elspeth hoped the rumours weren’t true. She knocked timidly on the classroom door.

  “Enter!” came Madame Chi-chi’s commanding voice. Madame Chi-chi was perched on her desk, which looked exactly like a large gold dressing table. She was applying a thick coat of bright red lipstick.

  “Oh. It’s you,” she said, as Elspeth came in. Madame Chi-chi smacked the lid back on to her lipstick. “I shall need you to place all those chairs in a circle,” she continued, “and wipe the board clean. And I hear you’ve been upsetting the other children, so you can scrape all the old chewing gum off the bottom of the desks.”

  “I haven’t been upsetting anyone!” Elspeth protested, but Madame Chi-chi wouldn’t listen.

  Tatiana Firensky did this, Elspeth thought angrily, as she moved the heavy velvet seats around the room. I haven’t done anything to her, and she’s turned everyone against me.

  The door flew open just as Elspeth finished wiping the board, and a stream of shouty, pushy show-offs danced into the room.

  “Ah! My darling little studentios!” Madame Chi-chi clapped her hands. “Tell me, are you ready to show-a-off-a like-a superstars?!”

  “YEEESS!” roared the class.

  Tim Fitzgibbons did a graceful pirouette and Octavia Ornamento leaped off her desk.

  Just as Elspeth was about to sneak out, one of the girls in the front row waved at her. Elspeth’s heart sank. It was Tatiana Firensky. Again.

  “Still wearing those stinky old trainers, Elspeth?” she sneered. “Who actually DRAWS on their own shoes?” Tatiana raised her fountain pen and flicked it towards Elspeth. A massive ink blot appeared on the front of Elspeth’s only dress, and all the show-offs shrieked with amusement. Even Tim Fitzgibbons pointed at her and laughed.

  “You-a go and clean-a up-a.” Madame Chi-chi dismissed her with a wave.

  Elspeth closed the door quietly. The bump on her head throbbed as she hurried upstairs.

  After cleaning the ink off her hands, Elspeth looked around the stuffy attic bedroom in despair. She didn’t have any other clothes to change into. As she dabbed at the mark on her dress with a tissue, Elspeth found herself humming the strange tune again.

  What on earth is it? Why can’t I remember the rest of the words? Elspeth asked herself. She felt sure the tune was connected to her parents in some way. She tried again to remember what they looked like, and felt very sad. Then she thought about how awful Tatiana and her cronies were being, and she felt extra sad.

  “There is no point feeling sorry for yourself,” she whispered. “That won’t help you one bit.”

  But that strange song made Elspeth think about all the other things she must have forgotten. Her memories of life before arriving at the Pandora Pants School for Show-offs were so hazy. Was the song a sign that she was going to get her memory back? Would she be able to figure out what the song meant? It all seemed rather mysterious.

  That night, Elspeth had strange, wild dreams. The song ran through her head over and over, and she could see images of sticky toffee sauce and gobstoppers strangely mixed with the mocking sound of the show-offs laughing at her. She dreamed that she was in a supermarket with two vague figures that must have been her parents, and Miss Crabb was lurking in the background, peering at them from behind a display of baked beans. She woke with a start at six o’clock, sat bolt upright in her wardrobe and listened to the sound of her heart thudding. One is for sugar, she caught herself humming.

  “That song won’t leave me alone,” she said to herself. Elspeth touched her forehead. Had the nasty bump on the head helped her remember a song from when she was little?

  As Elspeth started her chores that morning, she felt very uneasy. Her first job was to polish all the picture frames in the Great Grand Hall, but when she got there it was already full of people. She spotted Professor Bombast instructing workmen to move bits of expensive scenery into the school theatre.

  Of course, thought Elspeth, they’re making the place look good for the Look at Us! show.

  The Look at Us! show was an extra-big and extra-fancy school show. Journalists and lots of Very Important People would come to watch. Professor Bombast barked instructions as two men carefully hung his new portrait over the mantelpiece.

  Elspeth looked at the portrait and tried not to laugh. It showed Professor Bombast in a safari suit, baring his teeth and karate-chopping a giant tiger. But Elspeth knew that he had never fought a tiger. Despite all his wild stories, Professor Bombast had never hurt an animal in his life. Elspeth knew for a fact that the tiger-skin rug in the Great Grand Hall was fake, and had been bought from a shop in Hull. She had overheard Professor Bombast having a whispery phone conversation about it months ago.

  As you know, dear reader, when adults are having whispery phone conversations it generally means they are up to no good.

  Once Elspeth had finished polishing all the picture frames using a pair of Miss Crabb’s old bloomers and some rancid polish, she had to go straight to the kitchens to help with lunch.

  “I just need five minutes,” she muttered to herself. “Just five minutes to think!”
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  But there was no chance of that. In the kitchen, Gladys Goulash was plucking hairs from her chin with tweezers, then flicking the hairs into a pot of soup. Miss Crabb was leaning on the kitchen table having her morning snooze.

  Gladys Goulash and Miss Crabb were alike in many ways. They were both lazy and greedy, and they both thought children were horrible. The only difference was that Gladys Goulash was very stupid, and Miss Crabb was only stupid some of the time.

  Right now, Miss Crabb was twitching and lurching in her sleep, and it looked as though she was going to fall right off her chair and on to the boxes of vegetables lined up beside it.

  She caught herself just in time, waking up with an almighty snort and shouting at the first person she saw.

  “Hurry up and finish scrubbing those dishes, idiot girl!” Miss Crabb yelled at Elspeth.

  “I did them yesterday, Miss Crabb,” said Elspeth. “All the dishes are ready for lunch.”

  “Pah!” Miss Crabb threw a mouldy courgette at Elspeth.

  Luckily Elspeth ducked, so it hit Gladys Goulash on the nose and made her drop her tweezers into the pot of soup. Gladys Goulash peered into the pot and shrugged.

  “Not those dishes, girl,” continued Miss Crabb. “My dishes! The ones from my midnight feast two months ago. I found them under my bed this morning.”

  Elspeth turned round. Stacked up next to the sink was the most disgusting pile of dishes she had ever seen. Mouldy cheese grew on the side of the plates. A rat was nibbling some sticky black leftovers oozing down the side of a bowl.

  Elspeth sighed and set about washing Miss Crabb’s disgusting midnight-feast dishes. While she worked, she hummed the strange tune, to see if she could remember any more words. “Two is for butter, three is for syrup…” Elspeth sang to herself softly.