Jake Cake: The Robot Dinner Lady

by Michael Broad

  Michael Broad spent much of his childhood gazing out of the window imagining he was somewhere more interesting.

  Now he's a grown-up Michael still spends a lot of time gazing out of the window imagining he's somewhere more interesting – but now he writes and illustrates books as well.

  Some of them are picture books, like Broken Bird and The Little Star Who Wished.

  Books by Michael Broad

  JAKE CAKE: THE ROBOT DINNER LADY

  JAKE CAKE: THE WEREWOLF TEACHER

  Michael Broad

  PUFFIN

  This book is dedicated to my friend David

  PUFFIN BOOKS

  Published by the Penguin Group

  Penguin Books Ltd, 80 Strand, London WC2R 0RL, England

  Penguin Group (USA) Inc., 375 Hudson Street, New York, New York 10014, USA

  Penguin Group (Canada), 90 Eglinton Avenue East, Suite 700, Toronto, Ontario, Canada M4P 2Y3 (a division of Pearson Penguin Canada Inc.)

  Penguin Ireland, 25 St Stephen's Green, Dublin 2, Ireland (a division of Penguin Books Ltd)

  Penguin Group (Australia), 250 Camberwell Road, Camberwell, Victoria 3124, Australia (a division of Pearson Australia Group Pty Ltd)

  Penguin Books India Pvt Ltd, 11 Community Centre, Panchsheel Park, New Delhi – 110 017, India

  Penguin Group (NZ), 67 Apollo Drive, Mairangi Bay, Auckland 1310, New Zealand (a division of Pearson New Zealand Ltd)

  Penguin Books (South Africa) (Pty) Ltd, 24 Sturdee Avenue, Rosebank, Johannesburg 2196, South Africa

  Penguin Books Ltd, Registered Offices: 80 Strand, London WC2R 0RL, England

  penguin.com

  Published 2007

  6

  Copyright © Michael Broad, 2007

  All rights reserved

  The moral right of the author has been asserted

  Except in the United States of America, this book is sold subject to the condition that it shall not, by way of trade or otherwise, be lent, re-sold, hired out, or otherwise circulated without the publisher's prior consent in any form of binding or cover other than that in which it is published and without a similar condition including this condition being imposed on the subsequent purchaser

  British Library Cataloguing in Publication Data

  A CIP catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library

  ISBN: 978-0-14-194555-2

  A Robot

  Some Goblins

  And a Witch

  In class before dinner time one of two smells will waft under the door: either the delicious smell of chips or the rotten stink of cabbage.

  If it's chips you know it'll either be burger and chips, fish fingers and chips or pizza and chips. But if it's cabbage you know it'll either be mince and cabbage, liver and cabbage or even cabbage and cabbage (if you don't join the queue early!).

  Today it was cabbage, which didn't come as a huge surprise because it had been cabbage for the past two weeks and I was beginning to forget what chips smelled like!

  Mrs Brown the new dinner lady was to blame. She'd taken over the school kitchen exactly two weeks ago and not a single chip had been seen since then. As the dinner bell rang and a dozen chairs scraped the floor, the thought of yet another plate of steaming, green mush made me groan loudly and flop forward on my desk in protest.

  ‘JAKE CAKE!’ yelled Mrs Winter. ‘Have your batteries run down?’

  ‘No, Mrs Winter,’ I said, lifting my head a fraction. Mrs Winter is our science teacher, so she'd probably know if my batteries had run down, and if they had, she'd probably clip wires to my ears and charge me up again.

  ‘Good! Then you won't mind taking this note to Mrs Brown immediately!’ she said, scribbling frantically in her notepad and waving the square of paper in the air.

  As I dragged myself up to the front of the classroom and took the note I noticed a mischievous look on Mrs Winter's face, and when I got outside and read the note I found out why!

  This is what it said:

  Dear Mrs Brown,

  Could you please give Jake Cake a double helping of cabbage and make sure he eats every last morsel. The poor boy's energy levels were dreadfully low in class today and therefore he's clearly in need of more delicious green vegetables!

  Yours sincerely

  Mrs Winter

  P.S. Jake, it is very rude to read other people's notes!

  I should have known better than to mess with Mrs Winter. She's the one who made me stay behind after school for making up stories about headless horsemen playing polo on the football field (I didn't make it up, it really happened! But I'll tell you about that another time).

  In the canteen all the kids looked miserable as they carried cabbage-heavy plates to their tables, and towering above everyone was Mrs Brown,

  merrily slopping out the soggy green leaves from a large vat at her side.

  She was very tall and very wide, like a tank in a dress.

  I sighed heavily and passed the piece of paper to Mrs Brown.

  ‘MORE CABBAGE!’ she boomed excitedly, and ladled a giant helping of stinky green leaves on my plate. ‘MORE CABBAGE GOOD!’

  I mumbled a reluctant, ‘Thank you,’ and was about to move away when Mrs Brown gripped my arm in a vice-like grip.

  ‘MORE CABBAGE!’ she boomed again, and continued to fill my plate.

  Mrs Brown went on filling my plate until eventually the cabbage mountain grew so large it started spilling over the side, and still she piled it on. Stiff green leaves with thick white veins, soggy yellow leaves that were limp and mushy, great chunks of the-white-bit-in-the-middle that makes a horrible crunching sound in your mouth. Every disgusting part of the cabbage tumbled on to my plate, over the edge and on to the floor in a great green fountain of foulness.

  The plate was so heavy it swayed backwards and forwards and, as I tried to steady my hand, I noticed Mrs Brown turn her head to follow it. With one hand clamped to my arm and the other working double time with the ladle, her sights were fixed only on the plate and wherever it moved she followed.

  As her grip on my arm grew tighter and the ladle sped up I knew the only way to escape the cycle of cabbage would be to put my ‘plate theory’ to the test. I would of course get into tons of trouble, but what else could I do?

  The grim determination on Mrs Brown's face left me no choice.

  So I took a deep breath and lobbed the plate over the back of my head.

  I watched carefully as Mrs Brown's eyes widened to track the arc of its flight path. Suddenly she dropped my arm and leapt right over my head after it.

  That dinner lady must have jumped nearly two metres in the air!

  I expected to hear the clattering of my plate hitting the floor, or the splat of falling cabbage, maybe even the thud of a falling dinner lady. But instead I heard a voice, a very loud and very angry voice that silenced the whole canteen.

  ‘JAKE CAKE! WHAT ON EARTH DO YOU THINK YOU'RE DOING?’

  Turning around, I saw all the other kids frozen to the spot with their mouths hanging open. But they weren't looking at the dinner lady, they were looking at Mrs Winter who stood in the middle of the canteen with my plate on her head!

  GULP!

  Shaking with fury Mrs Winter slowly took the plate from her head, swept the food from her face and spoke in a calm, level tone that was somehow even scarier than shouting.

  ‘Jake Cake, will you please go and wait for me in my classroom,’ she said.

  Leaving the canteen with my head hung low, I glanced back at Mrs Brown. She was gazing at her ladle and looking confused. No one was paying her any attention, which meant everyone had been watching the flying plate and no one had been watching the flying dinner lad
y!

  No one would EVER believe what she'd done.

  As I sat on my own in Mrs Winter's classroom

  I tried to piece it all together.

  There was definitely something going on with Mrs Brown. No dinner lady could be THAT into cabbage, and more importantly no dinner lady, not even a really big one, should be able to jump over your head!

  Soon I heard loud angry footsteps making their way down the hall and my heart sank. I guessed Mrs Winter must be really cross to make so much racket. But as the footsteps drew closer and heavier, and the desks and chairs began shaking and quaking, it occurred to me that it might not be Mrs Winter at all… The door exploded inwards and Mrs Brown filled the doorway, a ladle in one hand, a plate in

  the other and the large vat of cabbage strapped to her back!

  ‘JAKE CAKE, MORE CABBAGE!’ she boomed, and stormed into the classroom, bringing most of the door frame with her.

  ‘ARRRRRRGH!’ I yelled and leapt from my desk, but there was nowhere for me to run to. I was trapped in the classroom with a crazed and freakishly strong dinner lady!

  Mrs Brown scooped a great heap of cabbage from over her shoulder, slopped it on to the plate and charged towards me.

  ‘MORE! MORE! MORE!’ came her thundering war cry.

  I stumbled to the back of the class with the dinner lady almost on top of me.

  I hit the wall and pressed my back flat against it. There was nowhere left to go. She had me cornered.

  ‘MORE CABBAGE FOR JAKE CAKE!’ Mrs Brown grinned, and with

  the plate held high she took one final step towards me. But her grin became a confused frown as her shoe slid on a slimy green leaf and suddenly the giant dinner lady was back up in the air again!

  Mrs Brown somersaulted through a shower of green leaves and landed on her bottom! But she didn't land on her bottom with a soft thud. She didn't even land on her bottom with a loud thud. The noise Mrs Brown made as she landed

  on her bottom could only be described as an almighty CLANG!

  I held my breath for a moment because I didn't know what to do. Even though Mrs Brown was big and scary and broke down doors, I was still worried about her. Normally when someone falls over you check to see if they've broken something, but with the noise Mrs Brown made it seemed more likely she had dented something!

  ‘Are you OK, Mrs Brown?’ I asked, carefully moving closer.

  ‘Bzzzzz!’ replied Mrs Brown.

  ‘Have you dented anything?’ I asked, crouching down beside her.

  ‘Wrrrrrr!’ replied Mrs Brown.

  ‘Shall I fetch the school nurse?’ I asked, leaning in closer.

  Suddenly Mrs Brown made a loud bang, sparks shot out of her ears and her head rolled off her shoulders on to the floor with another big CLANG!

  ‘ARRRRRGGGGHHH!’ I screamed, and legged it for the door.

  But I only got halfway before I realized that heads – and bottoms for – that matter – don't make CLANGING! sounds (which is a scientific fact, and Mrs Winter would have been pleased with my observation if she wasn't already angry about the plate of cabbage on her head).

  Feeling almost certain that the only things that made CLANGING! sounds were things made of metal, I went back to Mrs Brown. I picked up the head and studied it. I turned it around in my hands and studied it some more, then I tapped the top of it with the ladle and the dinner lady's head went CLANG! CLANG! CLANG! like a rusty old saucepan.

  Mrs Brown was a robot! A real-life, oil-drinking, non-human ROBOT!

  I had one of two choices. I could either leave the robot dinner lady where she was, without a head, and no doubt get the blame for breaking her and probably get into loads more trouble. Or I could try to fix her and then leg it. Then Mrs Winter would see Mrs Brown on the rampage and would definitely realize that none of it was my fault.

  I found a couple of wires dangling out of Mrs Brown's head so I plugged them back in and screwed the whole thing back on to her shoulders. Her mouth and eyelids made a funny

  clicking sound and flicked open, but she still wasn't moving or saying anything.

  I tried tapping her on the head with the ladle again. My mum bangs the TV when it plays up and it usually works, but nothing happened to the robot.

  As I tap-tap-tapped away on Mrs Brown's head I suddenly became aware of someone standing in the doorway

  (or what was left of the doorway). And there was Mrs Winter, with a mixture of confusion and horror on her face, as she watched me clanging away on the big heap of dinner lady!

  ‘It wasn't my fault!’ I blurted out. ‘She's a robot and she jumped over my head and then broke the door and

  slipped up on the cabbage and then her head fell off and I stuck it back on and…!’

  Mrs Winter waved my excuses away with a flick of her hand, pulled out a set of spanners from her desk drawer and strode towards me and the broken dinner lady.

  ‘If anyone was likely to get into trouble with Mrs Brown I had a funny feeling it might be you, Jake Cake,’ she said, as she unbolted a panel on the robot's back.

  ‘You knew she was a robot!’ I said.

  ‘Of course I knew,’ Mrs Winter chuckled, as she surveyed the mess of robot workings spilling from the dinner lady's back. ‘I have spent the last five years making her.’

  ‘Oh,’ I said, because I couldn't think of anything else to say.

  ‘Oh, indeed!’ said Mrs Winter, pulling at a bunch of loose wires and studying each connection in turn. ‘But it would seem one extra helping of cabbage was all it took to overload her system.’

  ‘So it wasn't really my fault?’ I said.

  ‘Well, you did make her jump over your head, which she wasn't really designed to do,’ said Mrs Winter with a frown. ‘But no, I suppose it wasn't your fault. Something must have got into her system.’

  I watched as Mrs Winter pulled out a small circuit board with dozens of coloured wires attached to tiny coloured circuits and little grey microchips. She traced her finger over the surface until she found what she was looking for.

  ‘AHA!’ said Mrs Winter, pulling out a tiny sliver of green with the tips of her fingers. She studied it closely and sighed. ‘It would seem all my hard work has been sabotaged by a tiny piece of cabbage.’

  ‘But you can make her work again?’ I asked, because when I thought about it I decided having a robot dinner lady was actually pretty cool.

  ‘I suppose I could,’ said Mrs Winter,

  as we dragged the dinner lady into the stationery cupboard. ‘But it would be only a matter of time before another bit of cabbage slithered its way into her system. Robots are very sensitive, you know.’

  As Mrs Winter locked the door I suddenly had an idea.

  ‘Couldn't you programme Mrs Brown to cook something else, something not so slimy?’ I asked, and tried not to sound too excited. Grown-ups get suspicious when kids get excited about something so you have to pretend that you don't really care. ‘Chips wouldn't get into her circuits,’ I suggested innocently. ‘But I don't suppose Mrs Brown is clever enough to cook chips…’

  ‘Clever enough?’ shrieked Mrs Winter, sounding very offended.

  ‘Well, chips are much harder to cook than cabbage,’ I said. ‘They might be too difficult. Mrs Brown is just a robot…’

  ‘Just a robot! I could programme Mrs Brown to make perfect chips if I wanted to!’ Mrs Winter strode over to the blackboard and started mapping out diagrams and calculations to prove her theory. As the chalk scratched and scribbled up and down the board I smiled to myself. It seemed Mrs Winter could be messed with after all!

  The following day Mrs Winter had dark rings round her eyes as though she hadn't had much sleep (in fact she looked as though her batteries had run down), and when the delicious smell of chips wafted under the classroom door I knew why.

  Mrs Winter had spent all night programming Mrs Brown to make perfect chips! She also programmed her not to make cabbage any more just to be on the safe side. And because nothing else got into her
circuit board Mrs Brown never went on the rampage again, which is a shame because now no one ever believes me when I tell them my dinner lady is a robot.

  They just say: ‘JAKE CAKE, DON'T MAKE UP STORIES OR YOUR NOSE WILL GROW LONG!’ But I wouldn't mind a long nose, especially if the smell of chips wafts under the door.

  There's a shed at the bottom of our garden I call the JCHQ, which stands for the Jake Cake Headquarters.

  It's my own private den where I write all the stories, draw all the pictures and file away evidence from my adventures.

  The JCHQ is my favourite place in the whole wide world. The best thing about it is NO GROWN-UPS ARE ALLOWED INSIDE, and Mum and Dad go along with this rule because they say it keeps me out of mischief.

  I spend all my spare time in the JCHQ; all my spare time except for Saturday mornings. I always watch TV on Saturday mornings because there's loads of good stuff on for kids.

  It was a Saturday morning when Mum came into the living room and stood in front of the TV, waving a bucket and a pair of gardening gloves.