by Simon Mayo
Having attempted to do his homework on Sunday afternoon, Itch put away his books and went down to the shed. He and Chloe had got it into reasonable shape, and his father had found alternative homes for the larger gardening items. This meant that his boxed collection could sit on the workbench, and he removed his new lump of rock from his rucksack.
He found his magnifying glass and examined the rock properly for the first time. It wasn’t particularly beautiful but was certainly intriguing. It was darker than he remembered, with both the light and darker browns closer to tan and black. The silvery lines that ran through it looked duller too. It seemed to have retained the heat that Cake had suggested had come from the sun. Itch was puzzled by it, but concluded it was not much of a looker compared with his tin ore. However, if it was uranium, it was 92 on the table, and he needed to start a new box. In time he would group it with the radium clock hands, as they were 88, but all he could find for now was an old cardboard Call of Duty case, and he slid it in, closing the flaps. He placed the box next to the others.
The following morning, just as he and Chloe were about to set off for school, he decided on a whim to check his new stone again. While his sister complained that they would be late, he went out to the shed and opened the cardboard case again.
For a moment he wondered if he had the right rock. It appeared to have darkened further overnight. The lighter shades of brown were catching up with the darker shades, so although the silvery veins were less shiny, the contrast with them was more stark. He had never seen a stone change colour before – he was sure Mr Watkins had always said that rocks never changed colour. Maybe it was the gloom of the shed, he thought, and took it outside. But the sunlight just confirmed the colour change, and Itch stood there in the garden, staring at his puzzle. This was certainly one peculiar piece of rock. Was there a chemical change taking place? Was it reacting to variations in temperature? Maybe it wasn’t a rock at all but something man-made?
He only had questions, but thinking that Mr Watkins might have some answers as he taught geology at A level as well as geography, he put the stone in his rucksack and ran to find Chloe.
6
IT WAS ANOTHER warm day, more summer than spring, and Itch and Chloe Lofte took their usual route to school across the golf course. Itch would have been nervous anyway the first day back after half term, but following the longer, arsenic-enforced break he was quite on edge. Chloe was as reassuring as a younger sister can be.
‘If anything, it’ll give you street cred. Make you more cool. They’ll be like, Oh, he’s one of the sick boys, he was in the greenhouse, he saw Glenacre with puke in her hair. You’ll be fine.’
‘You think so? I get to be cool because we were all sick on each other? Is that how it works?’ Itch was sceptical but still glad he had told Chloe his secret and that she was on his side. He hoped the same could be said for Jack.
* * *
Mr Watkins reversed into his classroom, protecting a mug of tea on his usual pile of books.
‘Hello again, boys! A good break, I trust. Longer than expected, obviously, so our thanks are due to Johnny, Natalie and Debbie for their noble sacrifice in getting us a longer holiday.’
Everyone laughed, and Jack, sitting next to her cousin, nudged Itch and smiled at him. Itch, relieved, smiled back.
Watkins continued, ‘Everyone is now OK, thankfully, but as you’ll have heard, the greenhouse is a goner and the enquiries are continuing. Dr Dart wishes it to be known that if any more posters of Dr Flowerdew’s unfortunate encounter with Craig’s regurgitated lunch appear on notice boards, she will take swift action.’
All the class laughed again. Stills from Sam Jennings’s now-famous video had appeared all over the school – including, so it was rumoured, in the staff room.
Mr Watkins smiled briefly, allowing the class their amusement. ‘Apart from that, we have a clear run through to the summer, with the ever so small hurdle of exams to navigate in four weeks’ time. If, indeed, one navigates hurdles …’ He took the register. ‘And just before everyone disappears, my geography students need to have read up on their deep mine shafts and those lovely wells for our next meeting together. You may go.’
Itch told Jack that he’d see her later and went over to his form teacher. Mr Watkins looked up from his illustrations of well diggers and mine workers.
‘The pump shaft at the Fowey Consuls mine was three thousand feet deep – that’s almost one thousand metres, Itch. Imagine that! Driven through granite too! An engineering marvel.’
‘Yes, sir.’
‘Have I told you the story about the seventeen water wheels …?’
‘Yes, sir, you have.’
‘And the deepest hand-dug—’
‘Yes, sir, that too. A few times.’
‘Ah. Are you all right, Itchingham?’
‘Yes, sir. Fine, thank you – but I have something I’d like to show you when you have a moment.’
‘What sort of a “thing”?’
‘Well, it’s a rock, actually, sir, but I can’t work out what it is.’
‘Then I’m your man, Itch, as you know. Lunch time is OK – come and find me in the staff room.’ Watkins propped his arms on the table, folded his fingers together and rested his chin on them. ‘I am intrigued. See you then.’
‘OK, thanks, sir.’ Itch hoisted his rucksack over his shoulder and headed off to the dreaded worlds of English and RE, then double cricket with Mr Corrin.
* * *
Just after one o’clock, Itch knocked on the staff-room door and asked for Mr Watkins. In what must have been the time it took to finish his tea, the teacher emerged.
‘Ah, Itch and his mystery rock – let’s go somewhere quiet.’ His teacher set off in the direction of one of the science labs. They were usually empty at lunch time, but the physics and biology labs were busy with revision classes. That left Dr Flowerdew’s chemistry lab: it was deserted. Mr Watkins eased himself onto one of the stools and motioned for Itch to join him. ‘So what do you have for me, Mr Lofte? I can’t remember being brought a rock before.’
Itch, suddenly nervous for reasons he could not work out, removed the stone from his bag and placed it on the table in front of them. There was no doubt in Itch’s mind that it was now considerably darker than when he had bought it on Saturday.
Mr Watkins picked it up and peered at it. ‘What’s the story here, Itch?’
‘Well, it might be uranium, sir – that’s what I was told. But I’ve looked online and I can’t see any with those silvery threads in it. It looks too dark, closer to iron. Also, it’s changing colour.’
‘It’s doing what?’
‘It’s getting darker. I got it on Saturday, and the browns were lighter and the silver more shiny. That’s why I brought it to you.’
Watkins put the rock down on the table and rubbed his hands together. Then he cracked his knuckles, something he usually only did when he was coming to his favourite bit of a lesson or about to tell a story. ‘Well, well, that’s certainly intriguing. It looks a little like uranium ore, as you say. Cornwall is full of it, of course. But those silvery veins suggest something else. Sometimes the veins are quartz or tin. But not here, I think. As I often say in class, there is a lot under the ground here that we don’t know about. It is still a mystery. Well, here’s another one! Has it been warm like this since you got it? Because that would suggest—’
The door to the lab opened and Dr Nathaniel Flowerdew came in. He stopped when he saw Mr Watkins and Itch at the table.
‘Ah, Dr Flowerdew, hello. We were looking for somewhere quiet to look at Master Lofte’s intriguing rock. You arrived just in time – come and see.’
Flowerdew, who had looked irritated to find his territory invaded, now came over to where they were sitting. ‘What exactly are we looking at?’ The sneer in his voice was unmistakable.
‘Well you might ask,’ said Watkins, handing him the rock. ‘Well you might ask.’
Flowerdew examined it while I
tch repeated what he had told Mr Watkins. Then he walked across to the window and turned it over and over in his hand. He switched hands and repeated the process. Watkins and Itch watched and waited for him to say something. He turned and came back to the table, replacing the stone. ‘Back in a minute. Don’t go anywhere.’
For a moment Itch and his geography teacher just looked at each other. Then Watkins stood up and started pacing. ‘I think I know what he’s doing. Mr Hopkins’s physics revision session is about to be interrupted somewhat. Third cupboard, middle drawer, I think. Let’s see.’ He started pacing, occasionally glancing at the rock on the table next to Itch. Within a minute the door was flung open again and a slightly breathless Flowerdew returned, carrying an oblong box. It had a handle and a tube that looked like a microphone attached by a coiled cable. He waved it around as he approached the table.
Mr Watkins smiled. ‘Ah, the trusty Geiger counter,’ he said. Itch looked astonished as he continued, ‘Uranium ore is mildly radioactive, of course, but the changing colour and heat suggests this is worth looking at more closely. Is it working, Nathaniel?’
Flowerdew was pressing the Geiger counter’s ‘on’ button and shaking it. ‘Dead as a dodo. Blast.’ He removed the non-functioning batteries, threw them in the bin by the door and left again.
‘What kind of reading would be normal, sir, if this is uranium?’
‘It’ll click every time it detects a radioactive particle. I’m a geographer, not a scientist, but if I remember right, radioactivity is the release of radiation from the nucleus of unstable atoms. They escape,’ said Watkins, sitting down again. ‘Maybe five hundred clicks a second, something like that.’
After a moment Itch said, ‘Does Dr Flowerdew enjoy teaching, sir?’
‘Why do you ask?’
‘Well, he seems to hate every minute he’s with us, that’s all.’
Mr Watkins shifted in his seat. ‘Oh well, we all have our moments, Itch, you know. You lot can be quite a challenge and, well …’ He was considering his next comment when Flowerdew came in for the third time, now clutching a packet of batteries.
‘How much darker has this rock gone, Lofte? Much darker? Slightly darker? Be more specific.’ He glanced up at Itch as he unwrapped the new batteries.
Itch frowned as he thought. ‘Well, when I got it, most of it looked like a dark Crunchie – you know, the honeycomb bit,’ he said. ‘If that helps.’
Flowerdew’s look suggested it hadn’t, but the batteries were in now and he tried the ‘on’ button again.
Whatever the three of them had expected, the torrent of clicks that emerged from the speaker on the side of the Geiger counter clearly took them all by surprise. Flowerdew swore. Watkins said, ‘Good Lord in heaven.’ Itch’s mouth was open but nothing came out. The needle on the front of the counter had jumped from 0 to 10,000 clicks per second. Its colour code went from green to blue to red. The needle was well into the red, pushing as far as it could go behind its plastic screen. They stood and stared and listened. Flowerdew moved the detector over the rock, and the constant rattle continued unabated. He switched it off and passed the machine to Watkins, who repeated the procedure, with the same results.
In the silence that followed, Itch was aware of both Watkins and Flowerdew switching their attention from the rock to him.
‘I guess that’s a radioactive rock, then,’ he said.
‘That’ll be why it’s hot,’ said Flowerdew quietly. ‘I don’t recall you telling us precisely where you got this, Lofte.’
Itch, feeling increasingly as though he had done something wrong, said, ‘I collect the table of elements, sir, and sometimes I buy stuff from a dealer I met in St Austell—’
‘I had no idea you were a collector, Lofte,’ interrupted Flowerdew.
That’s because you never take any notice of me or my class, thought Itch, but said nothing.
‘Do go on.’
‘Well, that’s it, really. He said he got it from a mate in Dorset or Devon or somewhere. Cost me ten pounds. Well, it will … I am guessing that it’s not uranium. Maybe I should keep hold of my money.’
Mr Watkins started pacing again. ‘Well, that’s just it, Itch. It’s not like any uranium I’ve seen dug up here. Or anywhere else, come to that. I think my friends at the mining-school team in West Ridge would like to see this.’
These words seemed to spark Dr Flowerdew into action. ‘No. No. Not at all. We need to isolate the rock in a lead case or box as soon as possible. I have one at home. This is too dangerous to leave around school.’
‘Well, you have a point,’ said Watkins, ‘especially after the greenhouse business. You’d better take it now, Nathaniel.’
And without waiting for a word from Itch, Flowerdew swept up the piece of rock and, holding it at arm’s length, left the lab.
Mr Watkins, still staring at the door, said, ‘How long have you had it, Itch? We should probably get you checked out.’
‘Only since Saturday, sir, like I said. I haven’t held it much either – it’s been in my shed mainly.’
‘Good. I’ll seek advice from Dr Flowerdew as soon as he returns. I fear, however, that it might be some time before you see that stone of yours again.’
* * *
That afternoon Itch sat with Jack at the back of Mr Littlewood’s history lesson. She was now fully up to date with what had happened with Watkins and Flowerdew at lunch time.
‘But he can’t just take it like that without asking you!’ She started raking her hands through her hair – something she always did when she was annoyed.
‘Well, he can and he has. Once the Geiger counter had done its stuff they were hardly going to let me walk around school with a radioactive rock measuring more than ten thousand clicks a second, were they?’
‘I have no idea what that means, but it does sound dodgy. Does Cake ever sell you elements that are, you know, harmless? Things that you could bring to school and no one get hurt? Nice drop of oxygen maybe? Or gold would be good.’
A voice from the front broke into their discussion. ‘I’m sure that’s the finer points of German foreign policy you’re discussing at the back.’ Mr Littlewood was still writing on the whiteboard as he spoke. ‘Sounds like Jack and Itch to me. Remind me, Jack, who the German Foreign Minister was.’
In front of them, many of their classmates turned round. Ian Steele was mouthing something at Jack, but it was impossible to make it out. However, unlike her cousin, Jack was on top of most of her subjects. ‘Was it Von Ribbentrop, sir?’
‘Nice one, Jack,’ said Mr Littlewood, ‘but I prefer to hear only one voice in lessons. And that’s mine.’
It was the class opinion that Mr Littlewood wasn’t a bad teacher, but it was his first year and he was pretending to be tough to show who was boss. He would probably mellow a bit next term, they thought; most new teachers did. He looked barely older than some of the sixth formers, and provided an interesting contrast to Dr Flowerdew, who had arrived at the same time. They had been introduced at the same assembly. Unlike Flowerdew, Jim Littlewood had tended to the sickest members of Miss Glenacre’s biology class as they lay outside the greenhouse, and had impressed many of the girls in Year Nine. Natalie Hussain, Debbie Price and Sam Jennings were singing his praises and seemed much keener on what Herr Von Ribbentrop had been up to than they had been before the incident. There was even a Facebook group dedicated to him, though no one knew if Mr Littlewood was aware of that yet.
At the back of the class, Jack and Itch resumed their note-taking. Itch’s head was still full of the clicking Geiger counter and his hot rock. After being told that he wouldn’t be seeing it for some time Itch had run to the window at the end of the corridor. He had watched in astonishment as Dr Flowerdew marched to his car, arm extended, clasping the rock with a handkerchief. Dropping it into his boot, he had then driven off at top speed.
Itch became aware that everyone else was writing. ‘What’s this we’re doing?’
‘Relations with A
ustria,’ said Jack. ‘Keep up.’
Itch then resumed what had become a familiar routine of taking notes from Jack, peering over her shoulder and trying to catch up with Mr Littlewood. The bell went with Itch still three paragraphs behind.
‘A page please on relations with Austria by Thursday. That’s a whole page and in normal-size writing, Colston, please.’ Matt Colston feigned indignation but laughed with everyone else.
On their way out of history and downstairs to chemistry, Itch said to Jack, ‘Fancy coming round for tea tomorrow? We could discuss, you know, German relations with Austria …’
‘Wow, that sounds exciting. Got netball tomorrow. Wednesday OK?’
‘Yeah, OK. I’ll be a bit stuck otherwise. Thanks.’
They arrived at the lab and took their place on the end of the second bench next to James Potts and Craig Murray, the boy now famous for vomiting all over Flowerdew. Potts had been forced to find a new partner after he and Bruno Paul had been caught turning on the gas taps at the end of a lesson.
After five minutes there was no sign of Dr Flowerdew and the general buzz of conversation was rising. After ten minutes most students were wandering around the lab and sitting on the benches. Just as Tom Westgate was about to set off and report the lack of a teacher, Flowerdew appeared in the doorway, clearly trying to control his breathing. Still panting, he came into the lab, provoking a scurry of bodies returning to their proper places.
‘I think you’ll find it’s How Gases Behave, page twenty-two. None of you are quite so advanced that you can afford to waste time so spectacularly like this.’
Ian Steele, behind Jack and Itch, could just be heard saying, ‘And good afternoon to you, sir.’ Those who heard smiled.
‘Itchingham Lofte – here, please.’
Everyone turned round. Itch didn’t need to look at the faces of Bruno and James to know that they were grinning. He walked up to the front and stood at Dr Flowerdew’s desk.
To the class, the head of science said, ‘As you have barely started, please don’t think of stopping. How Gases Behave, page twenty-two. With three examples and diagrams.’ He waited till all heads were down, then leaned very close to Itch’s left ear, his voice barely louder than a whisper. ‘I’ll need it for a few days for tests. It’s safe, but only where it is now.’
