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PRAISE FOR

brain scam ‘A heroic tale. Everyone should read this, especially parents.’ Toby Judge ‘I like de bit wiv de axe.’ Dudley ‘Mackerel Bait’ Ferris ‘Anyone who wants to know how to spell ‘rheumatoid encephalomyelitis’ should buy this book and keep it for a handy reference.’ Peter Chou ‘Lies, lovely lies.’ Zara Cox ‘Lies indeed! I deny everything! That pestilential pimple Smudge—Judge—I’ll get him!’ Prof. Kreeb, Director, Kreeb’s Correct-a-torium Jonathan Harlen is ‘a master of the off-the-wall, over-the-top, gross-out story.’ The Age

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Jonathan Harlen lives in Eureka, on the north coast of New South Wales, with his wife Helen and far too many children. He was born in New Zealand and still supports the All Blacks, except when they lose. When not writing, he enjoys inventing gruesome punishments for his children, such as holding them by the feet, dangling them upside down in the swimming pool, and making them suck up the leaves.

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jonathan harlen

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This edition first published in 2005 First published in 2002 Copyright © Jonathan Harlen 2002 All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying, recording or by any information storage and retrieval system, without prior permission in writing from the publisher. The Australian Copyright Act 1968 (the Act) allows a maximum of one chapter or ten per cent of this book, whichever is the greater, to be photocopied by any educational institution for its educational purposes provided that the educational institution (or body that administers it) has given a remuneration notice to Copyright Agency Limited (CAL) under the Act. Allen & Unwin 83 Alexander St Crows Nest NSW 2065 Australia Phone: (61 2) 8425 0100 Fax: (61 2) 9906 2218 Email: [email protected] Web: www.allenandunwin.com National Library of Australia Cataloguing-in-Publication entry: Harlen, Jonathan, 1963-. Brain scam. For 9-12 year olds. ISBN 1 74114 491 4 1. Juvenile detention homes – Juvenile fiction. 2. Escapes – Juvenile fiction. I. Title. A823.3 Cover and text design by Ellie Exarchos Cover illustration by Nathan Jurevicius Original text design by Wayne Harris Set in 12/18 pt Goudy by Midland Typesetters, Maryborough Printed in Australia by Mcpherson’s Printing Group 1 3 5 7 9 10 8 6 4 2

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Contents 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17

cat and mouse 9 sales talk 22 professor kreeb 27 kreeb’s correct-a-torium 36 a truly terrible idea 43 a villain and a troublemaker 50 force ten from dagenham 59 opening day 70 the oath of eternal obedience 83 nightfall 102 on the roof 113 the program begins 121 the program continues 141 red wine dreams 159 the binoculator at last 171 the lizard-ride 183 guess what 198

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1 cat and mouse

It all began with a mouse. A furry white mouse that jumped on my bed and ran up my arm as I lay sleeping one Sunday morning. I sat up, wide awake. The mouse leapt onto the floor. It scuttled into an open cupboard and hid behind a sports bag. I knew straight away this was my sister Emma’s doing. Neither of my parents is in the habit of letting a white mouse loose in my room at eight o’clock on a Sunday morning. When they want to wake me up they use more direct army-style methods, like chucking a bucket of cold water over my head. I got up and went down the hall to the kitchen, where Emma was making breakfast. ‘There’s a white mouse in my bedroom,’ 9

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I grumbled. ‘It jumped on my arm and woke me up.’ ‘Did it?’ Emma said innocently. ‘Gee. A white mouse. How d’you suppose that got there?’ ‘It crawled out of Alice in Wonderland,’ I said. ‘C’mon, Em. I know it was you. What kind of stupid stunt are you trying to pull?’ A grin spread across Emma’s face. ‘That stupid stunt, as you call it,’ she said, ‘just happens to be my next and greatest invention.’ ‘I hate to disappoint you,’ I said. ‘But God got there first.’ ‘Not the mouse,’ she said. ‘Something inside the mouse. Come out to my lab after breakfast, and I’ll show you.’ Not everybody’s sister has her own science lab, but then Emma isn’t everybody’s sister. She has a knack for coming up with loopy inventions. Two years ago, at the age of fourteen, she invented the world’s first remote-controlled cockroach. We used an army of these little critters – together with an airforce of hornets – to attack our appalling neighbours, the Cadwalladers, and drive them from the neighbourhood.* After our victory, Emma used her invention to make money. She began mass-producing thousands of * See my last book, The Cockroach War.

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remote-controlled cockroaches as pets. She sold these cockroaches to pet shops and toy shops for twenty dollars each. The shops sold them for thirty dollars, complete with a handset and a booklet of instructions. You might think thirty bucks is a bit much to pay for a cockroach, especially when you can stick your head down behind your kitchen fridge, any time you like, and have them crawling in your hair for free. But when you think about all the amazing things you could do with Emma’s remote-controlled versions, it was pretty good value. You could steer them over obstacle courses, for example. You could race them up walls and down drainpipes. You could run them up your little brother’s leg, into his underpants, or burrow them under the door and into your parents’ bed when they were having a quiet lie-in on Sunday mornings. That Christmas, Emma’s cockroaches sold like hot cakes. Parents who were expecting to buy their blushing baby daughter a Furby or a Barbie Doll suddenly got a very different request. ‘You want a what from Santa this year, pumpkin pie?’ I heard many parents saying, outside the toy shop in the shopping mall, as their daughters whispered shyly in their ears. ‘I’m sorry, snookum-puddle. I didn’t quite catch that. Did you say . . . a cockroach????’ 11

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Emma made enough money to build her own private laboratory, out the back of our beloved home at 388 St Clairs Road, Dagenham. It was more like an office than a lab, with clean white benches running along the walls, a couple of computers, a printer, a scanner, and a filing cabinet. There were also cupboards – lots of cupboards – which were full of strange electronic gadgets. One whole corner was taken up with a large floor-to-ceiling freezer, which made a low humming noise when I went out there after breakfast and opened the door. ‘It’s not remote-controlled, is it?’ I asked as I came in. ‘What?’ Emma said. ‘The mouse.’ ‘No, of course not,’ she scoffed. ‘A mouse’s brain is infinitely more complex than an insect’s, little brother. I couldn’t make a remote-controlled mouse even if I wanted to.’ ‘Phew,’ I said. ‘That’s a relief. So where is it, then? I don’t see it hanging around.’ ‘It’s still over at the house. Probably still in your bedroom, leaving some visiting cards between your sheets.’ ‘Oh gross.’ I screwed up my nose. I don’t mind toast crumbs between my sheets, or old toenails, or 12

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dandruff. But I draw the line at mouse-poo. It has a tendency to smudge. ‘If it poos in my bed, then I’m pooing in yours,’ I said cheerfully. ‘Fair’s fair.’ Emma just glared at me. We glare a lot in our family. We probably produce more glare per square centimetre than a factory making mirror sunglasses. ‘Maybe I’m missing something,’ I said, ‘but how are you going to show me what you’ve done to the mouse if it’s not here?’ ‘I’m going to use this.’ Emma switched on one of her computers. When the menu came up, she clicked on an icon labelled ‘MOUSECAM’. She clacked away at the keyboard for another few seconds, then a small video screen appeared. She enlarged this screen and stepped back to let me see. ‘Look, and be amazed!’ she announced grandly. ‘What you are about to witness is the greatest leap forward in human civilisation since the invention of the wheel!’ Personally, I’ve always thought the wheel was overrated. The chicken sausage, on the other hand – now that’s an invention I can get excited about. I realise the modern transport industry wouldn’t get far if all our vehicles ran on chicken sausages, but then I wouldn’t get far if I ate Bridgestone Radials, either. 13

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I stared uneasily at the video on Emma’s screen. The picture was very dark and very grainy at first. It was also jiggling around a lot, so I couldn’t tell what I was looking at. All of a sudden the picture got lighter, and I realised the camera was much, much smaller than I’d thought. It was under one of Emma’s shirts, thrown in a heap on the floor of her bedroom. The picture showed a sleeve of this shirt, jiggling around madly. In the background was a huge expanse of carpet, stretching out like an ocean across an enormous room. At the other end of the room was a giant-sized bed; a giant-sized window; and a towering cliff of wallpaper. That camera’s only centimetres above the floor! I thought. And it’s tiny! No bigger than a— The camera took off at breakneck speed and began scuttling across the sea of carpet towards Emma’s bed. It dived in under the bed and went straight to an old apple core that had been dropped beside one of the legs. ‘It’s the mouse!’ I said excitedly. ‘You’ve put a camera on the white mouse! But that’s weird – I didn’t see anything on it earlier, when it was in my room.’ 14

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‘It’s not one camera, it’s two,’ Emma corrected me. ‘And they’re not on the mouse. They’re in it. Inside its eyes.’ I stopped and looked at her. It took a moment for what she’d said to sink in. Then I turned and stared back at the picture on screen. ‘Inside its eyes?’ I said. ‘You’ve put cameras inside its eyes?’ ‘Yup.’ Emma nodded. ‘Brilliant, huh? No more mucking round with cockroaches, Toby. I’m in the big league now.’ The mouse was still eating the apple core. Every so often a tiny white paw would appear on the screen, turn the apple core over, then disappear again. I also noticed a blurry brown lump at the bottom of the picture, which I guessed was the mouse’s nose. ‘You mean what we’re seeing on the screen now is exactly what that mouse is seeing?’ I said. ‘At the same time?’ ‘Yup,’ Emma said again. ‘But that’s impossible!’ I burst out. ‘How can you put a camera inside a mouse’s eye?’ ‘Laser surgery,’ Emma replied. ‘I bought a small laser machine just like the one eye surgeons use to correct short-sightedness. Then I modified it.’ 15

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‘They must be pretty small cameras,’ I managed to mumble. ‘Ultra-small,’ Emma agreed. ‘Tiny. No bigger than specks of dust. In fact they’re so small they can’t even be seen on an X-ray. That’s how small they are.’ ‘I still don’t understand how you can stick something like that into an eye,’ I said. ‘Even the tiniest speck of dust hurts when it gets caught in there.’ ‘That’s on the surface of the eye,’ Emma said. ‘I’m talking about cutting the eye open, and surgically implanting something all the way inside the eyeball. It’s a delicate operation, that’s for sure. It takes skill and precision. But if it’s done properly, the subject doesn’t feel a thing.’ I stood there feeling slightly sick. The idea of cutting a mouse’s eye open and putting a camera inside it didn’t sit very well with the eleven Weetbix I’d had for breakfast. Emma walked across the room to her electronics cupboard, and took out a very weird-looking instrument. It was a sleek, streamlined, silver gadget about the same size and shape as a hairdryer. I don’t mean one of the small hand-held blow-dryers you probably have in your bathroom, but a big hairdryer like the ones they use at the hairdresser’s. 16

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Two spidery mechanical arms extended out menacingly from each side. In the middle – right above where the mouse’s head would be – was a long pencil-shaped probe, swivelling on a smooth metal ball. I guessed that this probe contained the laser beam which would cut into the mouse’s eye. Emma put her new invention down on the bench. ‘Welcome to the new age of video optical enhancement,’ she said. ‘I call this device a Binoculator. It’s the first and only one of its kind in the world. Isn’t it beautiful?’ I couldn’t answer. It wasn’t beautiful at all. In fact, Emma’s Binoculator was the ugliest, most evillooking contraption I had ever seen. ‘You know how a mammal’s eye works, I’m sure,’ Emma went on. ‘The light that comes into the eye is reflected through the lens at the front, then projected upside down on the retina at the back, which turns it into an image. From there this image is carried further into the brain where it’s turned right side up again, joined with the image from the other eye, and processed into a three-dimensional moving picture of the world. ‘What my miniature camera does,’ Emma said, ‘is film the images when they appear upside down on the retina. The camera is inserted very carefully 17

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inside the vitreous humor – that’s the gooey stuff inside the eyeball – facing towards the brain. It’s slightly off to one side, so it doesn’t affect the light coming in. It broadcasts fifty retina images per second to a receiver on the roof of this laboratory, and my trusty computers convert those retina images to the computer picture you now see.’ ‘Great,’ I said. ‘Terrific. So you catch a mouse, strap it down, cut its eyes open, and stick cameras inside them. That must be fun.’ ‘I don’t only use mice,’ Emma said. ‘The laser’s fully adjustable. I can operate on lots of creatures.’ ‘You can?’ I said suspiciously. ‘Like what?’ ‘Oh, I don’t know.’ Emma waved a hand airily. ‘Cats, for example.’ I froze. ‘Not our cat,’ I said. ‘Not our beautiful Twinkie. Tell me you haven’t done this to her.’ ‘Don’t get upset, Tobes,’ Emma replied. ‘It’s all in the name of science.’ ‘You monster!’ I howled. ‘You heartless beast! Twinkie isn’t just a cat, she’s – she’s like one of the family! She’s the baby sister I never had! I love that cat! You can’t go playing Jack the Ripper with her eyes!’ Emma just smiled at me. She booted up her 18

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second computer, and an icon labelled CATCAM appeared on the screen. ‘No-o-o-o!’ I howled again. ‘Not Twinkie! Not our cute little Twinks!’ ‘Get a grip, powder-puff,’ Emma said. ‘I haven’t hurt her, I promise.’ Next, a picture of our hallway appeared, giving a cat’s-eye view. Twinkie was slinking gracefully past the telephone table, looking towards Emma’s and my bedrooms. She stopped a moment. The picture moved smoothly up and down as she began washing one of her paws. ‘You have to admit, it’s impressive,’ Emma said. ‘It’s disgusting,’ I said. ‘They should lock you up and throw away the key.’ Twinkie continued down the hall towards Emma’s bedroom. I glanced at the screen on the other computer; the one labelled MOUSECAM. The white mouse was still under Emma’s bed, eating the apple. ‘I hope you’ve got a plan to save this mouse,’ I said. ‘Twinkie’s going to see it in a minute.’ Emma’s jaw dropped. ‘Omigod,’ she said. ‘Omigod, I forgot about that. Twinkie, no!’ Twinkie had reached the door to Emma’s room. She often went there in the mornings because it was 19

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nice and sunny. After Emma left for school she would curl up on Emma’s doona and have a catnap. This morning, though, there was an extra treat waiting for her. Bed and breakfast. ‘No, Twinkie, don’t!’ Emma cried. ‘Not that way! Go into Mum’s room! Damn, if only there was an audio function on this thing!’ ‘Get out of there, mousie!’ I yelled at the Mousecam screen in front of me. ‘Forget the apple! Run for your life!’ It was too late. Twinkie had spotted the mouse. She stopped dead, blinked a few times as if she couldn’t believe her good luck, then sank down onto her haunches. ‘Run, you stupid mouse!’ I whacked the top of the computer with my hand. ‘You’re about to get munched!’ ‘So are my cameras!’ Emma said miserably. ‘Oh, I can’t watch.’ I held my breath. For an instant nothing happened. Then Twinkie sprang. At the last moment the mouse looked up from the apple and tried to scramble out of the way but Twinkie was much too quick. A razor-sharp claw darted out and trapped the mouse by the tail. 20

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‘Jump, mouse, jump!’ I hollered. ‘Come on! Get away! You can do it!’ The mouse struggled vainly. I could almost hear it squeaking in mortal terror. Twinkie clamped another paw hard down onto its shoulder. On the Mousecam Twinkie looked enormous. Her eyes glinted ferociously. Her fangs were like long, curved swords, drawn and ready to strike. The wide-open mouth lunged down. The fangs bit deeply into the mouse’s neck, and the picture from the Mousecam went forever black.

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2 sales talk

The two of us sat slumped in the swivel chairs in front of the bench. Emma turned both computers off. The only sound in the room was the low, steady hum of the freezer. ‘Great invention, Em,’ I said, when I’d recovered enough to speak. ‘So do all your experiments get eaten? Or is this the first?’ Emma didn’t answer. ‘I can’t wait to see what’s next,’ I went on. ‘A dog, maybe? You could put cameras in a rottweiler, to send in after Twinkie.’ ‘I feel so humiliated,’ Emma mumbled. ‘I’ll bet this never happened to other great scientists. Did Pavlov’s dog get eaten by a bear? Did Newton’s apple get carried off by a badger? No! Because Newton and 22

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Pavlov didn’t make mistakes! They knew exactly what they were doing! I should never have let that mouse loose inside while Twinkie was there!’ ‘You should never have invented that repulsivelooking torture chamber in the first place.’ I said. ‘It’s evil.’ ‘It’s not evil.’ Emma glared at me indignantly. ‘It’s very useful. It could help a lot of people.’ ‘Yeah? Like who?’ ‘Like wildlife rangers, for example,’ Emma said. ‘It could help them track different endangered animals. If all the animals had micro-cameras implanted in their eyes, and the rangers had screens to monitor them—’ I laughed out loud. ‘You’re kidding!’ I said. ‘Do you honestly believe that wildlife rangers will want to take their beautiful endangered animals – their Siberian tigers and orang-utans and white rhinos – and cut their eyes open?’ Emma sniffed. ‘I knew you’d say something like that,’ she said sullenly. ‘You’re just as bad as the rest of them.’ ‘The rest of who?’ I said. ‘All the rangers and conservation groups I talked to!’ Emma snapped. ‘That’s exactly what they said when I tried to sell them my Binoculator!’ 23

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‘They didn’t want to buy one?’ ‘No! Not even at the rock-bottom bargainbasement price of two hundred and fifty thousand dollars! Those people wouldn’t recognise progress if it jumped up and bit them on the nose!’ ‘Two hundred and fifty thousand dollars!!?’ I echoed. ‘For that worthless pile of junk!’ ‘It is not a worthless pile of junk!’ Emma got to her feet angrily, and began pacing around the room. ‘It’s my ticket to wealth and fame! If I could just sell one, if I could just prove to one customer how amazing and useful it is—’ ‘You’re wasting your time,’ I said. ‘It’s a total lemon. Absolutely no use to anybody.’ ‘The Army could use it,’ Emma said. ‘Can’t you see it, Tobes? All our soldiers with cameras in their eyes? Our commanders would be able to see everything! No soldier would ever be lost behind enemy lines again!’ ‘Yeah, but that’s humans,’ I laughed. ‘We’re only talking about cats and mice, right? And maybe the odd orang-utan, and white rhino—’ ‘We’re all mammals, Toby,’ Emma said. ‘Our eyes are basically the same. One Binoculator could be used to operate on thousands of soldiers every year. Within a decade, every fighting man and woman in 24

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the country could be a high-tech, state-of-the-art, optically enhanced soldier of the future!’ Now it was my turn to get to my feet. I was gobsmacked. This was loony talk. ‘Have you totally lost your mind?’ I yelled. ‘This is people we’re talking about! This is our own species! You’re going to sell one of these freak factories to the Army, so they can operate on their own men?’ ‘No,’ Emma said grumpily, and folded her arms. ‘I’m not. The cowards didn’t want to buy one.’ I sank back down into my chair. ‘Well, that’s a relief,’ I said. ‘I suppose at two hundred and fifty thousand dollars a pop they couldn’t afford it.’ ‘Oh, they could afford it all right,’ Emma said. ‘But they chickened out. They said it would cause too many legal problems. Too many problems with morale. Here was I, thinking our army was full of tough, can-do, macho men, ready to make the tough decisions and go the hard yards. Men who could take the pain! Men who didn’t mind being mustard-gassed or showered with cluster bombs or riddled with machine-gun fire while they crawled through fields of exploding land-mines! Now I find out it’s full of a bunch of namby-pamby, frilly-laced wimps!’ ‘You think they’re wimps because they didn’t want to have their eyes cut open?’ I said. 25

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‘Exactly!’ Emma exclaimed. ‘Whatever happened to sacrifice, Toby? What about the good ol’ neversay-die Aussie fighting spirit? The ANZAC tradition? Where’s it all gone?’ We looked at each other for a while. I had no idea what to say. There are some inventions that are best left un-invented, and Emma’s Binoculator was definitely one of them, but she was obsessed with it. It had started to take over her life. ‘I’ll find someone to buy it,’ Emma muttered finally. ‘I’m going to advertise it on the Internet. I might even lower the price. Somewhere out there is a person who will love my Binoculator. Just you wait and see.’

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3 professor kreeb

It was six months later when Dad spotted the strange advertisement in the morning newspaper. Emma and I had avoided talking about the Binoculator since then. As far as I knew it was still out there in her electronics cupboard, gathering dust. ‘Look at this,’ Dad said to us at breakfast, tapping on the page in front of him while Mum made our school lunches in the kitchen. ‘That horrible Professor Kreeb woman has taken out a full-page ad. It looks as though she’s opening a school.’ That got our attention. We all stared at Dad in horror. The name ‘Professor Kreeb’ tends to get that sort of reaction from people, as some of you may know. For those of you who’ve never heard of her, 27

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Professor Jocelyn Kreeb is a famous child psychologist. She’s the one who hosts the hit daytime parenting show, ‘Brats’. She’s also the author of four best-selling parenting books: The Lost Art of Punishment, How Dare You Speak to Me Like That, Go to Your Room This Instant, and Every Good Child Deserves Thrashing. If you haven’t watched her TV shows, or read her best-selling books, you’ve almost certainly seen her picture. Her photo is always appearing in newspapers and magazines, together with some article she’s written. And you wouldn’t forget her face in a hurry, either. The fact is Professor Kreeb looks remarkably like a cane toad. She has the same huge warty head and fat warty body. She has the same yellowy-grey skin. She has beady little black eyes and thin black lips that seem to stretch from one ear right across to the other. She looks so much like a cane toad, it’s frightening. If you took a stroll in your garden one evening, and saw her crouched on your front lawn under the outside light, you wouldn’t hesitate. You’d rush up to the shed, grab the nearest spade, and wallop her on the back of the head as hard as you could. 28

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The first photo of Professor Kreeb I ever saw was inside a women’s magazine that I found in our diningroom. I ran with it to find Mum, who was unpacking some shopping bags in the kitchen. ‘Mum, Mum!’ I said. ‘Get a load of this disgusting old witch! Boy, is she ugly!’ ‘Now, Toby,’ Mum said. ‘You should never judge a person by what they look like. You know better than that.’ ‘You mean you don’t think she’s a disgusting old witch?’ ‘No, I think she’s a disgusting evil old witch, but that’s not because of what she looks like,’ Mum answered. ‘That’s because of her opinions on how to raise children.’ I started reading the article, looking for some of these opinions that Mum hated so much. They weren’t hard to find. Children today are running amok, Professor Kreeb wrote. They have no sense of discipline. They’re allowed to do anything they like. Their parents have lost confidence in themselves. They’re exhausted. They’re frazzled. They’re confused. Most parents are too busy working two jobs to pay the mortgage to remember all the wonderfully effective punishments used by their grandparents and great-grandparents, back down through the 29

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ages. As a result, our proud tradition of punishment is fast disappearing. The next day I got Mum to tape an episode of ‘Brats’. In the first half of the program Professor Kreeb read out letters from parents all around Australia, saying how naughty their children had been. A panel of four guest experts listened to the letters, then decided what would be a good punishment for each child. Sometimes the parents wrote in with punishments of their own, and asked for the panel’s comment. But mostly it was left up to the panel (and especially Professor Kreeb) to decide. On the day I saw the show, the first letter was from Mrs Tanya Warburton of Ringwood in Melbourne. Mrs Warburton’s three-year-old son, Kyle, had a nasty habit of piddling all over the bathroom floor whenever he went to the toilet. I’ve tried everything to stop him but nothing seems to work, Mrs Warburton wrote. He just yanks down his PullUps, whips out the ol’ fire hose, and sprays it madly in all directions. I’m at my wits’ end! What does the ‘Brats’ panel advise? ‘What a disgustingly offensive child!’ Professor Kreeb replied. ‘Fortunately, this kind of behaviour is easily fixed. I recommend a punishment invented 30

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by my great-great-great-great-grandfather, Baron Oswaldo von Kreeb. All Mrs Warburton needs to do is instal a small metal clamp to the rim of the toilet seat. The offending body part should then be clamped tightly into position, and held there for an hour or two, morning, noon and night. The boy will only be able to pee in one direction, and the problem will be solved.’ The second letter was from Gwendoline Cox, of Kalgoorlie. She was writing about her eleven-yearold daughter Zara. My daughter Zara is a terrible liar (she wrote). Just yesterday she stole twenty dollars from my purse, then went and bought fifteen Big Finger Kit-Kats at our local corner store. We found her lying face-down on her bedroom floor, her cheeks and hands smeared with chocolate, surrounded by empty Kit-Kat wrappers, and in a deep sugar-induced coma. But when she woke up she denied taking the money! What can we do to make her tell the truth? ‘The best-known punishment for lying is to wash out the child’s mouth with soap,’ Professor Kreeb said. ‘However, in my opinion this is fraught with danger. Many soaps these days are filled with wholesome, edible ingredients, and actually taste quite nice. I personally have heard of several foul-mouthed, 31

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unruly children who, upon having their mouths washed out with soap by their mothers, declared, “Yum! I love this honey-and-oatbran soap, Mum! It’s delicious! Can I have one every day in my lunch, please, instead of a muesli bar?” ‘Obviously this is no good at all. I suggest instead a traditional herbal punishment soap used on me by my German grandmother when I was a child. This soap is flavoured with garlic, rotten eggs, sour milk, chicken manure, and the entrails of a regurgitated slug taken from the mouth of a baby sparrow. One taste of this marvellous mixture and the child in question will quickly learn the value of telling the truth, I can assure you.’ Towards the end of the show Professor Kreeb left the TV studio. She went out into the streets with a roving cameraman and a team of helpers to find examples of bad parenting and brattish behaviour, and conduct interviews. Her first stop was a supermarket where a thin, exhausted-looking woman was standing behind a heavily laden shopping trolley, going through the checkout. The woman had a red-faced baby on her hip. Its nose was running like a tap, and it was crying its lungs out. A little boy standing next to the woman was yanking at her skirt, beating at her leg 32

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with his fists, crying even louder than the baby. Professor Kreeb and her cameraman swooped. ‘Jocelyn Kreeb, from “Brats”,’ the professor said to the mother, thrusting a microphone under her nose. ‘You’re live on national television. I was wondering how much longer you were going to let your snivelling little toe-rags scream their heads off, without doing something to shut them up?’ The mother blinked in alarm and embarrassment. She glanced fearfully into the camera. The boy beside her gave a terrific yank at her skirt, which almost tipped her over. ‘I-I-I’m sorry,’ she stammered. ‘Look, this isn’t a good time. I’m busy right now.’ ‘You’ve tried smacking them, I suppose,’ Professor Kreeb said. ‘Or are you one of these hopeless modern mothers who don’t believe in smacking?’ ‘I don’t want to smack them!’ the mother exclaimed. ‘They’re upset because I didn’t buy them a treat this week! My husband lost his job three days ago, and now we don’t have enough money to pay the rent! So will you kindly go away and leave us alone?’ Professor Kreeb turned to face the camera. ‘That’s the trouble with today’s parents,’ she said. ‘They’ve gone soft. They’re weak as dishwater.’ And to the mother she went on, ‘I can see you’ve reached the 33

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end of your tether, madam. May I suggest a punishment developed in America by experts at Harvard University? It’s just the thing your appalling children need.’ ‘I won’t tell you again!’ the mother said angrily. ‘Go away and leave us alone!’ ‘What! And let your two insufferable brats go on screaming? I think not!’ Professor Kreeb clapped her hands. ‘Jim! Terry! Shut these two little monsters up, will you?’ Two musclebound men in black tracksuits ran up to the poor mother. They wrenched her children away from her, then took out a long length of rope, and began tying them to the shopping trolley, one on each side. ‘Hey!’ the mother cried. ‘Stop that! What d’you think you’re doing?!’ ‘Calm down, madam,’ Professor Kreeb said. ‘Everything’s under control. All the most up-to-date American studies suggest this is the best way to discipline your children.’ ‘I don’t care about American studies!’ the mother shouted. ‘I don’t want my children tied to a shopping trolley! Stop! Wait! Where are you going? Come ba-a-a-ack!’ The two men in tracksuits had finished tying 34

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up the children. Now they were sprinting out of the supermarket towards the exit ramp, pushing the trolley in front of them. The two children were still howling their lungs out. ‘It’s all right, madam!’ Professor Kreeb called after the disappearing mother. ‘They’re just taking them down to the highway, to let them loose in the traffic! You’ll thank us for this next time you come shopping, I guarantee it!’ That was the end of that episode of ‘Brats’. I never watched another one, and if you have any sense, you won’t either. You can see for yourself that Professor Kreeb really was a disgusting old witch – she didn’t just look like one. Sometimes, first impressions can be spot on.

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4 kreeb’s correct-a-torium ‘I don’t believe you,’ Mum said to Dad, from the other side of the breakfast bar. ‘That Kreeb woman hates children. Why would she want to open a school?’ ‘I don’t know, Louise, but that’s what it says here,’ Dad replied, tapping at the page in front of him. ‘There’s a picture of her, too, in the corner.’ Mum stopped what she was doing and came out to peer over Dad’s shoulder. ‘That’s her all right,’ she said. ‘There’s no mistaking that face. But I just can’t figure out why she’d want to open a school.’ Opposite me, Emma choked on a bit of crust. She coughed until water sprang to her eyes. Mum had to pat her on the back to calm her down. ‘Are you all right, darling?’ Mum asked. ‘Sure,’ Emma replied. ‘Sure, I’m fine.’ 36

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‘I’ll read what it says,’ Dad said, and held the page up in front of him. A message to all caring Australian parents, from Professor Jocelyn Kreeb, he read out. Dear parents, I believe you know me as the host of ‘Brats’ on Network Seven. Many of you will have watched the program, and heeded my panel’s wise advice. Now, let me give you the opportunity to set your misbehaving child on the path to perfect obedience, once and for all. The first of May this year marks the dawn of a new era for parenting in Australia. After this date, no longsuffering parents need put up with any disobedience from their children, ever again. That is the date, dear parents, on which my wonderful Correct-a-torium will open its doors. My Correct-atorium is an entirely new concept in remedial education. It is aimed at all children aged thirteen and under who simply cannot be told what to do, and who are making their parents’ lives a misery. After just ONE MONTH at my Correct-a-torium, your problem child will never again dare to put a foot out of line! This is no idle boast, dear parents. I personally guarantee it. Enrol your rebellious, unruly offspring for just ONE MONTH, and he or she will be cured of all forms of bad behaviour, FOR LIFE! 37

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Imagine it for a moment. No more temper tantrums. No more trouble at school. No more lies. No more bad language. No more fighting with brothers and sisters. Just a perfect, well-mannered, well-behaved little angel, TWENTY-FOUR HOURS A DAY! It sounds too good to be true, doesn’t it? But it isn’t! Thanks to my wonderful Correct-a-torium, perfectly behaved children can indeed be yours. And that’s not all! To prove how genuine these claims are, I am offering a SPECIAL INTRODUCTORY DISCOUNT, in honour of the Correct-a-torium’s grand opening. In the first month, four lucky parents will be able to send their child to my wonderful school, ABSOLUTELY FREE! The four children who receive this prize will be those I judge to be the worst children in the whole of Australia, and therefore most in need of my help. So, dear parents, what are you waiting for? If you believe your child is one of the four worst-behaved in the country, and you would like me to turn him or her into a perfect little angel, after only ONE MONTH, at NO COST WHATSOEVER, call for an application form today! Fill out the form and return it, and if you are successful in the follow-up interview, this magnificent, once-in-a-lifetime prize could be yours! 38

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Dad finished reading. There was a long silence. Finally Mum turned to him and said, ‘How can this be allowed, Pat? Surely there are laws against this sort of thing?’ ‘Laws against a TV celebrity opening her own school?’ Dad frowned. ‘I don’t think so, Louise.’ ‘This isn’t a school!’ Mum said. ‘This is a shop of horrors! This is a dungeon of torments! God knows what that vile woman is going to do to the kids that get sent there! She’ll torture them! She’ll break their spirits! How else is she going to get badly behaved kids to be perfect little angels after just one month?’ Just then Emma gasped. We all heard it. It was the sort of gasp you make when you’ve just remembered something vitally important, that should have been done last Friday. ‘Emma?’ Dad said. ‘Are you all right?’ ‘Um, sure. I’m – I’m fine,’ Emma said shakily. ‘My toast went down the wrong way, that’s all. I’d better go do my hair.’ ‘You don’t look fine,’ Mum said. ‘You look as white as a sheet. What’s going on?’ ‘Nothing,’ Emma said. ‘I told you. My toast disagreed with me. And my hair’s a mess, I can’t go to school looking like this— ’ ‘Your toast won’t be the only thing disagreeing 39

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with you if you don’t tell me the truth,’ Mum said. ‘And you can stay right there until I hear it, young lady.’ Emma’s face went even whiter. She looked down miserably at her half-empty plate. ‘It was a mistake, a terrible mistake,’ she mumbled. ‘I had no idea that was why she bought it. Honest.’ ‘Emma,’ Mum said. ‘What on earth are you talking about?’ ‘Of course, we don’t know for sure,’ Emma went on hopefully. ‘I mean, she wouldn’t do that to children, would she? Nobody could be that cruel.’ ‘Emma, if you don’t stop muttering to yourself, and start making half a grain of sense, I’m going to pour this carton of milk right over your head,’ Mum said, and picked up the milk to show she really meant it. ‘It’s not my fault!’ Emma wailed. ‘I’m just the inventor! Business is business! Professor Kreeb had the money and she wanted it, so I sold it to her! That’s all!’ Mum put the milk down again. Very slowly. ‘You sold your Binoculator to Professor Kreeb?’ she said in a hushed voice. ‘Is that what you’re saying?’ Emma burst into a flood of tears. 40

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‘You told me you hadn’t sold it at all!’ Mum said. ‘You promised me only a month ago that you’d taken it to the tip! And instead it’s gone to that horrible witch of a professor, so she can use it on children!’ Emma sobbed even louder. She leapt up and out of her chair and ran off down the hall. ‘I didn’t know she was going to use it on children!’ she wailed as she ran off. ‘I swear I didn’t!’ ‘What did you think she was going to use it on?’ Mum called after her. ‘Her goldfish?’ Mum started towards Emma’s room but Dad stopped her. ‘Let her go, Louise,’ he said. ‘She knows she’s in the wrong. Anyway, the damage is done now.’ ‘I can’t believe it,’ Mum exclaimed. ‘My own daughter. After I told her she wasn’t to sell that horrible machine to anyone! She went ahead and did it anyway!’ All of this was news to me. I hadn’t realised Mum even knew about the Binoculator, let alone that she’d told Emma not to sell it. Boy oh boy. Now Em would be in a truly glorious amount of trouble. ‘Let me think,’ Mum went on. ‘We have to be calm about this. Obviously Professor Kreeb has bought the Binoculator so she can binoculate the children at her school in secret. Then, once the 41

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operation’s done, she’ll be able to spy on them day and night. She’ll see every little thing they do wrong, and she’ll punish them for it. That’s how she’ll get them to behave like perfect little angels. They’ll end up thinking she can read their minds.’ ‘We’ve got to stop her,’ Dad said. ‘I’ll call the police.’ ‘I don’t think that’ll help, Patrick,’ Mum said. ‘Professor Kreeb’s no fool. She’ll be keeping that Binoculator very well hidden. The police won’t agree to search the Correct-a-torium without good reason, and I don’t think our suspicions alone will be enough.’ ‘But we know she’s got the Binoculator!’ Dad said. ‘Emma sold it to her!’ ‘Yes, over the Internet, I’ll bet,’ Mum said. ‘No sales docket. No proof of purchase. No way of linking her back to Emma at all. Professor Kreeb knows that if she’s caught operating on children she’ll be in big trouble. So she’ll be covering her tracks. She obviously believes she can get away with it, and the horrible, scary thing is, she just might.’

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5 a truly terrible idea

Mum spoke to the police during the day, but got nowhere. They told her to call the Department of Education, whose job it was to inspect schools. The Department of Education assured her that Professor Kreeb’s school had already been inspected thoroughly, and no sign of anything illegal had been found. ‘So that’s the end of that,’ Mum said to us wearily at dinner. ‘As far as the authorities are concerned, Kreeb’s Correct-a-torium is squeaky clean. To get any further we need to prove that Professor Kreeb has the Binoculator – which means somebody has to find it, and take it to the police as evidence. That’s the only way.’ ‘I wish I could go and find it,’ Emma said. ‘I feel terrible about all this.’ 43

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‘Why can’t we all go and find it?’ I said. ‘We could do a commando raid, in the dead of night, and search the place from top to bottom.’ ‘No way,’ Dad said. ‘Have you ever heard of alarms, Toby? Security systems? Guard dogs?’ ‘Plus we’d never find it in one night,’ Mum said. ‘Like I said, Professor Kreeb’s no fool. She won’t exactly have it on display in the trophy cabinet.’ Another idea hit me then. It hit me with such force that I stood up. I didn’t mean to stand up – I simply found myself suddenly propelled to my feet, my chair pushed back behind me, staring at Mum and Dad with wide eyes. ‘But why don’t I enrol at her school?’ I said. ‘Remember her special offer? How she’s going to take four kids free of charge, the first month after it opens? Why can’t one of those kids be me?’ I expected some encouragement at least. They are my parents, after all. They didn’t have to look as if I’d suggested pulling a large plastic bag over my head and lying down in the middle of the road. ‘What’s wrong?’ I said. ‘It’s a brilliant idea! I could spy on her while she was spying on everybody else! I could find the Binoculator and get it to the police before it does any damage!’ ‘Toby,’ Mum said sternly, ‘it’s a truly terrible idea. 44

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It may be the very worst idea you’ve ever had.’ ‘But if the police can’t do anything, this is our only chance!’ I blurted out. ‘I have to do it! Otherwise Professor Kreeb will binoculate thousands of kids all across the country!’ ‘Yes, including you,’ Mum replied. ‘And God knows what other tortures she’ll inflict on you once you’re in her clutches. The woman’s a sadist. She hates children with a passion. I wouldn’t let you within a million miles of her.’ ‘But I’ll know what’s coming!’ I protested. ‘I won’t let her binoculate me! I won’t fall for any of her tricks! Dad, you can see that it’ll work, can’t you?’ Dad was still looking thoughtful. He hadn’t made up his mind yet, I could tell. ‘Patrick, I can’t believe you’re even considering it,’ Mum said. ‘I’m considering it because it’s the best idea we’ve had so far,’ Dad replied. ‘Although if anyone should enrol, Emma should. She’s the one who got us into this mess.’ ‘I would if I could, but I’m too old,’ Emma said. ‘And besides, Professor Kreeb knows my name.’ ‘She knows Toby’s name too,’ Mum said. ‘His surname is the same as yours.’ 45

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‘I could go there under a false name, and she’d never know I was Emma’s brother,’ I piped up. ‘What I’m thinking,’ Dad went on, before Mum could protest again, ‘is that we might be able to help Toby with this. We might be able to support him, and make sure he comes to no harm. Maybe if he had a mobile phone with him, so he could call us, any hour of the day or night—’ ‘Professor Kreeb would spot a mobile phone in five seconds,’ Mum snorted. ‘You think she won’t have thought of that? She won’t be letting anybody call out, I guarantee it.’ ‘What about a miniature mobile phone?’ Emma said. ‘One that you could hide on your body, anywhere you liked? One that didn’t even look like a mobile phone, but worked just as well?’ ‘Sounds great,’ Dad said. ‘Where do you plan to get one of those?’ ‘From my lab,’ Emma replied. ‘I’ve already invented it. It’s sitting on the top shelf in my cupboard.’ A few minutes later Emma returned holding something flat and grey and square, the size of a fridge magnet. She smiled proudly and held it up for us to see. ‘That’s it?’ Mum said incredulously. ‘That’s 46

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your miniature mobile phone?’ ‘That’s it,’ Emma said. ‘Classy, huh?’ ‘But it’s nothing!’ Mum exclaimed. ‘It’s got no numbers on it! It’s got no display! It looks like a stick of gum that’s been dipped in an ashtray!’ ‘Allow me to give you a demonstration,’ Emma said. ‘I simply stick the telephone here on my skin, like so—’ ‘Did you say stick the telephone on?’ Dad interrupted. ‘Yes. It’s a skin-magnet telephone. Right now I’m going to stick it on my arm, but it’ll stick to any part of your body you want.’ She pressed the skin-magnet telephone flat onto her arm. Now it looked more like a Band-aid than a fridge magnet or a stick of gum. Emma waved her arm around, then banged her hand on the table, but the skin magnet stayed put. ‘And now, to dial,’ she said. ‘The phone has a touch-sensitive pad inside, which means all you have to do is press it with your finger. It will then automatically dial the number it’s got stored in its memory. It can only dial one number, unfortunately, that’s its big limitation at the moment. I’ve programmed it to dial the number of our phone in the hall.’ 47

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She pushed the pad. We heard a series of musical metallic beeps. Then the phone on the telephone stand began to ring. ‘To disconnect, just push the pad again,’ Emma said, and pushed it. ‘But what do you talk into?’ Dad asked. ‘At this end, I mean. There’s nothing to hold onto.’ ‘There’s a miniature microphone next to the touch pad,’ Emma explained. ‘It’ll pick up the slightest whisper. So unless he’s wearing it on his bum, and he sits on it, you’ll hear him if he calls for help.’ ‘What’s its range?’ Dad asked. ‘Well, I haven’t tested the limits exactly,’ Emma said. ‘But somewhere around fifty kilometres. Here you go, Tobes, give it a test run.’ She peeled the skin magnet off her arm and handed it to me. I pressed it to the top of my wrist and felt it stick. ‘Emma,’ I said, ‘you’re a genius.’ ‘Of course,’ Emma agreed. Then, seeing Mum’s dirty look, she added, ‘But what matters with inventions like this, little brother, is not how clever they are. What matters is if they can be used for the good of humankind.’ I went outside to test the phone at a distance. It 48

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worked perfectly. It worked from on top of the hill at the end of our road, and it worked when I went next door and stuck my arm in a bucket of water. We still needed to do more tests, but the initial results were looking very promising. ‘Not even James Bond has a skin-magnet telephone,’ I said proudly, when we’d finished testing for the day. ‘What d’you reckon, Mum? Licence to kill?’ Mum didn’t look a hundred per cent convinced. ‘I’m not sure yet,’ she said. ‘I’ll sleep on it. Ask me again in the morning.’

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6 a villain and a troublemaker

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Dagenham East-Nor’-East 17 March

Professor Jocelyn Kreeb Director, Kreeb’s Correct-a-torium PO Box 1 Temptation Fields NSW 9999

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7 force ten from dagenham It was the last day in March. Dad was driving Mum and me up a winding mountain road towards Kreeb’s Correct-a-torium, three hours west of the city. It was the final day of interviews to see who would win the free places at Professor Kreeb’s school. ‘Are you sure you want to go through with this, Toby?’ Mum asked. ‘It could get pretty nasty.’ ‘Sure I’m sure,’ I said. ‘And it won’t get nasty. It’ll be a breeze.’ ‘I don’t know whether “breeze” is the right word to describe Professor Kreeb,’ Dad said. ‘She sounds more like a Force Nine gale to me.’ ‘Well, she’s about to meet Force Ten from Dagenham,’ I said. ‘Hurricane Toby. When huff comes to puff, I’ve got the right stuff.’ 59

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Mum sighed as Dad steered us around a sharp turn. We were only five minutes from our destination: an old abandoned monastery, near the town of Temptation Fields, which Professor Kreeb had converted into her evil Correct-a-torium. ‘I’m glad you’re confident,’ Mum said. ‘I hate to think what tortures that woman has in store for her first group of kids. Especially the four prize-winners. If she cures them in a month, half the parents in the country will be lining up to get their kids in.’ ‘If you want to quit, Tobes, now’s the time, mate,’ Dad said. ‘We wouldn’t think less of you if you wanted to turn around and go home.’ ‘I’m not quitting,’ I said. ‘Somebody has to find that Binoculator and save all those kids from a fate worse than death. And that somebody is me.’ I sat back and thought about the interview. I had to make a good job of it. There was no margin for error. The grand opening of Kreeb’s Correct-a-torium was in less than a month, and three out of the four prize-winners in her competition had already been chosen. The first winner, announced in a blaze of publicity two weeks earlier, was a boy named Dudley ‘Mackerel Bait’ Ferris. Mackerel Bait, as all his friends and teachers called him, lived in Caboolture, near 60

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Brisbane. He was thirteen years old. He was two metres tall and weighed 106 kilos. He had recently been diagnosed with hyper-acute Attention Deficit Disorder. He simply couldn’t keep still. His massive supercharged body produced more energy than the Snowy River Hydro-Electric Scheme. He had to be strapped into a harness to sleep at night, and he spent his days at school knocking over gum trees and playing basketball with teachers’ cars. His parents, Moira and Kevin Ferris, were quiet, shy people. When they appeared on TV, you could see that their house was a wreck. All the furniture was broken. Strips of clothing, ripped-up books and bits of leftover food were strewn across the floor. Several walls inside the house had big holes in them, with loose electric wires hanging down. ‘All we want is for Dudley to stop destroying things!’ Kevin Ferris said despairingly. ‘He’s constantly in trouble, and he makes our lives hell! If Professor Kreeb can fix his problem in a month, she’s a genius!’ The second winner, announced a week later, was Zara Cox of Kalgoorlie. The same Zara Cox whose mum had sent a letter to ‘Brats’, compaining about her lying. She was a tanned, sporty-looking girl, twelve years old, with long brown hair tied in a pony61

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tail. She sat on the couch looking at her fingernails while her mother talked loudly into the camera. ‘We used Professor Kreeb’s special punishment soap, but it didn’t work,’ Zara’s mother said. ‘Zara still lies about everything. Last week a man from Social Security rang up and asked for some family details. Zara told him her name was Infinity Starlight Magenta. She said I was a professional frog tickler, my husband was a faith healer, and that we lived six months of the year in the Amazon rainforest, in a teepee. Thanks to her we’ve lost all our Family Benefit and we’re in danger of being deported to Brazil. It can’t go on. We’ve got to do something. We’re at our wits’ end.’ The third winner, announced just one day later, was an eleven-year-old Chinese boy named Peter Chou. Peter was a thin, serious-looking boy with straight black hair and glasses. His parents stood outside the gates of their enormous three-storied mansion in the Adelaide hills, and talked about why they wanted Peter to go to Kreeb’s. ‘He is terribly, terribly disobedient,’ his father said. ‘We ask him to do six hours’ homework every night, but he only does three. Then, at midnight, when we wake him up for his violin lesson, he says he is too tired to play. He is still tired at four o’clock in 62

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the morning when we wake him up again for his spelling test. Yesterday he couldn’t spell “rheumatoid encephalomyelitis”. We were so ashamed. We hire the best tutors to teach him Quantum Physics and Advanced Nuclear Magnetic Resonance, and what does he do? He stares at his paper and does nothing. He says he is bored with study. He wants to play football and cricket with the other boys. We’ve tried everything to make him work harder, but he won’t listen to us. We sincerely hope Professor Kreeb can make him see reason.’ At the end of the interview with Mr and Mrs Chou, Professor Kreeb herself appeared on screen. ‘So there you have it,’ she said. ‘Three out of the four winners of my competiton have already been decided. You can see for yourself how appalling these children are. One is a brutal thug, one is a compulsive liar, and one is a lazy, good-for-nothing louse. Whoever wins the final free spot at my school – and the name of that lucky child will be announced next week, after a final round of weekend interviews – will have to meet the very highest standards of obnoxiousness and bad behaviour. We take only the most rotten children at Kreeb’s, as our beloved school motto, Nothing But the Worst, clearly states.’ I remembered this as our car rounded one final 63

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sharp bend, and we reached the heavy iron gates of Kreeb’s Correct-a-torium. At once my confidence vanished. The old monastery was a gloomy, forbidding place. It was a crumbling brick building with a steep roof and rows of tiny shuttered windows. It was completely overshadowed and hemmed in by a forest of tall pine trees. Dead pine needles covered the driveway, the garden and the small, dry lawn in a cloak of evillooking rust brown. A tall wire-mesh fence surrounded the grounds, topped off with three rolls of extra-spiky barbed wire. In a half-circle above the gate, in letters cast from wrought iron, were the words KREEB’S CORRECT-ATORIUM. Underneath that was the motto I’d been thinking about only seconds before. Nothing But the Worst. Dad pulled up. He looked at the intercom buzzer that stood outside his driver’s side window. ‘Still time to go home, Tobes,’ he said. ‘No way,’ I replied. ‘Do you remember our plans for the interview?’ Mum said. ‘Sure,’ I said. ‘Behave as badly as I can, as quickly as I can.’ Then, feeling a little doubtful, I added, 64

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‘I don’t look too goody-two-shoes, do I?’ Mum studied me. ‘You could’ve bleached your hair, and tattooed something on your knuckles,’ she said. ‘And maybe worn an earring or two. But no, you’ll be okay. Just remember that badness comes from the heart, Toby. You have to want to be bad. If you can do that, and let the badness shine out of you, you’ll be a big success.’ ‘Thanks, Mum,’ I said, and gave her a kiss on the cheek. ‘I love you.’ ‘I love you too, my brave clever boy.’ ‘No no no!’ Dad waved his arms at me in frustration. ‘Cut out the lovey-dovey stuff! You’re bad now, Tobes! You’re one of the worst four kids in the country! If Professor Kreeb catches you kissing your mother, you’ll be out on your ear!’ Dad spoke into the intercom. The gates opened, and we drove into the grounds. We parked in front of the main office, which was a modest-sized, ivycovered brick building next to the old monastery. The receptionist took us down the hall to Professor Kreeb’s office. Dad knocked once but there was no answer, so he knocked again. ‘Wait!’ growled a familiar voice from inside. I felt my heart hammering in my chest. A dry, metallic taste welled in my mouth. 65

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‘This is it, Toby!’ Dad whispered. ‘Zero hour! Time to do your stuff!’ I nodded. From now on, I had to be bad. Really bad. I had to go all the way. ‘If you think I’m staying one minute longer in this poxy dump, you’ve got another think coming!’ I shouted. ‘They haven’t even got Austar! And where’s the spa? Where’s the heated swimming pool? I told you this place wasn’t good enough! You can tell that fat crabby old cane toad she ain’t got a snowflake’s chance in hell of me staying here!’ The door flew open just as I finished talking. Professor Kreeb was much bigger in real life than she’d looked on TV, and twice as frightening. Her fat, bulging body filled up the entire doorway. She trained her beady eyes on me with a heat that could have melted the polar ice-cap. ‘Hasn’t got a snowflake’s chance in hell,’ she hissed. ‘Can’t you speak English?’ I almost apologised. I only stopped myself at the very last second. ‘What’s it to you, you mouldering tub of dog food?’ I said. ‘I don’t give two hoots about you or your stupid school!’ Professor Kreeb’s eyes narrowed to tiny slits. Her gaze bored right through me. She turned to my 66

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parents and gave them a thin smile. ‘Welcome,’ she said. ‘Mr and Mrs Smudge, isn’t it? And right on time. Make yourselves at home.’ She showed us to armchairs in the corner opposite her desk. ‘Please,’ she said. ‘All of you. Sit down.’ ‘Isn’t there anything to eat in this garbage heap?’ I said. ‘I’m starved.’ ‘We are here to discuss your bad behaviour, not to eat,’ Professor Kreeb said. We sat down. Professor Kreeb picked up some papers from the coffee table in front of her. ‘I have here the application form and references you sent in,’ she said. ‘The references, in particular, were most impressive.’ ‘I said I want something to eat,’ I demanded. ‘Are you deaf as well as ugly?’ Professor Kreeb gave me a withering stare. ‘It is very unusual indeed for a child to have a detailed criminal record by the age of nine,’ she went on. ‘And some of the crimes he has been involved in are quite audacious. He clearly has a genuinely delinquent mind.’ ‘Well, yes, we think so,’ Dad said modestly. ‘He always was ahead of his time.’ ‘He must truly be a torment to you,’ Professor Kreeb said sympathetically. ‘I’m sure he gives you 67

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new grey hairs every day. I simply hope that—Excuse me, young man, just what d’you think you’re doing?’ ‘I’m turning off the air-conditioner,’ I said. ‘It’s too hot in here.’ I’d got up and was standing next to a large airconditioning unit, fixed into the wall. I grabbed the temperature control knob at the bottom and twisted it, so that it broke off in my hand. ‘Ah, bugger it,’ I said, and tossed the knob on the floor. ‘Useless bit of junk. No worries, I’ll do it manually.’ I picked up an umbrella that was leaning against the corner of Professor Kreeb’s desk. ‘Leave that alone!’ Professor Kreeb yelled. ‘Sit back down!’ I poked the sharp metal tip of the umbrella in through the slats of the air-conditioner, until it hit the fan. Then I pushed hard. The blades of the fan broke with a series of awful grinding, grunging noises. A shower of bright sparks flew out in front of me, followed by a plume of thick blue smoke, and a loud bang. ‘Why . . . you . . . little . . . MONSTER!’ Professor Kreeb lunged towards me, her face contorted with rage. ‘You impudent pipsqueak! I’ll roast you! I’ll thrash you within an inch of your life!’ 68

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‘Help!’ I shouted, and dived across her desk, sending her computer and printer crashing to the floor. ‘Madwoman on the rampage!’ ‘I’ll boil you in oil!’ Professor Kreeb raged. ‘I’ll hammer you! I’ll pluck you like a chicken! How DARE you behave like that in my office!’ She came charging at me around the desk. I ducked under her outstretched arm, then ran as fast as I could for the door. I didn’t turn around until I was safe in the front courtyard and sprinting for the car. Mum and Dad were close behind me. Just as we reached the car, Professor Kreeb appeared on the front steps. She shook a furious fist in my direction. ‘Don’t think you can get away with this, Toby Smudge!’ she roared. ‘One day soon the world will be rid of vile little brats like you, and I, Jocelyn Kreeb, will be hailed as a saviour! Do you hear that, Smudge? You won’t escape! I’ve got plans for you, my boy! BIG plans!’

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8 opening day

A week later my parents received a letter from Professor Kreeb. My interview had been extremely successful, she said. She was delighted to offer me the final non-fee-paying place at her school. Over the next couple of weeks we gave Emma’s skin-magnet telephone a really thorough workout. We tested it underground. We tested it on top of mountains. We tested it at a range of ten kilometres, then twenty kilometres, then fifty. Like all of Emma’s inventions, it worked perfectly, every time. Next on the list was accommodation. Mum and Dad booked a motel room for themselves and Emma in Temptation Fields. They planned to stay there the whole time I was at the Correct-a-torium, ready 70

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to speed out to my rescue if the need arose. ‘Think of yourself as the spearhead, and of us as the main strike force, waiting behind,’ Dad said. ‘We’re with you 100 per cent. If you need us at midnight, or at four in the morning, or at one in the afternoon, it doesn’t matter. Whenever you call, we’ll be there.’ I was due to be dropped off at the Correct-atorium at 4 p.m. on the afternoon of Sunday the 30th of April. We left early, but there was an accident outside the city, and we got stuck in terrible traffic. We didn’t arrive outside the gates of the Correct-atorium until 4.25. The driveway was deserted. ‘I don’t see too many people,’ Mum said. ‘Maybe they’ve all gone inside.’ ‘Time for you to go in too,’ Dad said to me. ‘You’re on your own from here, Toby. Except you’re not on your own, if you know what I mean.’ He held up a cordless phone and grinned at me. I gave him a double thumbs-up. ‘Where did you stick your skin-magnet phone, by the way?’ Mum asked. ‘You never told us.’ ‘In my armpit,’ I said. ‘I figured that was the best place to hide it. Even if I get searched, they probably won’t look there.’ 71

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‘And if they do, they’ll die of brain damage from the B.O.,’ Emma said. ‘Brilliant.’ ‘You know, I’ve got the feeling you just might be able to pull this off,’ Mum said. ‘Of course he will!’ Dad ruffled my hair. ‘He’s my son! And you’ve got your spare skin-magnet phone in your bag?’ ‘Two spares,’ I said. ‘Terrific. Give us a call as soon as the coast is clear, so we can monitor your movements.’ ‘Will do.’ ‘Now,’ Dad said, rubbing his hands, ‘for a big send-off, how about we sing the Dagenham Footy Song? Just you and me?’ ‘Oh no!’ Mum and Emma groaned. ‘Do you have to?’ ‘Of course we have to!’ Dad said. ‘It’ll put hairs on his chest! It’ll put some pig in him! Me first, you second, Tobes! You ready?’ And together we sang: People often ask us! People often ask us! Where do we come from? Where do we come from? So we tell them! 72

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So we tell them! We come from Dagenham! We come from Dagenham! Lovely little Dagenham! Lovely little Dagenham! Pretty little Dagenham! Pretty little Dagenham! And if they can’t hear us If they can’t hear us THEY REALLY MUST BE DEAF!!! Two minutes later I was alone, lugging my backpack and sleeping bag down the driveway, over a treacherous bed of dead pine cones and crackly brown pine needles. I reached the Correct-a-torium entrance. To my surprise, the enormous double wooden doors were closed and locked. Both the Correct-a-torium and the office next door were completely empty. There was no sign of Professor Kreeb, or of any other children. But there were some strange and rather disturbing noises coming from around the back. If your family has one of those electronic bugzapper devices hanging up outside your home, and you’ve heard some poor unfortunate bug get roasted 73

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on it, then you’ll know the noise I mean. It’s the short, spine-tingling GZZZZT! of an electric current frying an insect to death. That was the noise I heard in the distance, from behind the Correct-a-torium, three times, in quick succession, as if the same stupid bug were hurling itself repeatedly against the zapper: GZZZZT! GZZZZT! GZZZ-Z-Z-ZT! Each sound was followed straight away by a quick yelp of pain. Human pain. Then, above the sound of the zappers and the yelps of people being zapped, I suddenly heard the familiar bellow of Professor Kreeb. ‘Come on, you miserable dung beetles!’ she was shouting. ‘Chop-chop! Get into position! Don’t waste everybody’s time, or you’ll get zapped even harder!’ I had to find out what was going on. It sounded horrible. I hurried down a narrow cobblestone path between the monastery and the office. Off to my left was a small garden shed and an overgrown fruit orchard. I ducked under the tangled branches of a big old plum tree, and crouched down. From here I could see clearly around the corner of the monastery into the back yard. It was horrible. Forty or fifty children were being herded towards a stage that had been put up under 74

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the pines. Some of the children were crying. All of them looked like they were in shock. If any of them tripped, or slowed down, or dropped their bags, they were immediately zapped by one of Professor Kreeb’s men. I counted twenty men. Each one was big and beefy and dressed in a black tracksuit, like the thugs on Professor Kreeb’s TV show. Each one held in his hands a strange white metal rod about a metre long. The tips of these rods glowed an eerie metallic blue colour – just like the wires inside a bug-zapper – and whenever a tip touched a child, the blue lit up suddenly, brighter than a flare. Professor Kreeb was standing alone at the front of the stage, taking in the scene with a grim, satisfied smile. ‘That’s it, men!’ she roared. ‘Don’t hold back! Any nonsense, zap the little brutes good and hard! They’ll soon learn to behave themselves when I’m around!’ I thought of Mum and Dad and Emma. I wanted to go home. Then I remembered the skin-magnet telephone, safe and secure in my armpit. I pressed the magnet firmly with my finger. It began to dial at once. Within a few seconds it was ringing, and it was quickly answered. 75

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‘G’day, Tobes,’ Dad said cheerfully. ‘That was quick. Where are you?’ ‘I’m hiding under a plum tree,’ I said. ‘Watching a whole bunch of kids get zapped.’ ‘Zapped?’ Dad repeated. ‘What d’you mean, zapped?’ ‘I mean zapped!’ I said. ‘With cattle prods! There are twenty big beefy men out the back of the Correcta-torium, and they’re herding everyone towards Professor Kreeb like a bunch of cows!’ There was a pause, then Dad said, ‘Well, we knew it would be bad. D’you want us to come back for you?’ ‘No, not yet,’ I said. ‘They’re not zapping everyone. Only the kids that try to run away. I reckon if I keep my head down, I’ll be— Hang on. There’s someone coming. I’ve got to go.’ I just managed to push the magnet with my finger again, to end the call, before a girl who looked very familiar swung in under the outer branches of the plum tree. ‘Hi!’ she said. ‘Mind if I join you? This looks like the safest place to be right now.’ ‘Uh, no,’ I said. ‘I don’t mind. Come on in.’ The girl crawled in beside me. I was sure I knew her from somewhere, but I couldn’t remember where. 76

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‘What were you doing just then?’ she asked seriously. ‘When?’ I said. ‘Just before. When I came in. You had your arm up and you were sort of – sniffing at yourself.’ ‘I wasn’t sniffing at myself,’ I said. ‘What were you doing then?’ ‘None of your business.’ She gave me a disapproving frown. ‘We’re on the same side, you know,’ she said. ‘I don’t want to be in this dump any more than you do. I thought we might be able to help each other get out of here.’ I didn’t want to get out of the Correct-a-torium, not yet at least. But I would probably need a few allies for the struggle ahead. I nodded. ‘All right,’ I said. ‘If you want to know what I was doing, I’ll tell you. I was making a call on the phone in my armpit.’ The girl stared at me for a few seconds. Then a huge grin spread across her face. ‘Sure,’ she said. ‘Right. Of course you were. You were making a call from the phone in your armpit.’ ‘I was!’ I protested. ‘Do they do that a lot where you come from?’ ‘Listen,’ I said. ‘You asked me a question, and I’m answering it. Right here in my left armpit is a state77

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of-the-art skin-magnet telephone invented by my sister Emma. I just made a call on it, and spoke to Dad.’ The girl shook her head. ‘You know something?’ she said. ‘That’s wonderful. That’s exactly the sort of outrageous lie I would’ve made up myself. And you told it so perfectly, as though you honestly believed it was true! I’m impressed. I really am.’ I realised then why the girl looked so familiar. ‘You’re Zara,’ I said. ‘The compulsive liar. You’re one of the other prize-winners.’ ‘Actually,’ she said, ‘my real name is Infinity Starlight Magenta. But I guess I’ll answer to Zara.’ ‘It’s great to meet you,’ I said. ‘I’m Toby.’ ‘Hi, Toby.’ She crouched down beside me and peered out at Kreeb’s men, who were still herding everyone towards the stage. ‘So. Do you come here often?’ ‘Oh sure,’ I said. ‘I love it here. My hobby is hiding under plum trees watching kids get zapped.’ ‘My hobby is collecting rare South American orchids,’ Zara said. ‘My parents live in Brazil, you know. In the rainforest. In a teepee.’ ‘You really are a compulsive liar, aren’t you?’ I said. ‘Hah!’ she exclaimed. ‘Look who’s talking, Mr Skin-Magnet-Telephone-in-Your-Armpit! I’ve 78

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never told a lie as bad as that!’ I was just about to show her the phone, to prove I wasn’t lying, when I heard a noise close by. It was the sound of someone bashing a large object with great force against a flat sheet of tin, and was coming from the direction of the shed. I called out, ‘Hey, stop that! Kreeb’s men’ll hear you!’ I scrambled out from under the plum tree and ran to the shed. The most enormous boy I’d ever seen was dancing and weaving in front of it with his fists raised. I knew straight away it was Mackerel Bait Ferris. He was nearly twice as tall as I was. Both his top front teeth were missing, and his nose looked as though it had once doubled as a bumper bar in a demolition derby. ‘In wiv a weft!’ he called out. ‘Feints wiv a wight! Uppercut! Weft to da kidneys! He’s gottim on da wopes!’ He swung one of his massive fists. It ripped into the shed door with a shuddering crash. He swung the other fist, and the impact almost took the door off its hinges. Before he could let go a third punch, and send the shed rolling away across the grass like a tumbleweed, I stepped forward. ‘Mackerel Bait! Mackerel Bait, stop!’ 79

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He did stop. He turned to me and lowered his fists. ‘Why?’ he said. ‘Am I doin’ somefink wong?’ ‘It’s quiet time, Mackerel Bait,’ I said. ‘The fight’s over. The shed surrenders.’ He shot me a broad grin. ‘I beat it pwetty good, huh?’ he said. ‘You killed it,’ I said. ‘Unanimous points decision. You’re the champ.’ All at once he frowned. ‘Say,’ he said doubtfully, ‘do I know you?’ I introduced myself as quickly as I could. Before I could tell him about Zara, two of Kreeb’s men appeared. Both were holding zappers. At the sight of Mackerel Bait they stopped a moment. Then they came cautiously forward. ‘We’ve got a live one here, Terry,’ one of them said. ‘Come on, big fella. The show’s over. Time to join the rest of the herd.’ ‘What herd?’ Mackerel Bait said. ‘When I say move, you big tub of lard, you move!’ The man stepped in and zapped Mackerel Bait hard in the stomach. Mackerel Bait didn’t even twitch. The man staggered backwards, staring at the end of his zapper, and at Mackerel Bait’s stomach. He took a whistle out of his pocket, and blew three short, loud blasts. 80

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‘Ooo, I wike whistles,’ Mackerel Bait said. ‘What’s going on?’ I heard Zara whisper from just behind me. ‘Just a bunch of cavemen hunting a mammoth,’ I whispered back, as Kreeb’s henchman high-tailed it back into the bush. ‘Hey, Mackerel Bait! This way, quick!’ The three of us ducked across to the cobblestone path. But it was too late – the game was up. Five more of Kreeb’s men were running towards us from the front of the Correct-a-torium. Another five were running from over by the stage. ‘Wet me hit dem!’ Mackerel Bait said, and began dancing around again with his fists raised. ‘In wiv a weft! Feints wiv a wight! He’s gottim on da wopes!’ ‘Forget it, ’ I said. ‘We’re outnumbered four to one.’ ‘Is dat bad?’ ‘It is when they’ve got zappers,’ I said. ‘One might not hurt you, my friend, but twelve will.’ Mackerel Bait looked disappointed, but went quietly. Kreeb’s men surrounded us, then bailed us up against the wall of the monastery, their zappers only centimetres from our faces. ‘Don’t try anything smart,’ one of the men 81

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snarled. ‘One step out of line, you get zapped right in the neck.’ ‘What a shame,’ Zara said. ‘Look at all these lovely cigarette lighters, and I don’t even smoke.’ ‘No more funny business!’ the man growled. ‘Now, move!’ ‘Our bags,’ I gasped. ‘We’ve left our bags under the trees.’ ‘Forget the bags!’ the man said. ‘You can get them later. I said move!’ They marched us roughly across the lawn. By this time everyone else was seated on a carpet of dead pine needles in front of the stage. Nobody was trying to escape. They’d learned the hard way that Kreeb’s men meant business. And towering above all of us, with her hands on her hips and an expression of gloating triumph on her face, was the revolting Professor Kreeb.

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9 the oath of eternal obedience ‘At last the final few stragglers have arrived!’ Professor Kreeb boomed. ‘Now we can begin!’ She paused, gazing fiercely down at us. ‘What a wretched, pathetic bunch of losers you are!’ she said scornfully. ‘What no-hopers! What holes in the air! What useless, worthless piles of poodle-dung! Has there ever been such a flock of dunderheads, such a gaggle of snot-brained dribblewits gathered together in one place? Of course not! This gathering here today is unique. It’s unprecedented. It will never be repeated again.’ ‘You are,’ Professor Kreeb continued, ‘quite simply, the forty-eight worst children in the history of this great country! You are the sludge! The scum! The dregs at the bottom of the barrel! You are the 83

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compost the rest of society forgot to take out to the chickens! In Roman times, do you know what would have happened to you? You would have been taken up into the mountains and fed to the wolves! What a shame there are no wolves in this country! What a shame dingoes don’t have the same ravenous appetite for human flesh! What a shame wombats do not get the urge to feast upon an unruly child once in a while, and bandicoots do not sneak into your rooms at dead of night and carry you off to their burrows, to chew you up into tasty, bite-sized morsels for their young!’ She paused for breath. Her nostrils flared. Her toadlike features seemed more bloated and disgusting than ever. ‘She’s mad,’ Zara whispered next to me. ‘I suspected it earlier, but now I’m sure of it. She’s holidaying in the Top End.’ ‘You are here at Kreeb’s Correct-a-torium,’ Professor Kreeb said, ‘because you are the worst of the worst. Your parents have given up on you. Your teachers never want you back. Your sports coaches, when they see you coming, run screaming into the clubhouse and lock themselves in the pie-warmer. Only I, Professor Jocelyn Prunella Kreeb, am clever enough to defeat you. Only I have the power to turn 84

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you into the quiet, perfectly behaved little churchmice that all children are supposed to be!’ Professor Kreeb’s eyes narrowed. She leaned over the edge of the stage towards us, like a cobra waiting to strike. ‘I know your little game, you see,’ she said softly. ‘I know how you children get away with things. You are cunning. You cover your tracks. You slip and slime and squirm your way out of punishments that you thoroughly deserve. Well, let me tell you that there will be no squirming your way out of punishments here at Kreeb’s. There will be no excuses. There will be no denials. There will be no escape, because I will be watching you like a hawk, and I will know everything – everything! – that you do! If you step out of line even for one moment, you will be corrected! Harshly corrected! On that you may rely!’ Professor Kreeb smiled evilly. Her piercing gaze settled on me, boring right into my skull. ‘It is my stated aim in life,’ she went on, ‘to rid the world of misbehaving children. I do not like children, you see. I detest them. I can’t understand how any self-respecting adult could feel otherwise. Oh, I understand that children are necessary for the continuation of the human species. All species must reproduce. But no other creatures let their offspring 85

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run riot as we humans do! Do you ever see lion cubs racing down footpaths on skateboards? Do you see baby chimpanzees smoking behind the bike sheds, or bombing each other in swimming pools? Of course you don’t! The human child is a curse, a blight upon the planet! That is why I’ve opened my school, to rid the world of this curse forever! In twenty years there will be Correct-a-toriums just like this one in every country across the globe. Children just like you will tremble at my name, and drop to their knees to pray that my shadow will never darken their door!’ ‘She is mad,’ I whispered to Zara. ‘She’s barmy as a bandicoot.’ ‘She likes making speeches, too,’ Zara said. ‘She must have studied at Toastmasters.’ ‘Toadmasters, you mean,’ I replied. ‘Your program of punishments will begin at nine o’clock tomorrow morning,’ Professor Kreeb boomed. ‘We will shortly be going in to dinner, after which you will be shown to your rooms. But first, be upstanding for the Oath of Eternal Obedience.’ Her henchmen brandished their zappers. Everybody stood up. Some of the men began handing out bits of paper. When everyone had a copy, Professor Kreeb went on, ‘You will recite this oath twice a day, at breakfast and at dinner, to remind you of why you 86

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are here. I want you to practise it now. If you don’t say it loudly, clearly, and with great feeling, you will receive a sharp prod of encouragement from one of my men. Let us begin.’ In toneless, mumbling voices, we read from the page in front of us: THE OATH OF ETERNAL OBEDIENCE We take this oath to praise our founder. We raise our eyes and gather round her— ‘No no no!’ Professor Kreeb shouted. ‘More clearly! And louder, I can hardly hear you! Start again!’ We began again. We take this oath to praise our founder. We raise our eyes and gather round her. Kreeb! Oh Kreeb! What style! What grace! The saviour of the human race! She stands against the modern tide Of ratbag kids with too much hide, Whose idea of obedience Is painting rude words on the fence, Who like to terrorise their school And act the goat, and play the fool. We know that we are kids like these 87

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The nation’s rejects, if you please. We are the worst that ever were One look at us, you will concur. A motley bunch of scraggly stiffs So brainless that we’d walk off cliffs. If not for Kreeb, where would we be? Our future would be plain to see. We’d end up in some city park Sleeping rough in winter dark Dressed in rags while buzzing flies Picked at scabs around our eyes. We’d last like this a month or so, Shivering in sleet and snow, And then we’d sadly meet our deaths Drinking turpentine and meths. The Council men would come and turn us, Check we’re dead, then quickly burn us With leaves and trash and other junk. ‘Phoo-ee!’ they’d howl. ‘Boy, that one stunk! Another child whose grave misdeeds Caused his parents’ hearts to bleed! He wouldn’t eat his peas or pears! He wouldn’t wash behind his ears!’ We know this is the fate for us If we sleep late and miss the bus, And so we’ve come to Kreeb’s at last 88

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To set aside our murky past, To knuckle down, and show some sense And take her dreadful punishments. A month of pain, a month of terror, Will quickly cure us of our error. And at the end, if we’ve survived, Our morals will be quite revived. We’ll kiss our mothers, stroke the cat, Clean seagull droppings off Dad’s hat. We’ll all be perfect. Good as new. Thanks again to You-Know-Who. ‘Terrible!’ Professor Kreeb howled when we had finished. ‘Nothing but an incoherent mumble! Say it again!’ We recited the oath again. And again. And again. After the fourth time our heads were spinning. The light under the pine trees had faded, and we could hardly read the words on the page. ‘That’s enough!’ Professor Kreeb barked. ‘Time to go in for dinner! Pick up your bags and proceed through the front entrance of the Correct-a-torium to the hallway! Wait for me there in silence! And remember, I expect you to be perfectly behaved!’ Zara and Mackerel Bait and I were allowed to go to the orchard to get our bags. We joined the lines 89

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of miserable children filing through the front entrance into the hall. ‘Nobody here looks like a real trouble-maker,’ Zara whispered to me. ‘Have you noticed? They all look like regular kids.’ ‘Regular kids whose parents wish they were perfect,’ I whispered back. ‘And who think this place will give them some kind of miracle cure.’ ‘I had a miracle cure once,’ Zara said. ‘When we were in Brazil I got shot with a poisoned dart by an Amazonian tribesman. It looked like I was a goner until my father found a faith healer who hit me over the head with a statue of the Virgin Mary. Then I woke up and felt better straight away.’ ‘I thought you said your father was a faith healer,’ I said. ‘Oh, well, sure he is,’ Zara replied quickly. ‘But he doesn’t know much about poisons. He does the more regular stuff, you know. Blindness, leprosy, possession by demons—’ ‘This way! This way!’ Professor Kreeb called ahead of us. ‘I want to show you the pantry first! It’s right here next to the kitchen! Walk on in!’ We followed her directions to a large store-room. There were gasps and whistles of amazement as we crowded in. Piled on shelves all around us was the 90

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most mouth-watering array of food I’d ever seen. Rows of cakes – chocolate mudcakes, cheesecakes, fruitcakes, ice-cream cakes, sponge cakes filled with jam and topped with giant strawberries – filled the top two shelves. On the shelf below that were jars of hand-made chocolates, jars of enormous biscuits, and soft, fluffy-looking muffins. The fourth shelf held trays of luscious fruits and berries. Below that, on the bottom shelf, were jumbo-sized bags of potato crisps and other delicious snack foods – corn chips, soya crisps, apricot logs and muesli bars. In ovens to our left was the hot food. Pies, pizzas, hot-dogs, steaming vats of lasagne, crumbed and battered fish, spaghetti bolognese – my stomach was gurgling at the sight of it. Whole chickens turned slowly inside a rotisserie. Deep dishes of roast beef, baked potatoes, corn-on-the-cob and peas stood steaming inside their own special warmer. The smells of the roasting meat and the pizza toppings mingled with the sweeter, richer smells of the ripe fruits and the chocolates. The aroma was overpowering. Several of the children in the group were swaying on their feet. They looked about to faint. ‘Whoops!’ Professor Kreeb clapped her hands, and gave a loud, horsey laugh. ‘It seems we’ve walked 91

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into the staff pantry by mistake! Your pantry is next door! Follow me!’ Before we could protest, her men herded us out of the marvellous store-room into another room next door, exactly the same size. Again there were gasps as we entered – this time not of wonder, but of horror. The top two shelves in this room were lined with rusted yellow cans of dog food. On the shelf underneath were half-empty, rat-nibbled sacks of chicken pellets, rotten potatoes, brown rice and birdseed. There were no ovens or hot food. A 44-gallon drum full of mouldy cauliflower and broccoli stood in one corner. Another 44-gallon drum full of uncooked chicken wings stood next to that. A third drum, filled to overflowing with fish- and prawn-heads and surrounded by buzzing flies, smelt so disgusting that no one could go near it. On a last filthy shelf to our right were trays of lettuces and mushrooms and tomatoes so slimy and black with rot that they were dripping – yes, dripping – onto the floor. ‘Ah, here we are!’ Professor Kreeb rubbed her hands in delight. ‘This is your pantry! Full of everything a growing child needs! And on the menu tonight, we have a delightful dish called “Rat Trap 92

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Surprise”! Your own fresh rat, caught here in this very room and baked still in the trap, with its neck broken and its eyes bulging out, until golden brown! Accompanying this rare delicacy will be a dogfoodand-birdseed risotto, a fish-head-and-toadstool omelette, and – as a very special treat for your first night – a pine cone to suck on for dessert!’ There was a long, stunned silence. ‘You will notice,’ Professor Kreeb went on slyly, ‘that there are no locks on either of the pantries. The doors are open. You may come in or go out as you please. I am trusting you—’ She paused. ‘I am trusting you not to steal a single crumb from the staff pantry while you are here. Anyone who does steal from the staff pantry will be found out, and punished! Harshly punished! I hope that is perfectly clear.’ We trudged into the dining room. It was bare and bleak, filled with plain wooden tables. On each table were four plates. On each plate was a skinned rat, still caught in a trap, exactly as Professor Kreeb had described, and roasted until it was black. Next to that was a pile of glistening brown muck that I guessed was the dogfood-and-birdseed risotto. A pale yellow puddle of uncooked egg lay around a pile of stinking fish-heads and toadstools at the bottom, while in a small dessert bowl off to one side 93

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was a brown, prickly-looking pine cone. ‘Yum!’ Mackerel Bait said, rubbing his hands and smacking his lips. ‘Good tucker, eh? Dis wooks gweat!’ ‘Just like Mum used to make, eh, Mackerel Bait?’ I said. ‘Usuawy Mum gives me two pine cones,’ Mackerel Bait told me. ‘I wike pine cones. Dey’re weawy cwunchy.’ The three of us chose a table. We were about to sit down when I noticed a thin, serious-looking Chinese boy sitting by himself at a table in the corner. I excused myself and wandered across to say hello. ‘Peter Chou, right?’ I said, and extended my hand. ‘G’day. I’m Toby Judge.’ ‘Hello, Toby.’ We shook, then Peter pointed despondently to his plate. ‘I was just wondering if it’s possible to call this stuff “food”? ‘I know, it’s lousy,’ I agreed. ‘And the waiters are no great shakes either. We haven’t even had a drinks menu yet.’ I nodded to where a line of Kreeb’s men stood in front of the windows, zappers at the ready. Peter smiled. ‘Not exactly Maxim’s of Paris, is it?’ he said. 94

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‘Not exactly,’ I said. ‘But listen. We’ve got a spot at our table if you want to join us. No point sitting here on your own.’ Peter blinked at me in surprise. ‘Thanks,’ he said. He picked up an enormous black canvas travel bag, and staggered with it to our table. By the time we got back, Mackerel Bait had already eaten his rat, and was digging in to his dogfood-and-birdseed risotto. ‘Mmmmm!’ he exclaimed, dribbling brown dogfood goop from his mouth as we sat down. ‘Dewicious!’ ‘Oh please,’ Zara said. ‘Don’t. I’ll throw up.’ ‘On balance, that would probably make your meal taste better,’ I said. ‘If you throw up in it, I mean.’ I introduced Peter. The three of us sat trying not to watch Mackerel Bait, who was wolfing down his toadstools and fish-heads, scooping up the runny omelette with a spoon. ‘In the Amazon, you know,’ Zara said, ‘we always have anaconda kebabs on Sundays. They’re great. The only problem is, you need a really long kebab to stick right through an anaconda. Some of them are more than twenty metres long.’ ‘You’ve been to the Amazon?’ Peter asked. 95

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‘We live there for half the year,’ Zara said casually. ‘The twelve of us. My parents, me, and my nine little brothers and sisters.’ Peter glanced at me doubtfully. I shrugged. I was beginning to find Zara’s lies good entertainment, although I hoped I never had to rely on her testimony in court. Two of Kreeb’s men walked past our table with their zappers raised. We waited for them to go. ‘Listen,’ Peter said, ‘I don’t have any anaconda kebabs, but I do have other kinds of food. I brought my own supply. It’s nothing much, but it might help fill the gap, if we can sneak it past the guards.’ He dug in his enormous bag and brought out a plastic container. Quickly he placed slices of fresh turkey and ham on our plates, then returned the container to his bag. From a second container he took out fresh bread rolls, some butter and some lettuce. ‘Eat it quick,’ he said. ‘Before they see us.’ ‘Are you sure you’ve got enough to share?’ Zara asked. ‘Oh yeah,’ Peter said. ‘Mum and Dad are posting me more. Hand me your cups, too, and I’ll pour you some lemonade.’ A short time later we sat back, having finished our rolls and our drinks, and feeling much better. 96

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I looked around to see if anyone else had brought their own food, but as far as I could tell no one had. ‘Well, there goes the sleeping-pill-in-the-food theory,’ I said. ‘Unless the drug isn’t supposed to kick in until later.’ ‘What sleeping pill?’ Zara said. ‘What’re you talking about?’ ‘I was sure Professor Kreeb was going to try and knock us out with some kind of sleeping pill at dinner,’ I said. ‘So she could operate on us in time for tomorrow morning.’ ‘Operate on us?’ Zara frowned. ‘Why on earth would she want to do that?’ Keeping my voice low, I explained about the Binoculator. When I’d finished, Peter and Mackerel Bait looked shocked, but Zara only laughed. ‘That’s even better than the one about the phone in your armpit,’ she said. ‘You’re good at this, aren’t you? Nearly as good as me.’ ‘I’m not lying, Zara,’ I said. ‘I wouldn’t. Not about something like this.’ ‘Why not?’ Zara grinned. ‘I would.’ ‘So hang on,’ Peter said. ‘Let me get this straight. If Professor Kreeb didn’t have this machine you say she’s got, this Vernaculator or whatever it is— ’ ‘Binoculator.’ 97

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‘Binoculator, right. If she didn’t have that, she wouldn’t have any power over us? Her entire program of punishments would be useless?’ ‘Exactly,’ I said. ‘Which is why we have to find it and steal it before she uses it. But that’s what puzzles me. I was sure she was going to try and binoculate us tonight. She has to, if the punishments are starting tomorrow morning.’ ‘Toby, Toby, Toby,’ Zara said, and shook her head. ‘Take a tip from the Master. Your content is good, your delivery is excellent, but you have to know when to stop.’ ‘I’m not lying, Zara,’ I repeated. ‘Takes one to know one,’ Zara said, and winked. ‘Look, this is ridiculous,’ I said. ‘I’ll prove I’m not lying. You remember the skin-magnet telephone I said I had in my armpit? You thought I was lying about that, too, didn’t you? But I wasn’t. Come in close, so the guards don’t see.’ I checked quickly to make sure that all of Kreeb’s men were standing at the window. Then I lifted my T-shirt to show Zara the small grey magnet under my left arm. Zara burst into peals of laughter. ‘That’s not a telephone!’ she scoffed. ‘That’s just a square, grey, sticky thing! My Mum wore one of 98

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those when she gave up smoking!’ ‘It’s not a nicotine patch, for God’s sake!’ I hissed. ‘You don’t wear nicotine patches in your armpit!’ ‘My mum did,’ Zara said. ‘She wore them all over her body. She covered herself with them. Six thousand, eight hundred and sixteen of them to be exact. She set a world record for giving up smoking, too. Three point eight seconds.’ ‘If it is a telephone,’ Peter said cautiously, ‘where’s the part you speak into? Where are the numbers you push?’ ‘It doesn’t have any of that,’ I said. ‘It’s not a telephone, it’s not a telephone,’ Zara taunted. ‘You’re lying.’ I pressed the skin-magnet angrily with my finger. It began to dial. A few moments later we heard Dad’s mobile phone beginning to ring. ‘See?’ I said. ‘That’s the phone ringing at the other end.’ ‘So you say,’ Zara said. ‘I’ll believe it when somebody answers.’ ‘Hello? Toby?’ My mother’s voice cut in, sounding breathless and worried. ‘Toby, are you all right?’ ‘I’m fine, Mum,’ I said into my armpit. ‘This is just another test. Are you back in the motel yet?’ 99

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‘We’re in our room watching a movie,’ Mum said. ‘Are you sure nothing’s wrong?’ ‘No, it’s just dinnertime,’ I said. ‘Everything’s quiet. We’re just trying to figure out how Professor Kreeb is going to binoculate us.’ ‘We’ve got company!’ Peter hissed at me suddenly. ‘Watch out!’ I turned to see one of Kreeb’s men coming out of the kitchen, walking directly towards us. ‘Mum, I’ve got to go,’ I said. ‘No time to explain. I’ll call back—’ Kreeb’s man had spotted me. I didn’t have time to disconnect the call. I jammed my elbow in tight against my ribs, hoping that Mum would disconnect from the other end. She didn’t. She told me later that she accidentally pressed ‘Hold’ instead of ‘End’. I heard a recorded female voice saying, ‘The person you have called is on another line. If you wish you may call back later. Otherwise please hold, and your call will be answered as soon as possible.’ Then some classical music began playing. The sound of soft violins floated up from my armpit. Kreeb’s man stopped and listened, then brought his zapper in close to my neck. ‘Where’s that music coming from?’ he demanded. ‘What music?’ I said. ‘I don’t hear any music.’ 100

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‘Those violins!’ the man barked. ‘They’re coming from somewhere on this table! I want them to stop! Now!’ What could I do? I couldn’t make the music stop without pushing the skin magnet in my armpit. I was trapped. Then Peter, cool as a cucumber, said, ‘Actually, it’s coming from my tooth. My new filling picks up radio signals all the time. Classical music, jazz, top forty. I never know what it’s going to play next. It’s this big filling at the very back of my mouth, see?’ Peter opened his mouth wide and tapped one of his rear molars. Kreeb’s man leaned down to listen to the tooth. As soon as his eyes left me, I snaked a hand in under my armpit and disconnected the call. The music stopped. Peter snapped his mouth shut, and smiled. ‘There you go, it’s gone already,’ Peter said. ‘The wind must’ve changed. Shame, really. I quite liked those violins.’ Kreeb’s man straightened up and glared at us. He was confused, but still suspicious. ‘I’d better not hear anything again,’ he snarled. ‘Or I’ll zap the lot of you. You understand?’ ‘Perfectly,’ Peter said. We all let out a huge sigh of relief after he’d gone. 101

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10 nightfall

After dinner Professor Kreeb made some announcements. Boys and girls would be sleeping in dormitories on separate floors, she said. Each room contained two double bunks, therefore the maximum number of children per room was four. Breakfast would be at eight o’clock the following morning, while the program itself would begin at nine. ‘There’s one more room I’d like to show you, before you choose your room-mates and retire for the night,’ she said to finish. ‘Pick up your bags and follow me to the first floor.’ All forty-eight children trudged up the stairs after Professor Kreeb. She led us into a large, brightly-lit room just off the main corridor, filled with comfortable armchairs and a new white carpet on the floor. 102

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‘This is the Kreeb’s Correct-a-torium recreation room,’ she announced, as we filed in. ‘It is equipped, as you can see, with the very best in games and video entertainment. Wander around for a while. See what the room has to offer. Look, and be amazed!’ We were amazed. At the very back of the room stood four pool tables and two table-tennis tables. A row of pinball machines, video games and car rally simulators lined one wall. Along the opposite wall were six sound-proofed cubicles, each with its own Playstation. Immediately inside the main door was a library of recently released videos and computer games. ‘Look at the movies they’ve got here!’ Zara breathed, gazing at the library in rapture. ‘I could stay in here for weeks!’ ‘They’ve got Megadeth Rampage Four!’ Peter exclaimed excitedly, pointing to the computer games. ‘And Slimeball Zombies! And Headbusters from Planet Zork!’ ‘Wait a moment, wait a moment!’ Professor Kreeb interrupted us. ‘Did I mention that this is the staff recreation room? I believe it may have slipped my mind. Naturally, you are forbidden to watch any of the videos, or play any of the games in here. Your own state-of-the-art recreation room is right next door.’ 103

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We moved to another room, exactly the same size, which was dark and completely bare. In the middle of the floor, piled in a small heap, were a Batman mask, six plastic building blocks, and a bent stick. ‘Here you are, children!’ Professor Kreeb cried exuberantly. ‘Your very own garden of delights, to use any time you want! Come in and relax on the bare wooden floor! Try on the Batman mask! Hit one of the building blocks with your stick! Hours of fun and entertainment await you!’ ‘No, please, no!’ Zara groaned. ‘Those movies! They were so wonderful! How could anyone be so cruel?’ ‘There goes Headbusters from Planet Zork,’ Peter sighed. ‘Of course both of these recreation rooms remain open at all times,’ Professor Kreeb went on. ‘There are no locks on any of the doors. There are no hidden cameras. No guards. I am simply trusting that you will do the right thing, and stay out of the room that doesn’t belong to you.’ ‘I smell a rat,’ Zara muttered to me, as we were herded with the others back towards the stairs. ‘A big rat. And not one of the ones we had for dinner.’ ‘I told you, she wants us to misbehave,’ I said. ‘So she can catch us out, without us knowing how, 104

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and punish us. Do you believe me now?’ ‘Maybe,’ Zara said. ‘I believe you,’ Peter said. ‘I can see exactly how it’ll work. With this much temptation around, people are bound to misbehave.’ We trudged up another flight of stairs to the girls’ dormitories on the second floor. Zara joined the other girls milling around in the corridor, trying to sort out who was going to room with who. ‘I’m positive Kreeb’s going to try something tonight,’ I said to her just before she left. ‘I just don’t know what. Tell your room-mates. Tell everyone you can. And be careful.’ ‘I’m always careful,’ Zara said. ‘Be very careful. That Binoculator is lethal.’ ‘So are the piranhas in the Amazon,’ Zara said. ‘Zara, I’ll tell you one last time, I’m not lying. You’ll find out the hard way if you don’t believe me.’ ‘I always find out the hard way,’ Zara said cheerfully. ‘It makes life so much more interesting.’ On the next floor I found a room with Mackerel Bait and Peter. In it were two bunk beds and a small washbasin. The window was locked. It was clean enough, and the beds were quite comfortable, but I was still desperately worried about Professor Kreeb. The only time she had left to binoculate 105

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us, according to my calculations, was tonight, after we’d gone to sleep. ‘Does dis mean we don’t get to pway wiv da stick?’ Mackerel Bait said in a disappointed voice when we’d all relaxed on our bunks. ‘Later, Mackerel Bait,’ I said. ‘Oo, dis bed is bouncy,’ Mackerel Bait went on. ‘I wike bouncy beds. Whee-e-e-e!’ He began bouncing up and down on the top bunk opposite Peter and me. Every time he bounced, the bunk underneath him buckled like a hammock, and creaked loudly in protest. I lay listening to this noise, wondering what all the parents would think if they knew the truth. Peter’s parents, Zara’s parents, Mackerel Bait’s – they and all the other mums and dads. How would they feel if they knew Professor Kreeb planned to operate secretly on their beloved children, and insert tiny miniature cameras into their eyes? They wouldn’t be all that rapt, it seemed to me. Peter was lying on the bunk above me, reading a book. ‘Do your parents really wake you up every night for violin lessons?’ I asked him. ‘Not every night,’ Peter said. ‘Just three nights a week. It’s a special way of teaching violin, developed in America. It’s called the “Harley-Davidson Method”.’ 106

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‘And do they really give you spelling tests at four o’clock in the morning?’ ‘Sometimes,’ Peter said. ‘Only if I get words wrong in tests at school. The same goes for my other subjects. As long as I get 100 per cent in my tests at school, I don’t get any more tests at home.’ ‘But that’s terrible!’ I said. ‘Nobody can get 100 per cent all the time! Not even you!’ ‘I know,’ Peter said dejectedly. ‘Sometimes I only get 98 or 95, or even 90. I’m so ashamed when I get 90. My mother always cries.’ ‘Your mother needs to get a life,’ I grumbled. ‘Sorry, I don’t mean to be rude. But that’s ridiculous. What about you, Mackerel Bait? Do your parents ever give you tests?’ ‘Oh, sure,’ Mackerel Bait said. ‘Dey tested me for a orphanage once, but I failed.’ ‘You’ve got to be an orphan to get into an orphanage,’ Peter said. ‘I know. Dat’s why I failed.’ Mackerel Bait bounced one more time, extra high. When he landed, the bed collapsed underneath him with a tremendous crash. ‘Uh-oh,’ he said, when the dust had settled. ‘I breaked it.’ ‘No, you didn’t break it,’ Peter said kindly. ‘You 107

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just flattened it. Look, there’s still a top bunk and a bottom bunk. There just happens to be no room left between them, that’s all.’ ‘I didn’t bweak it?’ Mackerel Bait said, surveying the twisted wreckage underneath him. ‘Absolutely not,’ Peter said. ‘You improved it.’ ‘Gee!’ Mackerel Bait smiled happily. ‘I impwoved it! Dat’s gweat!’ ‘How did you put that big hole in the wall at your place, Mackerel Bait?’ I asked. ‘The one we saw on TV?’ Mackerel Bait thought for a moment. ‘Oh, dat,’ he said finally. ‘Dere was a fwy on da wall. So I swatted it.’ ‘What with?’ I asked. ‘A fly-swatter?’ ‘No, wiv da couch.’ ‘What couch? The living-room couch?’ ‘Yup.’ ‘You mean – you picked up the living-room couch and swatted a fly with it?’ ‘Yup,’ Mackerel Bait said. ‘Why didn’t you use something smaller?’ Mackerel Bait shrugged. ‘It was a small couch.’ ‘Sounds like you were just trying to do the right thing, Mackerel Bait,’ Peter said with a sigh. ‘Just like me. That’s the story of my life, in fact. I’m such 108

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a goody-goody I make the Tooth Fairy look like a career criminal.’ ‘What’s the worst thing you’ve ever done?’ I asked him suddenly. ‘Come on, Petey-boy, cough it up. Your secret is safe with us. Tell us the really baddest thing.’ Peter thought for a while. ‘I can’t really think of anything,’ he said. ‘Oh, wait. I drank untreated milk once. I was staying on a farm with a friend, and we sneaked out to the barn and drank some milk straight from the cow. I felt so guilty I couldn’t sleep for a week.’ ‘That’s the worst thing you’ve ever done, huh?’ I said. ‘Unless you count getting 90 per cent in some of my tests, yes. Why, what’s the worst thing you’ve ever done?’ ‘Sorry, can’t tell you,’ I said. ‘Your ears would melt.’ We lay quiet again. I felt downhearted all of a sudden, and very homesick. I was so lucky with my family. We had our ups and downs like any family, but life at home was generally pretty good. Mum and Dad didn’t expect me to be perfect, like Peter’s parents. They didn’t make me run around like a headless chook taking a million extra classes and 109

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lessons. If I got 90 per cent in a test they cried with delight, not disappointment. They made me feel like the best kid in the country, not one of the worst. I love you, Mum & Dad, I thought, as a tear sprang to my eyes. You’re wonderful. You’re the best parents a kid could ever have. I was jolted out of my daydream by a loud clunking noise on the outside of our bedroom door. ‘Hey!’ I shouted, as I sprang to my feet. ‘Hey, what’s going on out there?’ ‘Curfew!’ one of Kreeb’s men called from outside. ‘We’re locking the doors. They’ll be unlocked again in the morning.’ ‘But we haven’t used the bathroom yet!’ I said. ‘Tough,’ Kreeb’s man shouted back. ‘You’ll have to hold it in all night now, won’t you?’ I banged on the door and rattled the handle, but it was no use. Mackerel Bait got up off the ruins of his bed and put in a couple of hefty shoulder-charges, but the door was solid wood, deadlocked top and bottom. ‘Now I really do smell a rat,’ I said. ‘They’re up to something. I just know it.’ ‘Maybe they’re keeping us in here so we won’t get into trouble,’ Peter said. ‘No, they want us to get into trouble,’ I replied. ‘That’s the whole point of this place. Something 110

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nasty is going to happen, believe me.’ We waited for fifteen minutes, listening for the slightest sound. Then, feeling tired, I lay down on my bunk. Not long after my head hit the pillow, I thought I heard something. A very faint, almost inaudible, whispery hiss. ‘Can you hear that?’ I said to the others. ‘That hissing sound?’ Peter and Mackerel Bait couldn’t hear anything. at all. ‘It’s coming from the floor under my bunk!’ I cried. ‘Mackerel Bait! Get this bed out of the way, quick!’ Mackerel Bait picked up the bed as if it was an empty cardboard box, and moved it to the centre of the room. I scoured the floor with my eyes. Right in the corner I spotted a tiny air-vent, the size of a postage stamp. I got down on my knees and sniffed. I couldn’t smell anything unusual, but the whispery hissing sound was definitely louder. In a flash I knew exactly what it was. ‘Gas!’ I gasped. ‘They’re gassing us! We’ve got to get out of here! Fast!’ Already I was starting to feel groggy. By the time I stood up again I was so dizzy I could hardly move. 111

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I staggered to the window ledge and groped for the latch, but it was locked. It was bolted down securely into the wood, and couldn’t be moved. ‘The window!’ I croaked. ‘We have . . . to open . . . the window! Quick! Before . . . it’s . . . too . . .’ My knees buckled. The last thing I saw before everything went black was Mackerel Bait lunging towards me as I slumped to the ground.

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11 on the roof

When I came to, I couldn’t see a thing. I had no idea where I was. I could feel a cool breeze blowing against my face, and something hard and lumpy pressing into my back. The Binoculator! I put my hands to my eyes. I’ve been operated on! Oh no! Two pairs of hands grabbed me and held me down. I heard Peter’s voice right next to me, urging me to lie still. My eyes adjusted to the darkness enough for me to see Mackerel Bait sitting on the other side. Above me was a cloudless night sky, studded with stars. ‘We’re up on the roof,’ Peter explained to me. ‘It’s four o’clock in the morning. We’ve been hiding here all night.’ 113

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I sat up, feeling a deep ache in my shoulders and down my back. I groaned. ‘Don’t tell me how high up we are,’ I said. ‘I hate heights.’ ‘Relax,’ Peter said. ‘It’s only three storeys.’ ‘I said don’t tell me that!’ I threw myself flat against the roof and shut my eyes. ‘You don’t understand! I get dizzy going up escalators in supermarkets! I get panic attacks standing on top of storm drains!’ ‘You’ll be fine as long as you don’t move,’ Peter reassured me. ‘On the other hand, if you do move, and you fall off the edge, you’ll go splat like a fly on a windscreen.’ ‘Great,’ I opened my eyes. ‘Just great. How’d we get up here, anyhow? Last thing I remember, we were trapped in our room.’ ‘I opened da window,’ Mackerel Bait said. ‘Wid my fist.’ Mackerel Bait held up his right hand. Even in the dark I could see that the knuckles on it were bloody and grazed. There was a nasty cut running back from one knuckle, all the way to his wrist. ‘We got out just in time,’ Peter said. ‘I’d already nearly fainted. But the fresh air from the broken window cleared my head. Mackerel Bait found a drainpipe, and we climbed the rest of the way.’ 114

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‘Climbed?’ I said weakly. ‘No, no, that must be a mistake. I get altitude sickness if I step on an ant. Besides, I couldn’t climb anywhere. I was out cold.’ ‘Mackerel Bait carried you,’ Peter said. I groaned. A wave of queasiness washed over me. I pictured Mackerel Bait struggling up the drainpipe, three storeys off the ground, with me draped over his shoulder like a sack of spuds. It wasn’t a picture I wanted to frame and hang up on my bedroom wall. ‘Don’t worry, it was fine,’ Peter said reassuringly. ‘He only dropped you once. He caught you by your shoelaces, and swung you up again. Easy.’ I’m not sure what I did then. I might have passed out for a few seconds. ‘Anyway, it doesn’t matter how we got up, does it?’ Peter went on cheerfully. ‘We’ve escaped getting binoculated. This time.’ ‘Zara!’ I burst out suddenly. ‘And all the others! They’ll have been gassed too!’ ‘I’m sure that’s the plan, yes,’ Peter said. ‘But they’ll be getting binoculated! Right now! We’ve got to stop her!’ ‘We can’t stop her,’ Peter said. ‘Her men are everywhere. We’ve seen them shining torches out in the grounds. They’ve been searching for us for hours.’ 115

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‘I’ll ring Mum and Dad!’ I said breathlessly. ‘They can get the police to come out and catch Professor Kreeb in the act. We can’t let her get away with this—’ I felt under my arm for the skin-magnet telephone. To my horror, it wasn’t there. Somehow, while Mackerel Bait was lugging me up the drainpipe, it had come off. ‘It’s gone!’ I whispered. ‘I’ve got spares in my bag, but they’re no use to us here. Maybe it’s somewhere on the roof. If only we had a light . . .’ ‘What we really need,’ Peter said, ‘is a ladder. If we had a ladder we could climb down without Kreeb’s men seeing us, and get back to our room.’ Just as he spoke there was a thump against the gutter directly below us. The top of a big aluminium ladder poked up above the edge of the roof. ‘Well, what do you know,’ Peter said. ‘That’s what I call service.’ ‘It’s not for us to go down!’ I said. ‘It’s for someone else to come up! Quick! Hide!’ We scrambled up towards the chimney behind us. Before we could get there, a powerful torch-beam swept over us. We turned to see one of Kreeb’s men step off the ladder and onto the roof. ‘Here they are, Terry!’ he shouted. ‘All three of 116

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’em! The miserable little beggars won’t get away from us this time!’ Another of Kreeb’s men jumped off the ladder beside him. And another. And another. Even Mackerel Bait could see that the situation was hopeless. The only thing we could do was jump, which would be suicide. ‘We’ll get even for this,’ I said under my breath to the others. ‘I promise.’ We went quietly. Soon we were back at ground level, sitting in Professor Kreeb’s office. We had been told that Professor Kreeb was on her way. Four of her beefiest henchmen were standing guard at the door. While we waited, I looked around the room. We desperately needed clues to help us find the Binoculator, and here was a good place to start. After a few moments I noticed a picture frame hanging offcentre on the wall beside Professor Kreeb’s desk. Inside this frame was a large colour photograph of the Correct-a-torium, taken from the front gate, with the school motto, Nothing But the Worst, in the foreground. There were other pictures on the walls, but that was the only one hanging off-centre. Everything else in the room was very neat and tidy. It struck me as strange. 117

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Suddenly Professor Kreeb burst into the room. She marched past us to her desk and stood behind it, glaring at us fiercely. ‘Sabotage!’ she shouted. ‘Vandalism! Wilful destruction of property! I could hardly believe my ears when I was woken up just a short time ago, to be informed that you three criminals had gone on a wild roof-top rampage!’ Of course Professor Kreeb was lying about being woken up. She’d been awake all night, binoculating children at a secret location somewhere in the Correct-a-torium. Her eyes were watery and redrimmed. ‘I might have known you three would be the trouble-makers,’ she growled. ‘You especially, Toby Smudge. You’re the ringleader in all of this, aren’t you, boy? Of course you are. I don’t even have to ask.’ ‘You were trying to gas us!’ I shot back defiantly. ‘We only broke the window and escaped because we heard gas coming from a vent in the corner of the room!’ Professor Kreeb looked startled for a moment. Then the corners of her mouth bent upwards in a warped, leering imitation of a smile. ‘Gas?’ she said scornfully. ‘My dear, dear boy, that 118

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wasn’t gas! That was fresh air! You don’t think I’d keep you cooped up in those stuffy rooms all night without piping in some air, do you?’ I hesitated. I still had no proof she was using the Binoculator. To accuse her of lying now would be useless. I’d only be packed up and sent home. ‘It sounded like gas to me,’ I mumbled. ‘It doesn’t matter what it sounds like, does it?’ Professor Kreeb cried. ‘It only matters what it smells like! Did you smell anything unusual? Anything bitter or chemical-tasting?’ ‘No,’ I agreed. ‘Of course you didn’t! It was fresh air! The very freshest of fresh air! Gentle alpine breezes wafting from the wooded glades and bubbling mountain streams, directly into your room!’ If that was fresh air, then I’m a bandicoot’s breakfast, I thought. Fresh air doesn’t make you keel over ten seconds after you breathe it. Not even if you’re a city boy like me. ‘I guess we made a mistake, then,’ I mumbled. ‘You bet your spotty little bottoms you made a mistake!’ Professor Kreeb began pacing up and down behind her desk. ‘A terrible mistake! A gross error of judgement! A com—’ She froze. She’d just noticed the photo hanging 119

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off-centre on the wall. As casually as she could, she straightened it. ‘A complete miscalculation!’ she went on. ‘Thanks to you, I’ve got a broken window, a bent drainpipe, a damaged gutter, and a huge overtime bill for the search party! When the program begins later this morning, you can rest assured you will be punished! Severely punished! The very worst torture my Correct-a-torium has to offer will be reserved exclusively for you! Is that clear?’ ‘Yes, Professor Kreeb,’ we murmured. ‘Excellent! I’m glad I’ve managed to drum that much into your thick criminal skulls! Now go! Get out of my sight, before I change my mind and have all three of you thrown to the crocodiles!’

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12 the program begins

Professor Kreeb’s men escorted us back up to our room and locked the door. The bed and the window that Mackerel Bait had broken had already been replaced. All the bits of glass had been cleared away. We sat on our bunks watching the sun come up, listening for the tell-tale faint hissing sound, which never came. ‘She’s too scared to try it a second time,’ Peter said. ‘She knows we’re onto her.’ ‘No, I don’t think she does,’ I said. ‘I think she bought our story about hearing the gas and trying to escape. She’ll try and get us another way, when we least expect it. But not this morning.’ I took one of the replacement phones out of my bag and stuck it into my armpit. Then I called Dad. 121

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I briefed him on what had happened so far, and asked his advice. His advice was to track the Binoculator to its hideout and steal it, as soon as we could. ‘You’re running out of time, Toby,’ Dad said. ‘From the sound of it, you’re the only ones left that she hasn’t operated on. Watch your backs.’ ‘We will,’ I said. ‘At least she can’t spy on us, that’s one good thing. But we still haven’t found any clues.’ ‘Keep your eyes peeled,’ Dad said. ‘And your ears to the ground. And your nose to the grindstone. And both hands on the wheel.’ I grinned. ‘Aye aye, sir.’ ‘Good luck, mate. And good luck to the others as well.’ ‘Thanks. Over and out.’ At eight o’clock we had a quick snack of plain buttered bread and orange juice from Peter’s stash. We joined everyone else in the dining hall for breakfast. On the menu that morning was cold porridge that smelled like wallpaper paste, and batwings on toast. As soon as we sat down, Mackerel Bait tucked in to his porridge. I searched the room for Zara but she spotted me first, and came over. ‘Where’ve you all been?’ she demanded irritably, crouching down beside us. ‘I’ve been looking for you everywhere!’ 122

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‘Zara, something’s happened,’ I said. ‘Professor Kreeb gassed everyone last night. After her men locked us in our rooms, she let in a colourless, odourless gas that knocked everybody out. Then she binoculated everybody. Including you.’ Zara gaped at me for a moment. Then she gave a loud snort of laughter. ‘Boy, you never give up, do you?’ she said. ‘And here I was, almost believing you last night! You’re amazing! Have you got a crush on me or something?’ ‘I’m sorry?’ I said in bewilderment. ‘A crush? What?’ ‘If you haven’t got a crush on me, then you’re in big trouble. You need to see somebody.’ ‘He’s not lying, Zara,’ Peter put in. ‘You wouldn’t have heard the gas. The sound it made was too faint. It worked in seconds—’ he snapped his fingers ‘—just like that. The three of us escaped by breaking a window, and hiding on the roof. We’re the only ones who didn’t get caught.’ ‘You and everyone else in this room now have tiny microscopic cameras implanted in your eyeballs,’ I said to Zara. ‘They’re so small no surgeon could spot them. They won’t show up on an X-ray. But all Professor Kreeb has to do is switch on her computer, and she can see everything you do.’ 123

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Zara looked shaken. At last, I thought, she’s come to her senses. The seriousness of the situation has finally sunk in. ‘Listen,’ she said to me in a low voice. ‘This isn’t fair. I’m the one who tells the really big fibs around here, okay? The howlers and whoppers are my department. I’ve just finished telling everyone at my table about my father being a faith healer in Brazil, and about us always eating anaconda kebabs on Sundays, and you know what? They believed me! I’ve got them eating out of my hand! It isn’t easy being a born liar these days. You have to work at it. The world is full of smart-alecks and cynics who ask tricky questions, and laugh in my face. I’m a persecuted minority. I’m the last of a dying breed. So could you kindly not muscle in on my territory by going on with this ridiculous camera-in-the-eyeball nonsense? From now on, keep it strictly to yourselves.’ Before we could say another word, she stormed off. The three of us sat stunned. ‘Girls,’ Peter said. ‘Can’t live with ’em, can’t live without ’em.’ ‘First they think you’re lying,’ I said. ‘Then they think you’ve got a crush on them. Then they refuse to admit they’re in danger, even when it’s staring them right in the face. I mean, is it scientifically 124

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proven that they even have a brain?’ ‘The world would be a much better place,’ Peter said firmly, ‘if it was filled entirely with boys. Don’t you think so, Mackerel Bait?’ ‘Yup,’ Mackerel Bait said. A few minutes later, breakfast was over. We recited the Oath of Eternal Obedience three times, then Kreeb’s men herded us into the main entrance hall, where Professor Kreeb was waiting. The main entrance hall of the Correct-a-torium was actually quite beautiful. It reminded me of a church. Its ceiling was very high, and criss-crossed with solid wooden beams. Its floor was dark polished wood. At the back of it, a huge old-fashioned staircase swept up towards the first floor. A grandfather clock and a trophy cabinet lined the wall to our right, while to the left, down a narrow corridor beside the stairs, was a small door marked ‘Do Not Enter’. Inside the main door, high up on the wall, was a portrait of Professor Kreeb. It was the sort of portrait you’d expect to find in a lord’s castle, showing a famous ancestor who’d once offered his shirtsleeve for Queen Elizabeth the First to blow her nose on. It was painted in oils, and surrounded by an elaborate gilt frame. The imposing toadlike visage of Professor Kreeb frowned down at us we trooped inside. 125

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The real Professor Kreeb was standing at the base of the stairs with exactly the same expression on her face. Funny, that. ‘Silence, you pestilential little pimples!’ she roared, once we were all standing in front of her. ‘It’s nine o’clock! The moment you’ve been waiting for has arrived! The Kreeb’s Correct-a-torium program of diabolical punishments is about to begin!’ I was expecting trumpets, or at the very least someone banging on a gong. But there was nothing. Professor Kreeb cast a triumphant glance over us, and rubbed her hands with glee. ‘I have shown you the delights of the pantry!’ she said. ‘I have shown you the fabulous recreation room, and your five-star luxury accommodation on the second and third floors! But I have not yet shown you what lies downstairs! Down in the windowless cellar, where the mould glistens, where the air smells rank with decay, where even the vermin creep about on tip-toe, for fear of coming to a sticky end!’ She marched to the door marked ‘Do Not Enter’. When she opened it, we saw more stairs, narrow, and made of stone, leading downwards almost vertically into the gloom. ‘It’s time to descend!’ she boomed. ‘To go down into the mildewy darkness! To breathe the stale, fetid 126

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air and grope your way along the slimy walls! Watch out for spiders! Don’t step on any snakes! Be careful of the hairy-grubs! They grow as big as sports cars down here!’ She moved away from the door so that we could go through it. Nobody moved. It was only when her henchmen began using their zappers that the children at the front of the group edged slowly forward. ‘So there’s a whole other section of the Correcta-torium underground,’ I whispered to Peter. ‘Interesting.’ A minute later all forty-eight of us had jammed inside the stairwell. The door above us closed. Darkness engulfed us completely. From above and below came the sounds of children stumbling on the stairs, squealing, and moaning in fear. The air grew unbearably hot and thick. Sweat began dripping into my eyes. It seemed like ages before we reached the bottom, and could spread out across the hard stone floor. We were in a wide passageway lit by dim yellow bulbs. It made me think of the marsupial house at the zoo. To our right there was a row of small rooms with floor-to-ceiling glass at the front. I could only see inside the first room, which was bare and empty. 127

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What’s that going to be used for? I wondered. Solitary confinement? But surely it was too big for that. And why the pane of glass? Was that for people to see out, or in? Before I could think of answers to my own questions, something else happened. A section of the stone wall to our left, opposite the row of rooms, slid open. Inside was a gleaming stainless-steel elevator, the biggest I’d ever seen. And inside that was Professor Kreeb. Professor Kreeb stepped out of the elevator quickly. The wall closed behind her with a smooth rumble. After just a few seconds there was no trace left of where the elevator had been. ‘At last, we begin!’ Professor Kreeb said. ‘Now for the very first punishment, of the very first day, of the very first program at my marvellous Correct-atorium!’ ‘Now you will see the art of punishment taken to new heights!’ she went on. ‘Now you will see real punishments! Traditional punishments! Punishments that hurt! No namby-pamby detentions here! No soppy cuts in pocket money! No limp-wristed starcharts on the fridge! After just one morning of my program, my lovelies, I guarantee that you will be defeated! Your spirits will be entirely crushed! Each 128

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and every one of you will have turned into meek, submissive, obedient little worms!’ She strode to the first glass-fronted room and stood in front of it. Twenty men with zappers gathered at her side. ‘And now, the question is – whom do I punish?’ Professor Kreeb said. ‘Do any of you deserve to be punished? Have any of you misbehaved since you arrived at my Correct-a-torium? Let us consult the official List of Crimes and Misdemeanours, to see if the answer is yes!’ One of her men handed her a black leather suitcase. She opened it, and took out a thick roll of white paper. She held up one end of it, and let the rest of it unroll onto the floor. ‘Behold, the first victim on the list!’ she barked. ‘Thomas Arthur Fripp! Step forward!’ A thin, spotty-faced boy next to Mackerel Bait gave a squeak of panic. ‘Come on, Fripp! Get out here!’ Professor Kreeb snapped. ‘I haven’t got all day!’ ‘But I haven’t done anything!’ Thomas Fripp protested, in a high, piping voice. ‘Honest, I—’ ‘Silence!’ Professor Kreeb roared. ‘Of course you’ve done something, Fripp! You’re a child! You’re bad to the bone! What’s more, I’ve got a detailed 129

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description of your crime right here!’ ‘She’s used the cameras!’ I whispered to Peter. ‘She must’ve been spying on people since sunrise! Man, that was quick!’ ‘But where are the computers?’ Peter whispered back. ‘There must be a room full of them somewhere.’ ‘Maybe somewhere underground,’ I said. ‘This morning before breakfast, Fripp,’ Professor Kreeb went on, ‘you went to the bathroom to brush your teeth, did you not?’ Thomas Fripp swallowed hard. ‘Um, yes,’ he said. ‘Yes I did, but—’ ‘You went to the bathroom at precisely 7.17 this morning, and there you went on a spree. You took all the paper towels out of the dispenser and stuffed them into the toilet bowls, to block the plumbing. Don’t deny it, Fripp. You’re guilty as sin!’ ‘I-I—’ Thomas Fripp mumbled. ‘I didn’t mean to! It was an accident!’ ‘Accident, my foot! Take him away!’ As Thomas Fripp howled in protest, two of Kreeb’s men grabbed him and hauled him through a door in the wall, next to the first punishment room. 130

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The crowd hushed. Everyone waited to see who the next victim would be. ‘Mary Vandenburg!’ Professor Kreeb called out. ‘Sarah Bateman! Johanna Miles!’ Three girls off to my left let out squeals similar to Thomas Fripp’s. ‘No!’ one of them muttered. ‘She couldn’t’ve found out! She couldn’t’ve!’ ‘Step forward, girls!’ Professor Kreeb ordered. ‘At once! Or I shall have you zapped!’ The girls stumbled forward and stood fidgeting in front of Professor Kreeb, clinging to each other for support. ‘Now then!’ Professor Kreeb continued, consulting her list of Crimes and Misdemeanours once more. ‘What a sad and sorry tale this is! What a wretched example of juvenile trickery and cunning! At dawn this morning, you three girls woke up and went for a walk, did you not? You wandered deep into the pine trees, to a place far away from prying eyes, where you made secret plans for a raid on the staff pantry. You returned to an unlocked laundry van you had spotted parked in the driveway, and you stole three pillow cases out of the back. You cut eye-holes into each pillow case with a pair of nail scissors, and with these primitive disguises on your heads, you sneaked into 131

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the pantry and stole as many cakes, chocolates, pizza slices and corn chips as you could!’ ‘How can you know that?’ one of the girls cried out. ‘How can you know it was us?’ ‘Silence!’ Professor Kreeb roared. ‘After successfully completing your raid, you ran back into the woods and ate everything you had stolen, down to the very last mouthful, before the rest of the children in the school had even woken up! Is this not correct?’ ‘Nobody saw us do it!’ another girl said. ‘We didn’t talk in our room, in case it was bugged! We had hoods over our faces when we did the raid! You couldn’t know it was us! You couldn’t!’ ‘I know everything you do, you miserable worms!’ Professor Kreeb bellowed. ‘I see everything! Your puny little brains are an open book to me! Nothing you do will escape me! D’you hear me? Nothing at all!’ ‘No, it’s a trick,’ someone beside me whispered. ‘It’s got to be.’ ‘But how is it a trick?’ someone else whispered back. ‘She caught those girls even though she couldn’t see them or hear them! That’s impossible!’ ‘I assure you, it is not a trick!’ Professor Kreeb continued. ‘Many years of studying the behaviour patterns of children like yourselves, combined with 132

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my natural psychic ability, have given me complete mastery of your thoughts! I know exactly what goes on inside those horrible little brains of yours! I know them inside out! I know every thought you think before you think it! I know your every desire and your every fear! You may believe you are acting in secret, but every move you make is crystal clear to me! So beware! You are all about to meet your doom!’ A terrified silence settled over the crowd. It was obvious that Professor Kreeb’s plan was beginning to work. I had to stop myself from calling out that it was all completely fake. Professor Kreeb was no brain expert. She was no more of a mind-reader than my grandmother’s cat. But if I called out now, we were done for. So I stayed quiet, waiting for the right time. Professor Kreeb clapped her hands loudly. Six of her men stepped forward to grab the three girls. They were dragged kicking and screaming through the same door that Thomas Fripp had been dragged through earlier. ‘The next and final victim for the first round of punishments!’ Professor Kreeb went on. ‘David Dominguez! Step forward!’ A fat boy with olive skin and straggly black hair slunk out of the crowd to my left. Professor Kreeb fixed him with a withering gaze. 133

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‘There are three kinds of boys I truly detest,’ she said. ‘One is boys who pick their noses. Two is boys who eat what they pick from their noses. And three is boys who eat what they pick from their noses while scratching their fat pimply bottoms! This unspeakable bit of filth is guilty of doing exactly that! At precisely 8.05 this morning, on the way down the stairs to breakfast, he reached down and gave his bum a thorough mauling, while at the same time munching on the most enormous glistening goober the world has ever seen! Take him away!’ A buzz swept through the crowd as David Dominguez was dragged through the door after the others. ‘She can see into our brains!’ someone said. ‘No, it’s a trick, it’s a trick!’ someone else said. ‘She must have cameras everywhere.’ ‘She can’t be using cameras! Those girls were outside, and they had hoods on their heads, remember?’ Bright lights suddenly lit up the first punishment room across the passage. Everyone turned to look. I noticed something I hadn’t seen before. The room wasn’t empty after all. The floor was covered with thick, gloopy wet sand. 134

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Professor Kreeb raised her hands for silence. ‘You are about to witness a wonderfully gruesome punishment I have borrowed from the steamy tropical jungles of Niberia,’ she said. ‘In Niberia, when children misbehave, their tribal elders take them to a place known as the Valley of the Shifting Sands. This valley has for generations struck terror into the hearts of Niberian children. Once the shifting sands take hold of them, there is no escape. The children can only pray that the elders have thrown them into a shallow pit, where the deadly sand will not rise up over their heads. But this pit you see before you now is not a shallow one. No indeed! This pit is deep enough to swallow a giraffe standing on an elephant! So how will our five helpless victims fare when they are released into the room, and the sands take their murderous hold? Let us now see!’ Professor Kreeb drew in a deep breath, then yelled as loud as she could: ‘Release the first five victims!’ A panel slid open automatically at the back of the room. The three girls and two boys spilled out, straight onto the sand. The panel closed again behind them with a thunk, leaving them sinking slowly into the mud. 135

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The rest of us watching from the passageway shouted and waved. It was no use. The quicksand was already up over their knees, and was drawing them in deeper and deeper every second. They screamed and screamed. Soon the sand had swallowed them almost to their waists. ‘Alas!’ Professor Kreeb cried out. ‘It looks like curtains for our five young friends! Not even the strongest ropes could pull them free now! There is only one creature in the world that can get them out! A creature more terrifying than death itself! A vicious West African predator which likes nothing better than to pluck poor unfortunate children from the quicksand, like juicy worms, and swallow them whole!’ She took another deep breath. ‘Release the Niberian sand lizards!’ she yelled. The panel at the back of the enclosure slid open again. Out came two of the most bizarre creatures I have ever seen. If you can imagine a lizard the size of a Komodo dragon, with two enormous webbed feet and a yellow stripe down the middle of its back, you’ll be getting close. The two lizards gazed with hungry yellow eyes at the children stuck in the sand. They didn’t sink down because of their enormous webbed feet. 136

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Instead, they walked around on it as easily as if they were walking on dry land. One of them slithered forward and took Thomas Fripp’s head in its mouth. As we watched in horror, it began to pull. Thomas Fripp let out a tremendous muffled scream. His arms clawed wildly at the air. His neck began to stretch horribly, as if it were made of silly putty. The sand lizard pulled even harder. There was a disgusting wet slooshing sound. Thomas Fripp came free of the quicksand. The lizard tossed him in the air with a flick of its neck, and swallowed him, head-first. Now it was our turn to scream. We saw poor Thomas Fripp sliding like a slippery fish down the lizard’s enormous throat. His wet, sandy legs kicked out desperately behind him. He slid in further and further, until all that we could see of him was his shoes, poking out from between the lizard’s teeth. Then he stopped. The lizard tried to finish swallowing him, but for some reason it couldn’t. Thomas Fripp seemed to be stuck in its throat. By this time the second lizard had plucked one 137

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of the girls from the sand in exactly the same way, and had got into trouble trying to swallow her too. ‘You may be wondering why the lizards have not yet eaten our two young friends!’ Professor Kreeb said. ‘It cannot, because its neck has been ringed! If you look closely you will observe the ring, at the very bottom of the neck!’ We looked and saw the ring. ‘Now then!’ Professor Kreeb continued. ‘What happens when we get something stuck in our throat that we can’t swallow? Why, we try to bring it up again, don’t we? We vomit it up again as quickly as we can, before we choke on it!’ The lizard did look as if it was choking. It was coughing in alarm, shaking its head from side to side, trying to get rid of the annoying lump of meat stuck in its craw. The other lizard, the one trying to swallow the girl, was doing exactly the same thing. This retching continued noisily for a few seconds. Then, without warning, Thomas Fripp burst forth in a spray of green slime, like a missile launched from a submarine. He shot straight up into the air and disappeared through a large hole in the ceiling. Holding our breaths, we waited for him to come down again, but he didn’t. The girl got vomited up through the ceiling a few 138

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moments later. She didn’t come down again either. ‘Another thing I forgot to mention about these lizards,’ Professor Kreeb went on, ‘is that they are incredibly stupid. Thanks to their extremely small brain, roughly the size of half a grain of rice, they have a memory span of precisely five seconds – only two seconds longer than a goldfish’s. So, unfortunately for those three children still stuck in the quicksand (or perhaps fortunately, depending on which way you look at it), the lizards will soon forget their horrible experience and try to eat these children as well.’ She was right. The lizards were already pulling at the heads of the other two girls, leaving David Dominguez to sink deeper into the mud. We had to watch the whole disgusting scene all over again: the girls’ necks stretching out like silly putty; the wet slooshing sounds as they got plucked into the air; and finally the truly chunderous sight of the girls being swallowed, then vomited into the roof, in a spray of green digestive slime. By the time David Dominguez had had the treatment, all of us watching outside were pretty close to vomiting ourselves. ‘Enough!’ Professor Kreeb shouted, as David Dominguez rocketed skywards in a slipstream of bile 139

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and disappeared from sight. ‘That’s the last one, boys! Cage the sand lizards! Towel the victims off and take them away! Let’s move!’ The hole in the ceiling of the punishment room closed over. The sliding doors at the back of the room opened. Four of Kreeb’s men appeared, holding extralong zappers. They used these to herd the reluctant sand lizards back through the doors behind them, and out of sight.

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13 the program continues ‘There you have it!’ Professor Kreeb announced, when things had quietened down again. ‘The very first punishment of the day has been completed! And right on time, too – it’s exactly ten o’clock! Before we move on to the next punishment, we will pause a moment for reflection and discussion. Does anyone have any questions?’ For a long time no one said anything. Finally a small girl in front of me raised her hand. ‘What’s happened to them?’ she asked in a timid voice. ‘The five children. Where’ve they gone?’ ‘Why, they’ve gone to the recovery room, of course!’ Professor Kreeb said. ‘Where else would they go? They’re in no fit state to continue here with us!’ ‘Are they hurt?’ someone asked. 141

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‘Oh yes!’ Professor Kreeb replied. ‘I hope so! I’d say they’ll be in deep shock for an hour at least. They’ll have scratches on their heads from the lizards’ teeth, and some rather tender neck muscles from all that stretching. They’ll also have a nasty allover body rash from being slathered in reptilian gastric juices. But they’ll live.’ There were no more questions. By now a deep sense of dread had fallen over the crowd. That was only the first punishment. What would the others be like? After being drowned in quicksand, then eaten by giant sand lizards, what could be next? Professor Kreeb clapped her hands. ‘Time to continue!’ she said. ‘So many marvellous punishments! So little time! I scarcely know where to begin! Onwards, down the passageway, to the next room!’ She strode on ahead, leaving her men to push and prod us towards the second room. This was empty except for a gleaming metal trough in the middle, filled with a syrupy golden liquid. ‘Ah, the honey bath!’ Professor Kreeb sighed. ‘One of my favourites! That large trough you see before you is filled to overflowing with sweet, delicious honey. Victims of this torture are dipped in the trough until their entire body is covered in 142

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honey. After that we tie you to the floor, and release the three-toed, raspy-tongued Patagonian honeyeaters! These adorable creatures have razor-sharp claws on each foot, and long extendable tongues used for extracting honey from the hives of wild bees. The honey-eaters’ tongues are rougher than the coarsest sandpaper. They’re so rough they can strip the bark off trees. They can lick the nose clean off a grizzly bear, and the armour plating clean off a tank. Imagine how it will feel, having six starving Patagonian honey-eaters leaping all over you, licking your body with their brutal tongues! It’s agony! It’s more pain than any human being can bear!’ ‘Unfortunately,’ Professor Kreeb went on, ‘our herd of honey-eaters is in quarantine at the moment, after the outbreak of a rare tongue fungus. We therefore cannot offer you this marvellous punishment this morning. But never mind. We have many other tantalising tortures to choose from. Onwards, once again, to the next room.’ In the middle of the third room was a heavy metal table. A mass of leather straps and buckles were fixed to the top of it. Two huge drilling machines, like dentist’s drills, rose above it, one on each side. At the front was a control panel with a digital display and a complicated set of buttons. 143

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‘This is our latest and most expensive purchase,’ Professor Kreeb said proudly. ‘A high-quality, fully automatic tattoo machine. We simply strap the victims in place, select a design from the computerised memory bank, push the “Start” button, and the machine does the rest. And what a fabulous range of designs we have at our disposal! If a child is caught smoking, for example, we tattoo an ashtray on their shoulder. If a child throws an apple core from a car, we tattoo an apple core on their left thigh. We tattoo dog-turds on irresponsible dog-owners. We tattoo garbage cans on children who forget to take out the garbage. The possibilities are, quite simply, endless!’ ‘Unfortunately,’ Professor Kreeb said again, ‘the ink cartridge on our tattoo machine has run out, and the tattoo machine company is late with the replacement. So we can’t offer you this punishment today either. But the next punishment is absolutely guaranteed to be in full working order! And it’s the most wonderfully diabolical punishment of all!’ Once again we moved on down the passageway. Peter and Mackerel Bait and I kept close together for support. Zara had joined us, and now and again I caught her looking at me thoughtfully. ‘Do you believe me yet?’ I whispered. ‘Maybe,’ she said. 144

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‘Can’t you see that’s how she knows what everyone’s doing?’ I went on. ‘She’s monitoring us on computer screens. She hasn’t had time to spy on everyone, but she’ll get around to it. After a few more days she’ll have everyone scared out of their wits.’ Zara hesitated. ‘That may be true,’ she said. ‘But I still think you’ve got a crush on me.’ ‘Oh for God’s sake—’ I began. ‘In case you do have a crush on me, I ought to tell you that I already have a boyfriend. His name is Gianfranco. He’s captain of the Italian national soccer team, and he’s very jealous. If he saw us standing here whispering to each other, he’d shoot you on the spot.’ Thankfully, I felt Peter tugging at my shirtsleeve. ‘Toby,’ he hissed. ‘Toby, take a look at that!’ I looked inside the fourth punishment room and couldn’t believe my eyes. It was filled with floating fluffy white balls: hundreds of them – no, thousands – hanging in the air from the floor right up to the ceiling. ‘Ooooh!’ Mackerel Bait said beside me. ‘Wook at dat! Dat’s even better dan da stick!’ ‘This can’t be a punishment,’ Peter said. ‘Not unless they’re going to tickle us to death.’ He laughed, but I didn’t say anything. Just 145

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because something looks harmless doesn’t mean it is harmless. Often the most poisonous plants and the most dangerous animals look as though they wouldn’t hurt a fly. ‘Cute, aren’t they?’ Professor Kreeb said. ‘They are the seeds of a very interesting plant known as the Tantalus vine. These seeds are one of nature’s true miracles. They can float in the air for up to three months, without touching the ground, looking for exactly the right place to germinate. It isn’t easy for a Tantalus vine seed to germinate, because the Tantalus vine does not grow in soil like most plants. Oh dear me, no. The Tantalus vine does not need soil at all. What a Tantalus vine seed needs, in order to begin growing, is saliva. Any kind of saliva will do, but human saliva is especially suitable. It’s warm, it’s moist, it’s juicy, and it’s packed full of nutrients that Tantalus vine seeds just love. If you happen to swallow one of these seeds – or breathe one in through your mouth or nose – it will begin growing in your throat immediately. And once a Tantalus vine starts growing in your throat, well . . .’ Professor Kreeb paused. ‘I’m afraid you’re done for. You haven’t got a chance.’ I swallowed hard. Peter and Mackerel Bait had turned pale as ghosts. All three of us remembered 146

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Professor Kreeb’s promise to us earlier that morning. My hand hovered above my skin-magnet telephone, ready to call my parents. I forced it back down. Maybe I would call them, but not yet. Not until all hope was lost. ‘Some people,’ Professor Kreeb went on solemnly, ‘never recover from this punishment. It’s too much for them. They have a complete nervous breakdown on the spot. This punishment is therefore reserved for the very worst among you. The rottenest of rotten apples! The blackest of black sheep! The children so hell-bent on creating mayhem and chaos that only the harshest of punishments will save them!’ She gave the three of us an evil smile. ‘Mackerel Bait Ferris!’ she shouted. ‘Peter Chou! Toby Smudge! Step forward!’ The three of us stepped forward. At once we were surrounded by Professor Kreeb’s men, zappers raised and at the ready. ‘Ah yes!’ Professor Kreeb said. ‘These three are truly the worst of the worst! The scum! The dregs from the bottom of the barrel! It was exactly for worthless vermin like this that my glorious Correcta-torium was built!’ She consulted her List of Crimes and Misdemeanours, and read out an account of what we had 147

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done the night before. It was all lies. It didn’t say anything about the gas she had piped into the dormitories, or the cruel operations she had inflicted on the other children. She made it sound as though we’d broken the window and escaped onto the roof for no other reason than to cause trouble. ‘Do you deny that this is a true and accurate account of what happened?’ she asked us when she had finished. We shook our heads. We knew there was no point in protesting. ‘Do you have anything further to say in your own defence?’ We shook our heads again. ‘Very well then!’ she shouted. ‘Take them away!’ A bunch of guards grabbed us roughly and dragged us through a door in the wall, down a dark, narrow passageway and around a corner. By the harsh blue light of the zappers I could see there were two sliding doors in the wall in front of us. I guessed they led into the back of the room filled with fluffy white balls. One of Kreeb’s men had his finger on a button next to this door, ready to push. ‘Ten!’ the man at the door called out. ‘Nine! Eight!’ 148

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‘Once we’re in the room, hold your breath for as long as you can!’ I whispered to the others. ‘Then cover your mouth and nose with your hands! Don’t let the seeds get through!’ ‘Two! One! Zero!’ The sliding doors opened. I was blinded by the sudden harsh light. The jolt of a zapper at my back sent me sprawling forward, into a blizzard of fluffy white balls. I managed to gulp in a breath, and held it. I could see the crowd watching from beyond the glass. I could see Professor Kreeb gazing at us triumphantly, waiting for the punishment to work. As I held the air in my lungs I felt hundreds of silky, feather-light Tantalus vine seeds brushing against my face and body. They tickled me on the backs of the legs. They brushed oh-so-lightly against my arms and shoulders. They were everywhere. All around me. There was no escape. If any one of them got into my throat, I was a goner. I covered my mouth and nose with my hands. When my breath gave out, I sucked in another lungful as carefully as I could, trying to leave no space between my fingers for the seeds to get in. The next time I breathed, a shimmering bunch of white seeds clung to the outsides of my hands. 149

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They were unbelievably soft and slippery. They were as weightless as cobwebs. I could feel their feathery tendrils beginning to slip through the cracks between my fingers. I now had my hands pressed over my mouth so tightly that I could barely suck in any air at all. I needed more air, or else I was going to faint. I relaxed my hands just the smallest, tiniest bit – and at once I felt a single slippery Tantalus vine seed slide smoothly between my two little fingers, and disappear down my throat. I stopped breathing at once. I gagged and choked. I coughed, trying to bring the seed back up again, but it was too late. Immediately the tiny seed began swelling inside my neck. I could feel thin rootlike tendrils reaching towards my mouth, and probing down my windpipe towards my lungs, slithering like newly-hatched snakes. I jammed my fingers into my mouth, trying to pull the tendrils out, but there were too many of them. They’d wound themselves around my tongue. They were growing along the base of my lips, in the hollows of my cheeks, in the gaps between my teeth. They were feeding on my saliva. Every recess of my mouth was being sucked dry. Even worse, they were now snaking up the back of my mouth into my nose. 150

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Peter and Mackerel Bait were in an even worse state than I was. Small green fernlike leaves were already poking out from Mackerel Bait’s nose, while a bright pink flower was blossoming at Peter’s ear. ‘You see how quickly these seeds begin to grow!’ Professor Kreeb exclaimed. ‘Soon they will have used up all the saliva in their victims’ mouths! That won’t stop them, however, because if there’s one thing a Tantalus vine loves even more than saliva, it’s earwax! Especially human earwax! It’s like nectar of the gods to them! When the roots of those eager little seedlings reach their victims’ ears, then you’ll really see them grow!’ A vine was growing from my own nose now. I tried to pull it out, but it was incredibly strong. It quickly spread to cover half my face, then snaked up into my hair. Other tendrils had wriggled their way through my sinuses to my eardrums, and were making loud sucking noises as they vacuum-cleaned all the earwax they could find. Within a minute, my head was covered in a thick tangle of vines and leaves. New leaves were uncurling on my neck and shoulders, while bright pink flowers were blossoming out both ears. I was turning into a potplant! I had to do something, fast! But what? 151

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This is the end, I thought miserably. The vine’s going to keep growing until it smothers me. And then I die. As I stood there helpless next to Peter and Mackerel Bait, who were in exactly the same state, a vent opened up in the floor beneath my feet. There was a loud humming noise, combined with a sudden whooshing of air. All the remaining fluffy balls – the ones that hadn’t germinated in our throats – swirled down the vent like water running down a plughole, and disappeared. The vent closed again. Professor Kreeb peered at us through the glass partition, and smiled. ‘They do look wonderfully pretty, covered in pink flowers, don’t they?’ she said to the watching crowd. ‘They’d be a lovely addition to someone’s garden. The trouble is, the Tantalus vine grows so very quickly. It tends to smother everything it touches. And the flowers are deadly of course. Far too deadly to keep in your average suburban home. The nectar they produce is 96 per cent pure hydrochloric acid. Imagine that! Ninety-six per cent pure! One splash of that is enough to eat straight through your skin! I saw a man sniff a Tantalus vine flower once. When he lifted his head again, his nose fell off. No, they’re far too dangerous to put in anyone’s garden. I think we 152

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might leave them right there, for our own private viewing pleasure.’ She looked at us. Every part of our bodies was now covered with twisting vine tendrils and leaves. There was no way I could have called my parents on the skin-magnet phone, even if I’d wanted to. ‘There’s still one thing missing from this lovely scene, isn’t there?’ Professor Kreeb said. ‘We can’t have beautiful flowers without beautiful birds! And it just so happens there’s a species of native parrot that feeds on Tantalus vine nectar. The diet of this parrot consists entirely of 96 per cent pure hydrochloric acid taken from the flowers of Tantalus vines growing wild in Cape York. Let’s take a look at it, shall we?’ She clapped her hands. ‘Phase Two of the punishment!’ she shouted. ‘Release the hydrochlorikeets!’ A panel in the ceiling slid open above me, and a mob of very strange silver-coloured birds began pouring into the room. The birds were the same size as galahs. Every feather on their body was a gleaming metallic silver. Their beaks, claws and crests were bright red, and so were their eyes. They screeched and cawed and flapped their wings madly above us, making a terrible din. 153

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Then they swooped. A bickering, noisy flock of birds perched on my vine to drink the deadly nectar from the pink flowers. I was pecked and scratched and scraped until I was reeling. But still more birds came. All this time my vine continued to grow, feeding on saliva and earwax, spreading out its tendrils across the floor. Then an amazing thing happened. The rustling, sucking sound in my throat and ears suddenly stopped. The vines that were wrapped around every centimetre of my body went limp. The feeding roots in my mouth and sinuses began to quiver and twitch weakly. Something’s happening to it, I thought in surprise. It’s weakening. It’s not holding me so tight any more. If I could just get my hands free – yes, that’s it – and work my arms free – YES – I might be able to pull some of them off . . . The vine was definitely weakening. Some of the leaves on the floor were beginning to curl up and go brown. Holy mackerel! I thought. There’s no saliva or earwax left! And there are no other victims for it to latch onto, to get a fresh supply! ‘It’s running out of food!’ I shouted to the others, 154

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as I tore the shrivelling roots from my throat in a single limp handful. ‘It’s dying! You can get free of it! Look! Look!’ It was true. The vine was definitely dying. All over my body – and Peter’s and Mackerel Bait’s – leaves were curling up and going brown. Pink flowers were wilting and drooping. The vine itself was so dry and brittle it snapped easily. ‘We’re free! We’re free!’ I shouted, kicking the remains of the dying plant away from me, and jumping for joy. ‘Yippee!’ ‘Yippee!’ shouted Peter, jumping beside me. ‘My ears are cwean!’ Mackerel Bait said, and tapped at his head with the palm of his hand. ‘I can hear! I can hear!’ At that exact moment, something hot and wet dropped to the ground in front of me. I heard a fierce sizzling sound. I looked down to see a small glimmering blob of liquid silver eating its way slowly into the concrete floor. ‘Watch out for the droppings!’ Professor Kreeb called out to us from the other side of the glass. ‘They’re 96 per cent pure hydrochloric acid too!’ I glanced up towards the ceiling. The hydrochlorikeets, disturbed by all our jumping and shouting, were wheeling and diving everywhere. 155

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Another liquid silvery blob missed Peter’s arm by a whisker. ‘Incoming!’ I shouted. ‘Bird droppings at one o’clock! Run for your lives!’ Deadly silver droppings began raining down. The more we dodged and weaved, the more panicked the hydrochlorikeets became, and the more droppings they produced. ‘I can’t keep this up much longer!’ Peter panted. ‘You’ve got to!’ I panted back. ‘These things’ll eat straight through you! Just think of it as a game of dodgeball!’ ‘I’ve never played dodgeball.’ ‘Well, now’s your chance to learn!’ A hot silver blob landed on my shoes, burning a hole through the tip. Another blob splattered on the rim of Peter’s glasses, and melted the frame. Then a dropping hit Mackerel Bait right on the top of the head. He let out a shriek. I turned and saw that a patch of his thick fiery-red hair was melting. Wailing in terror, he tried desperately to wipe the melted gooey mess off with his hands, but succeeded only in rubbing it in deeper, like shampoo. ‘It’s got me!’ he yelled, as globs of melted hair dripped off his forehead. ‘I’m being eaten by a dwopping! Aaaah-h-h-h!’ 156

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Quick as a flash I whipped off my T-shirt and threw it to him. He caught it, and rubbed it against the top of his head. By doing this he managed to wipe away the acid, but he also wiped off the melted hair as well. When he’d finished, all that was left was a few sorry-looking tufts sticking up above his ears. ‘I can’t do this any more!’ Peter moaned, grabbing my arm. ‘I’ve got to rest!’ ‘Don’t give up now!’ I said. ‘We’re through the worst of it! They can’t poo for much longer! Keep dodging!’ The shower of deadly bird droppings was beginning to lessen. But Peter was flat-out knackered. With a groan he slumped into my arms. I hauled him on his feet, then yanked him out of the way of another lethal silver missile as it fell. I don’t know how we got through the next few minutes. Mackerel Bait was too busy saving himself to help me with Peter. Every time I thought it was over, the hydrochlorikeets would start screeching and cawing again, and down would come another flurry of droppings. Eventually no more droppings came. The entire mob of hydrochlorikeets had come down to land along the back wall. Mackerel Bait had managed to avoid getting hit any more times, despite having 157

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melted hair over his face. I’d kept myself and Peter safe as well. When the last of the birds landed on the ground, I let Peter go. A wave of relief and exhaustion washed over me. I shut my eyes. I stood there swaying, half-wanting to cry, half-thanking my lucky stars that I was still alive. I heard the sound of cheering from out in the passageway. It began slowly, then turned into the loudest, longest cheers I have ever heard. The crowd out in the passageway was going berserk. I opened my eyes and gave a feeble wave. Mackerel Bait waved too, but Peter stayed sound asleep on the floor. ‘Stop that! Stop that at once!’ Professor Kreeb barked, as the cheers and applause continued. ‘Be quiet!’ The cheering and whistling only grew louder. ‘Be quiet, I said!’ Professor Kreeb bellowed. ‘Stop it this instant, or I’ll have you zapped within an inch of your lives!’ I managed to give one more feeble wave before my knees gave way. I slumped out cold next to Peter, in the middle of the floor.

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14 red wine dreams

When I woke up, I found myself in a long, dimly-lit room like a hospital ward. There was no sign of Mackerel Bait or Peter. The five other children who’d been punished that morning – Thomas Fripp, David Dominguez, Mary Vandenburg, Sarah Bateman and Johanna Miles – were also in the room, lying quietly in beds along the walls. I felt woozy and weary but otherwise surprisingly okay. I swung my feet to the floor and glanced at my watch. It was just before three in the afternoon. I padded barefoot across the lino towards the others. Johanna Miles and Mary Vandenburg were lying on their backs, staring miserably at the ceiling. ‘Have you seen my two friends?’ I asked. ‘The 159

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Chinese boy, and the big gorilla with the melted hair?’ The girls kept on staring at the wall. ‘Have you seen them?’ I repeated. ‘I need to find out where they went.’ ‘Who cares about your friends?’ Mary mumbled. ‘Who cares about anything any more? We’re doomed.’ ‘Doomed?’ I said in surprise. ‘Why? ‘Because of Professor Kreeb, that’s why!’ Johanna said. ‘Didn’t you see what happened this morning? She can see inside our brains!’ ‘Oh, that!’ I said with a laugh. ‘That’s nothing. That’s just a big scam.’ ‘What are you talking about?’ Johanna sat up. ‘You were there when she caught us! That wasn’t a scam! And neither was what she did to us after!’ ‘It’s only the first day,’ Mary muttered. ‘We’ve got a whole month of this. I don’t think I can take it any more.’ As quickly as I could, I explained to them about the Binoculator. When I’d finished they just looked at me. I could tell they wanted to believe me, but it obviously sounded too good to be true. ‘You mean it?’ Mary said. ‘You really mean it? We’ve just had tiny miniature cameras put in our eyes?’ 160

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‘That’s right,’ I said. ‘That’s how Professor Kreeb knew you’d raided the pantry. And that’s how she spied on Thomas and David, too.’ ‘So she’s not psychic?’ a voice inquired behind me. I turned to see Thomas Fripp and David Dominguez standing at the end of the bed. ‘She’s no more psychic than I am,’ I replied. ‘She’s a con-artist who operates illegally on children. Once we expose her to the police, she’s going to jail for a very long time.’ ‘But . . . if we’ve got cameras in our eyes,’ Mary said hesitantly, ‘how are we going to get rid of them? Aren’t they going to be in there forever?’ ‘No,’ I said. ‘You can have a second operation to take them out again. It’s not difficult, with the laser technology they’ve got these days. And the cameras aren’t doing your eyes any harm in the meantime.’ Just then Zara burst into the room, with Peter and Mackerel Bait close behind her. ‘Great, you’re awake!’ Zara said. ‘We tried to talk to you earlier, but you were out to it. I think I’ve come up with a clue to help us find the Binoculator.’ I was tongue-tied for a moment. Was this the same Zara who thought I had a crush on her because I kept telling her she was in danger? The same Zara whose boyfriend Gianfranco was the captain of the 161

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Italian soccer team, and who lived for half the year in a teepee in the Brazilian rainforest? ‘I owe you an apology,’ Zara said. ‘I know for sure you’re not lying now. I remembered something from last night that made everything crystal clear. I had this dream, you see. I was inside an old monastery just like this one. I couldn’t see or hear anything at first, it was all too dark. I just remember floating, and feeling cold, damp air on my face. Then, towards the end of the dream, I saw stone walls, and I smelled the smell of red wine. Nothing else, just that. It was a really strong, sharp red-wine smell, like the smell of the wine my parents drink at home. I even woke up with the taste still on my tongue.’ ‘Old monasteries like this sometimes have wine cellars,’ Peter said. ‘So maybe Zara’s dream was a memory of where she went last night, after she’d been gassed.’ ‘It could be even further down than the punishment rooms,’ Zara went on. ‘That was the other clue – the stone walls on either side of the passageway this morning. They were the same as the walls in my dream.’ I nodded. ‘It makes sense,’ I said. ‘There could be a whole network of passageways underground. The computer control room is probably down there too.’ 162

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‘The next question is, how do we get there?’ Zara said. ‘We’ve been out snooping around, and as far as we can tell, the only way underground is the stairwell we used this morning. The one that’s always guarded and locked.’ ‘But it’s not the only way down!’ I said excitedly. ‘Don’t you remember, Professor Kreeb came down in an elevator? A huge one – some kind of goods lift, it looked like. All we need to do is figure out where it came from, and how we can hijack it to take us to the wine cellar.’ ‘We don’t even know if it goes to the wine cellar,’ Peter said. ‘I’ll bet you it does,’ Zara said. ‘You’ve seen the shape Professor Kreeb’s in. She’s way too old and fat to be running up and down a whole bunch of stairs. Besides, how do you think she managed to get fortyfive kids binoculated in one night? She didn’t take them down one at a time, that’s for sure.’ ‘But we’ve checked everywhere,’ Peter said. ‘Every corner of this place. There’s no sign of an elevator entrance anywhere.’ ‘There wouldn’t be,’ I said. ‘It’ll be hidden. And I don’t think it comes from the Correct-a-torium anyway. We walked away from the Correct-a-torium when we went down those stairs to the punishment 163

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rooms. We walked back out under the courtyard, maybe twenty or thirty metres. That would have brought us . . . let me see . . . right under the office! Yes! The elevator comes down from somewhere near Professor Kreeb’s office, I’m sure of it!’ Even as I was speaking, a plan was beginning to take shape in my mind. ‘Zara, you were with Professor Kreeb all morning,’ I said. ‘Did she say where she’d be this afternoon?’ ‘No,’ Zara said. ‘The program finished at one o’clock. Nobody’s seen her since then. We’ve all had lunch, and now we’ve got free time.’ ‘Right,’ I said. ‘And you know what free time means, don’t you? That means time for Professor Kreeb to spy on people. She’ll be down in her control room, watching the screens on all her computers. Right now’s our best chance. Peter and Mackerel Bait and I can’t risk another night in the dorms. We’ll get gassed and binoculated for sure. I think I’ve got a plan for keeping Professor Kreeb and her men busy while the three of us sneak down in the elevator. I’ll need everyone to help. All of you – all your friends, everyone you can talk to. Remember, Professor Kreeb can see through your eyes, but she can’t hear you talking, so as long as you don’t act suspicious, you’ll be fine. Now listen . . .’ 164

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Three-quarters of an hour later we were ready to go. Zara and the others in the recovery room had spread the word to everyone in the Correct-a-torium. Peter and Mackerel Bait were hiding in the fruit orchard near the shed, waiting for my signal. At exactly 3.58, I strolled casually into the reception area in front of Professor Kreeb’s office, and smiled at the receptionist behind the desk. ‘G’day,’ I said. ‘Any chance of a chat with the Kreebster? It’s kind of urgent.’ The receptionist stopped typing and stared at me. ‘And who might you be?’ she asked. ‘I’m Toby,’ I said. ‘The Professor knows me. Tell her all the computers in her control room are going to crash in—’ I looked at my watch ‘—oh, I’d say about fifty-five seconds.’ The receptionist went pale. She snatched up the nearest telephone and quickly jabbed at some numbers. She turned her back and held a muffled conversation with someone at the other end of the line. ‘Yes, that’s right,’ I heard her whispering. ‘Yes, it’s him . . . That’s what he said, they’re going to crash . . . yes, I’ll put him on.’ She handed the phone to me. ‘Hello,’ I said. ‘Toby here.’ 165

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‘I’m warning you, Smudge,’ Professor Kreeb’s voice growled. ‘Don’t try getting smart. What happened to you this morning was nothing. It’s not even a fraction of what I can do.’ ‘Not without your computers,’ I said cheerfully. ‘You can’t do a thing without them. And you know what? They’re all about to go down for the count.’ ‘I don’t know what you’re talking about,’ Professor Kreeb said after a pause. ‘What computers?’ ‘The ones in your control room,’ I said. ‘Where you are now. Probably not too far from where you’ve got the Binoculator hidden, isn’t that right, Professor?’ There was a silence. ‘How on earth . . .?’ she said. Then: ‘I’m warning you, Smudge—’ ‘It’s Judge, actually. Toby Judge. You bought the Binoculator from my sister Emma. Your whole elaborate plan is about to go right down the gurgler, Professor. As of . . . now.’ The second hand on my watch counted down the final second to four o’clock. A howl of rage burst out from the phone. ‘My screens!’ Professor Kreeb bellowed. ‘They’ve gone blank! Every last one of them! What’ve you done to my system, you wretch?’ ‘That’s for me to know and you to find out,’ 166

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I said, and dropped the phone. I knew the receptionist would come after me. I had a hunch there might be some henchmen in Professor Kreeb’s office who would also join in the chase. I sprinted outside and jumped into an empty garbage can that Mackerel Bait and I had placed around the corner earlier. I pulled the lid tight over my head, sat perfectly still, and waited. I heard the sound of heavy boots thumping past me across the courtyard. I also heard the skittery clack-clack-clack of a pair of high heels. That takes care of the hired help, I thought, and poked my head out of the can. Seeing that the courtyard was clear, I gave a short, low whistle. Mackerel Bait and Peter ran out from behind the shed in the orchard. Together we ran back in through the empty reception area and into Professor Kreeb’s office. ‘Has it worked?’ Peter panted, as we reached the locked door. ‘Did she fall for it?’ ‘If she fell for it any harder she’d hurt herself,’ I said. ‘Let’s do it. Mackerel Bait, break down the door.’ Mackerel Bait began hacking into the door with an axe he’d taken from the garden shed. I watched him nervously, praying that my plan would succeed. 167

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Professor Kreeb’s computers hadn’t crashed, of course. Every one of them was still in perfect working order. We’d merely tricked her into thinking that her computers had crashed, by doing one simple thing. Exactly on the stroke of four o’clock, all the children in the Correct-a-torium had shut their eyes. That meant that every computer screen in Professor Kreeb’s control room had suddenly gone black. What’s more they were going to stay black – if Zara had done her job properly – for roughly fifteen minutes, while all the children who’d shut their eyes counted slowly to one thousand. Fifteen minutes wasn’t much time, I had to admit. But it was all we had. This is like a game of hide and seek, isn’t it, Professor? I thought. You’ve hidden the Binoculator, and we’re coming to find it, ready or not. With a final mighty blow of his axe, Mackerel Bait bashed down the office door. The three of us spilled into the room, searching for anything that might help us find the secret elevator. My eyes fell on the photograph of the Correcta-torium, on the wall beside Professor Kreeb’s desk. It was hanging off-centre again. 168

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I went to the photograph and lifted it off its hook. Underneath, just as I’d hoped, I found a green button mounted into the wooden panel. When I pushed the button, the entire end wall behind Professor Kreeb’s desk slid aside, revealing two gleaming stainless-steel doors. ‘Here it is, here it is!’ I shouted to the others, who were crawling around under Professor Kreeb’s desk. ‘We’re in business! Let’s go!’ The stainless-steel doors slid open. The inside of the elevator was even bigger than I’d remembered. If you’d stood in the middle and swung a fullygrown rhinoceros around in a circle, you still wouldn’t have touched the sides. Everything Professor Kreeb needed to set up her control room and her punishment rooms could have been transported this way. So could all the children, once they’d been drugged and carried down from the dorms. ‘I’ve found a map,’ Peter said, pointing to a diagram next to some green buttons on the side wall of the elevator. ‘It looks like there are seven levels. Office, Punishments, Animal Enclosures, Carnivorous Plants, Instruments of Torture, Computer Control Room, Binoculation.’ ‘Level Seven it is!’ I exclaimed. I pushed the 169

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button, and we gripped the side rail. ‘Is everyone ready? Doors are closing! Hang on to your axe, Mackerel Bait! You never know when it might come in handy! Down we go-o-o!’

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15 the binoculator at last With a clunk, a whirr and a hiss, Professor Kreeb’s secret elevator began descending. I’d hoped it would go down fast, but it didn’t. It was agonisingly slow. It crept down from level to level like a damaged Russian submarine lurching towards the ocean floor. Not long after we’d passed level four – the carnivorous plant nursery – I remembered something. ‘Mum and Dad!’ I said. ‘I’ve got to call them! We’re going to need reinforcements after we’ve stolen the Binoculator!’ I called them up on the skin-magnet phone. My father answered straight away. ‘Toby! At last! What’s going on?’ ‘We’ve found where the Binoculator is and we’re 171

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on our way down to get it!’ I said. ‘Call the police! Get them out here as soon as you can!’ ‘Will do,’ Dad said. ‘But it may take a little time. The nearest police station is thirty Ks away.’ ‘We can hide from Kreeb’s men for a while, but not long,’ I said. ‘Fifteen, twenty minutes max. Then they’ll be all over us like a rash.’ ‘We’ll come out as soon as we’ve made the call,’ Dad said. ‘Where will you be?’ ‘Underground,’ I said. ‘There’s no time to explain. I’ve gotta go.’ The elevator lurched to a standstill. I rang off. The doors opened and we stepped out into a wide stone room lit by dim neon lights on the ceiling. The rich, earthy smell of wine clogged our nostrils. Two giant wooden barrels stood in the middle of the room. Piles of regular-sized barrels, and racks containing bottles of wine, lay against the walls. ‘The wine cellar!’ Peter breathed. ‘Zara was right!’ ‘There’s got to be a door here somewhere,’ I said. ‘There’s one right down the end. I’ll try that.’ I ran past the giant barrels to the door and opened it. Beyond was a narrow, musty concrete stairwell, rising steeply towards the next floor. 172

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‘It’s just the stairs,’ I called back to the others. ‘Keep looking.’ The three of us fanned out, searching behind the stacks of smaller barrels, to see if we could find another door. ‘Found it!’ Peter called out a few moments later. ‘This one looks promising! Hang on – it’s locked, though.’ Mackerel Bait and I joined him. The door was almost completely hidden behind a stack of barrels. It was heavy and wooden, exactly like the door in our dormitory room upstairs. Mackerel Bait shoved the nearest wine barrels out of the way and stepped forward, axe at the ready. He was having the best time. After nine blows the door splintered open with a deafening crack. At the same moment bright red lights began flashing all around us. The cellar began echoing with shrill, pulsating bursts of sound. ‘We’ve triggered the alarm!’ I shouted. ‘They’re onto us! Find the Binoculator, quick!’ We burst into a small, bare room about the size of a dentist’s surgery. Down the far end of this room, hard up against the bench, was a modern-looking hydraulically-operated chair. A set of shelves next to the chair carried a gruesome array of needles, 173

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syringes, knives and surgical tools, latex gloves, swabs, chemical bottles – not to mention a tall stack of sealed plastic trays, which I guessed contained the micro-cameras. The Binoculator was on the bench directly behind the chair. It gleamed an evil metallic silver which turned the colour of watery blood with every flash of the alarm’s red light. I grabbed it and lifted it into my arms. It was surprisingly light. My father had explained to me once about steel alloys, and how light they were. The Binoculator must have been made from the lightest steel alloy there is. Taking care to keep the gruesomely long needles away from my face, I turned to leave. ‘Destroy it!’ Peter shouted. ‘Let Mackerel Bait smash it with his axe!’ ‘No, we need it as proof!’ I said. ‘We’ve got to take it with us! Let’s go!’ Coming back out into the wine cellar, Peter gave a shout. ‘The elevator!’ he said. ‘It’s on its way down!’ I followed his gaze. The green button beside the elevator doors was now brightly lit. Somewhere behind the constant buzzing of the alarm I could hear the clunking and whirring of the elevator as it descended. 174

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‘The stairs!’ I shouted. ‘We’ll have to go up that way! Quick!’ I made it to the stairwell entrance, then stopped. Out of the corner of my eye I’d spotted Mackerel Bait, way back in the middle of the room. He was chopping at the side of one of the giant wine barrels with his axe. Thick gushes of red wine spurted out through the holes he’d made, and sprayed all over the floor. ‘Mackerel Bait, there’s no time!’ I shouted. ‘Come on!’ Mackerel Bait gave the barrel one final almighty swipe. A huge crack appeared, all the way up the side, then the barrel split in two. Thousands of litres of wine cascaded out onto the smooth stone floor. Mackerel Bait ran for the stairs, keeping just ahead of the deluge he’d created. Just as he reached me, the elevator doors opened at the other end of the room. A posse of Kreeb’s henchmen came charging out – straight into an enormous swirling lake of slippery red wine. They went down like ten-pins. They skidded and tumbled and slipped over each other, then when they tried to get up, they slipped over again. ‘That’s what I call rolling out the red carpet!’ I said to Mackerel Bait, as we took off after Peter. 175

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‘I wike dis axe!’ Mackerel Bait replied. Climbing up the stairs, in near-darkness, and with the Binoculator weighing me down, was hell. The air soon grew insufferably hot. It was so thick and moist and heavy, it was almost unbreathable. Panting and puffing, drenched in sweat, the three of us managed to climb two more floors before we had to stop to rest. ‘They’ll be coming,’ Peter panted. ‘They’ll be right behind us.’ ‘Keep it up!’ I said. ‘Only five more levels to go!’ ‘Five more levels!’ Peter moaned. ‘That’s too much! This place has got more levels than Headbusters from Planet Zork!’ Suddenly the doors to the fifth level flung open beneath us. A fresh posse of Kreeb’s men burst through and gave chase, zappers at the ready. ‘Mackerel Bait, drop to the rear and hold them off!’ I said. ‘Use your axe if you have to! Don’t let them through!’ Peter and I threw ourselves up the stairs. Mackerel Bait followed close behind. We made it up one more level, but Kreeb’s men were gaining fast. We couldn’t possibly make it all the way up. We had to find another means of escape, and quickly. 176

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‘Go in at the next floor!’ I said to Peter. ‘The animal enclosures! I’ve got an idea!’ Up, up, up we went again. The muscles in my legs were like jelly now. I don’t know how I kept going. Below us, Mackerel Bait was engaged in a pitched battle with the front rank of Professor Kreeb’s men. He was twisting this way and that, lunging and ducking, lopping the tips off zappers with great frenzied swooshes of his axe. ‘Stay close, Mackerel Bait!’ I yelled. ‘Don’t get left behind!’ Finally, there it was. The third floor landing. Peter and I fell through the door, then slammed it quickly behind Mackerel Bait as he staggered past us. I drove the bolt home just as Professor Kreeb’s men threw themselves against the outside. The door wouldn’t hold for long. We sprinted as fast as we could for the elevator at the far end of the room. To our horror, the elevator opened in front of us. A third batch of Kreeb’s men stepped out, and began approaching slowly across the floor. Both exits were blocked now. There was nowhere left to go. With a crack like a gunshot the bolt on the door behind us gave way, and the second group of Kreeb’s men spilled into the room. 177

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‘So was that your idea?’ Peter asked me, as he glanced anxiously at the two lines of men approaching from different directions. ‘Or are you saving it for a rainy day?’ I glanced in desperation around the room. It was three times as large as the wine cellar we had just left. It was lined on both sides with cages containing all of Professor Kreeb’s exotic animals and birds. One cage was filled with vampire bats the size of giant condors. Another cage was filled with giant condors the size of vampire bats. There were spotted tigers and striped leopards, and duck-billed ostriches, and ferocious-looking sabre-toothed koalas. In one cage I saw a pack of Patagonian honeyeaters gathered around a trough of honey. In another cage I saw a flock of hydrochlorikeets, screeching and squawking madly. But the most amazing sight was the cage next to the hydrochlorikeets – the biggest cage of all. Inside this cage were the two Niberian sand lizards we’d seen earlier in the day. I recognised them by the yellow stripes down their backs, and the rings at the base of their necks. But they were just babies. Also in the cage with them was their mother – and she was positively gigantic. She was the size of a Stegosaurus. She lay basking quietly under a palm 178

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tree while her offspring played in a patch of quicksand nearby. ‘There’s no escape, you may as well give up!’ one of Kreeb’s men called out. ‘Tell the big bonehead to put down the axe! If you give back the Binoculator you won’t be harmed!’ ‘We can’t give back the Binoculator, we can’t,’ Peter muttered. ‘Hit us with that idea, Toby. It’s now or never!’ ‘Okay, you asked for it,’ I said. ‘Mackerel Bait, you see that big cage off to the left? The really big one, with the big wide door at the front? Open it. Break the padlock with your axe.’ ‘What!’ Peter cried in alarm. ‘Are you crazy? That’s the sand lizards’ cage!’ ‘Correct,’ I said. ‘And we’re going inside it. Kreeb’s men won’t follow us in there.’ Mackerel Bait didn’t need to be told twice. He made a dash for the cage and knocked the padlock off the door with a single swipe. Kreeb’s men sprinted after us, but when they saw we were going in the cage with the sand lizards, they relaxed. They waited till we were inside, then shut the door and picked up the broken padlock to see if they could fix it. ‘Smart move, boys!’ one of them laughed. ‘Now 179

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you’re going to be lizard tucker!’ ‘Unless you’re lucky, and the Prof. gets here first,’ another one said. ‘Then you’ll be Kreeb tucker,’ a third one said, and they all laughed. At that moment, however, the three of us had other things to worry about. We were standing at the edge of a swimming-pool-sized pit of quicksand, watching the two baby sand lizards having a playfight. The mother was still basking sleepily under a palm tree. She hadn’t noticed us yet. ‘Try climbing on the mother’s back,’ I whispered to the others. ‘We might have a chance from up there.’ ‘Oh sure,’ Peter said dryly. ‘Climb on the mother’s back. That shouldn’t be a problem. I’ll try and teach her the national anthem, while I’m at it.’ ‘Mackerel Bait, you watch out for the babies,’ I went on. ‘We’ll advance around the edge of the pit very slowly and quietly. If that mother wakes up and decides she’s hungry, we’re in big trouble. She doesn’t have a ring on her neck, in case you haven’t noticed.’ ‘All the better to eat you with, Grandma,’ Peter said. We began our advance. The two baby sand lizards slithered across and began snapping at us curiously 180

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with outstretched mouths. Mackerel Bait bonked them both on the nose with his axe, which got rid of them for a while, but it wasn’t long before they returned. ‘I guess the situation can’t get any worse,’ Peter said miserably. ‘It just did,’ I said. ‘The mother’s woken up.’ Ahead of us, at the very back of the cage, the mother sand lizard was stretching lazily. She flicked out a long forked tongue, then raised her head and fixed us with a sleepy gaze. Just then one of the baby sand lizards made a lunge for us again, and Mackerel Bait bonked it on the nose. It squealed loudly. That woke the mother up. She hoisted herself to her feet and hissed, glaring down at us with angry yellow eyes. ‘Boy, is she ever touchy,’ Peter said. ‘I’ll try and get her attention,’ I said. ‘I think I know how. You guys get ready to climb up the tail.’ I stepped forward, holding the Binoculator in front of me. The mother sand lizard followed me with her eyes. I threw the Binoculator up in the air and caught it. The mother sand lizard hissed again, then gave a flick of her forked tongue. ‘Tell me you’re not going to do what I think you’re going to do,’ Peter said. 181

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‘You want it?’ I yelled to the mother lizard. ‘Here it is! Go fetch!’ I tossed the Binoculator right into the middle of the quicksand pit. Then, as all three sand lizards slithered towards it, I ran to the mother’s tail with Peter and Mackerel Bait, and leapt up onto it, as high as I could. The three of us grabbed hold of the ridges of scales that ran down from the mother’s spine, and held tight. ‘Our proof is about to get eaten,’ Peter said. ‘Yeah, but we aren’t,’ I said. ‘Just hang on!’ With a thrust of her powerful legs, the mother outdistanced her babies and reached the Binoculator first. She stretched out her enormous neck, and gobbled it up. While she was doing this, Peter and Mackerel Bait and I managed to climb further up her tail onto her back, where we sat holding on for dear life, our mission in ruins, with no idea whatsoever of what was going to happen next.

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16 the lizard-ride

After the mother sand lizard had eaten the Binoculator, she lay still for a while, digesting her meal. She didn’t seem to mind, or even notice, having the three of us on her back. Maybe in her native Niberia humans had often ridden on her back – if they weren’t eaten first, that is. Maybe her babies rode up there sometimes, and she was used to feeling the weight. Whatever the reason, it looked as though she might leave us alone, which was the first piece of good news we’d had in a while. Crouched between the mother sand lizard’s shoulderblades, I thought things over. We were certainly safe from Kreeb’s men for the time being, and safe from the baby sand lizards. We’d lost the Binoculator, but at least it wasn’t back in the hands 183

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of Kreeb’s henchmen. I hadn’t given up hope that somehow we could get it out of the mother sand lizard’s stomach, and hand it to the police when they arrived, which would probably be quite soon. It occurred to me that Mum and Dad and Emma were probably already here. They would be somewhere up at ground level, trying to find out where we were. That gave me hope. It it wasn’t for the fact that we were trapped three levels underground, surrounded by enemies, and with no apparent means of escape, I would have felt quite good. The mother sand lizard, meanwhile, was eyeing Kreeb’s men with the same angry look she’d given us earlier. Kreeb’s men didn’t look so cheerful any more since we’d thrown the Binoculator into the quicksand and climbed up onto the mother’s back. In fact, they looked downright nervous. One of them had run to get a smaller padlock from one of the other cages, which they’d fixed to the big wide door. ‘Steady, boys!’ the leader of the men called. ‘Don’t do anything to alarm her! We’ll just keep her in here till the Prof. arrives!’ The mother slithered forward, past the quicksand pit, until her head was almost touching the door. Foolishly, one of Kreeb’s men took out his zapper, and zapped her on the nose. 184

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‘No, you idiot, no!’ the leader cried out, but it was too late. The mother sand lizard jerked her head back, gave a hiss that was so loud it was almost a shriek, then turned side-on and blasted the cage door with the side of her tail. I almost fell off when she hit. Mackerel Bait grabbed me just in time, and hauled me up again. ‘This baby needs seat belts,’ I said shakily, as the mother lined up her tail again, and let go with another massive swipe. The smaller replacement padlock didn’t hold. It snapped clean in two, and pinged across the room like a bullet. The door to the cage flung open full force, almost wrenching off its hinges. The mother sand lizard was free. ‘She’s out, she’s out!’ one of Kreeb’s men howled. ‘Run for your lives!’ The mother sand lizard rushed through the open door and began lashing out with her tail in all directions. At the first swipe, three of Kreeb’s men went flying through the air. At the second swipe, two more went flying in the opposite direction. The rest of them ran. Most headed for the stairs, but some – who obviously hadn’t been hired for their brains – headed for the elevator, still open at the far end of the room. The mother sand lizard easily reached the doors 185

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of the elevator before they closed. She thrust her head deep inside, ignoring the doors as they closed around her neck. Bloodcurdling screams rose up from just in front of us as two of Kreeb’s men got eaten. Two more managed somehow to squeeze past her and stumbled away across the room. The mother turned to follow them, but dragged her body and her tail into the elevator with her. At once the doors began closing. Letting out a hiss of alarm, she snapped at the doors with her jaws, almost throwing us off her back, but it was too late. The doors clunked shut. A moment later the elevator began to go down. ‘No, not down!’ Peter yelled, pummelling the walls with his fists. ‘Up! Why can’t we go up?!’ ‘She hit some of the buttons with her tail!’ I said. ‘I can’t see which ones are lit! Hang on . . . she’s moving . . . I can see now! All of them are lit, except four and five!’ ‘That means we’re going straight to Level Six!’ Peter said. ‘The computer control room! Professor Kreeb’ll be in there!’ ‘Not for long she won’t be,’ I replied. The mother sand lizard was still very afraid and confused. She crouched almost motionless, curled up in a tight half-circle, hissing quietly. Every so often 186

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she would buck a little, or try to straighten her tail, or raise her head until her snout bonked on the ceiling. Halfway down I decided to call Mum and Dad, to see where they were. I pressed under my armpit with my finger. Five seconds later, Mum answered. ‘We’re inside the gates, Toby,’ she said. ‘We’re just getting out of the car. Where are you?’ ‘Directly underneath you, I think,’ I said. ‘Nearly six floors down. We’re riding on the back of a giant lizard.’ ‘You’re what?’ Mum said. ‘A giant sand lizard,’ I repeated. ‘It’s escaped from its cage. We’re about to go on a tour of the computer control room.’ ‘Is it safe?’ Mum asked. ‘Absolutely,’ I said. ‘Don’t worry about a thing.’ ‘Have you got the Binoculator with you?’ ‘Yeah, it’s with us,’ I said. ‘Kind of. I’ll tell you later.’ I disconnected the call as the elevator clunked to a halt. There was a short pause. I looked at Peter and Mackerel Bait. They were grinning from ear to ear. ‘I think I’m going to enjoy this,’ Peter said. ‘Me too,’ Mackerel Bait added. The two steel doors slid open. With a hiss that 187

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grew into a deafening roar, the mother sand lizard stampeded out. The computer control room was only small, about half the size of the wine cellar, with dozens of computers laid out on desks in neat rows. Professor Kreeb was there, as we’d expected, together with half a dozen of her men. She was standing in the middle of the room. All the computers were on and all the screens were working again. Zara and the others up at the Correct-a-torium must have finally opened their eyes. Professor Kreeb was shouting into a telephone. Her face was flushed a deep, angry purple. Her eyes were wild. ‘I said cancel it!’ she barked. ‘No, I don’t need the technicians! The little beggars pulled a swiftie on me! They tricked me! I’ll get them for this if it’s the last thing I— Whoooaaaaaa!’ She dived out of the way as the mother sand lizard swept past. After that, things got rather confusing. The mother sand lizard set about destroying the contents of the room with great broad sweeps of her tail. I didn’t see too much of what went on – it was all I could do to hang on and avoid getting destroyed myself – but now and then a really spectacular act of vandalism did catch my eye. 188

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I saw whole rows of computers getting crushed and trodden on. I saw showers of white sparks as light bulbs exploded and electrical fittings were torn from walls. I saw desks knocked over. I saw chairs being splintered and smashed. I saw filing cabinets being tossed in the air like popcorn, and sheets of paper drifting through the air like oversized confetti. I saw Kreeb’s men high-tailing it for the stairs, abandoning ship like the cowardly rats they were. Professor Kreeb, on the other hand, did not abandon ship. She did not wither in the face of the sand lizard’s attack. She’d managed to grab a zapper from one of her men, and she stood her ground, bellowing and spitting curses, zapping the other men as they turned to flee, ignoring the explosions and the showers of sparks and the lizard’s tail swishing only centimetres from her nose. ‘Come back here, you cockroaches!’ she bawled. ‘You fish-heads! You scrawny piles of goat-gizzard! Come back here and fight like men!’ When the carnage was finally over, and the noise had died down, and the sand lizard had destroyed everything there was to destroy, Professor Kreeb was still in the room. She stood alone and unbowed, gazing at the smouldering ruins of her life’s work, her 189

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face blackened, her clothes torn, her eyes bloodshot, her hair wild and loose over her shoulders. Slowly she turned towards us. She lifted her zapper and pointed it at me like a long accusing finger. ‘You!’ she croaked. ‘Toby Judge! You’re responsible for all this! You’ve been a very . . . naughty . . . boy!’ She stepped falteringly towards me. The sand lizard hissed in warning. ‘Watch out!’ I said. ‘Don’t come any closer! You’ll get eaten!’ Professor Kreeb kicked aside a smashed monitor from one of her computers, and puffed out her chest indignantly. ‘I will NOT get eaten!’ she exclaimed. ‘No one would dare to eat me! I’m famous! I’ve got my own TV show! Now come down here and take your thrashing like a man!’ The mother sand lizard hissed a second time. She flicked out her tongue. Her head began swaying slowly from side to side. ‘Don’t you look at me like that, you overgrown handbag!’ Professor Kreeb said. ‘You slimy piece of regurgitated dog’s breakfast! One more peep out of you and I’ll skin you and use you as a car seat-cover!’ 190

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The mother sand lizard froze. Her muscles tensed. In a single lightning-fast movement she lunged forward and devoured Professor Kreeb, zapper and all. ‘No-o-o-o-o-o!’ Professor Kreeb wailed, as she slid head-first down the lizard’s throat. ‘You can’t eat me-e-e-e! I’m famou-u-us!’ Silence. The lizard coughed. It swallowed. It hiccuped. A bubbling, gurgling sound came from its stomach. Then, with a loud crack and a shower of sparks, everything went black. ‘Power failure,’ Peter whispered. ‘Some loose wires must have crossed and blown a fuse! Now what do we do?’ ‘We escape!’ I whispered back. ‘Get down to the floor and head for the stairs! They’re to the right, I think. We need to join hands, so we stay together. Give me your hand, Mackerel Bait. No, not your axe, mate! Your hand! That’s it. You too, Pete. Now, on the count of three, we all slide down together. One . . . two . . . three!’ We slid down over the lizard’s ribs and hit the floor. Then we were off, groping our way past overturned desks and smashed computers towards the stairwell. Behind us we could hear the lizard scraping 191

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its tail this way and that, and hissing softly. She didn’t come after us. Maybe she was too disorientated in the dark. Maybe she’d had enough excitement for one day. We found the stairs and began the long climb to the top. In the pitch darkness we seemed to climb forever. Step after step after step. A landing, followed by another landing, followed by another. I knew Mum and Dad and Emma were somewhere close, looking for me, so I forced myself to keep going. It was all I could do to keep groping forward without tripping or walking into walls. All three of us knew when we were getting near the top. The air grew a bit lighter. Grey shapes loomed out of the murk. Climbing grew easier, and our only battle now was against tiredness, which overwhelmed us like a powerful sleeping pill, making us fight for every step. The door in the Correct-a-torium’s main hall wasn’t locked. We came out into a late afternoon sun that was so bright we had to narrow our eyes to tiny slits. I couldn’t see who was waiting. None of us could. We guessed it was about half a dozen people, judging from the noise they made. ‘Toby!’ Mum said, and got to me first to give me a big hug. ‘Thank God you’re safe! We were just 192

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about to go down the stairs with Zara when the power went out!’ ‘Good on you, sport!’ Dad slapped me on the back when Mum had finished. ‘You made it! I was getting worried for a minute there.’ ‘Toby!’ another familiar voice cried. ‘Mackerel Bait! Peter! It’s great to see you!’ Zara thumped into us so hard she just about bowled us over. The four of us clung together in a huddle, laughing and swaying. I still hadn’t got used to the light yet. I was seeing swirls and flashes in front of my eyes. The warm welcome wasn’t helping, either. ‘You were down there so long!’ Zara said. ‘I thought you must’ve been drinking the wine.’ ‘No, we just locked ourselves in with the sand lizards,’ Peter said. ‘They looked lonely. We were teaching the mother sand lizard to go fetch.’ My eyes had improved enough that I spotted Emma in the hallway, standing off to one side. She looked worried. I gave her a thumbs-up, and she smiled. ‘So where is it?’ she said to me. ‘Where’s my Binoculator?’ ‘Ah,’ I said. ‘That’s a long story.’ ‘You did get it back, didn’t you?’ 193

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‘Yeah, we got it back,’ I said. ‘But we had to feed it to the mother sand lizard.’ ‘You what?’ ‘We ran out of breadcrumbs,’ Peter said. Peter and I explained the whole thing, right from when I’d strolled into Professor Kreeb’s office at four o’clock that afternoon. We described how we’d gone down in the elevator to the wine cellar and stolen the Binoculator, only to throw it into the quicksand as a decoy for the lizards. We described how we’d ridden the mother lizard into Professor Kreeb’s computer control room, and watched the entire room get destroyed. When Peter mentioned that Professor Kreeb had been eaten, nobody could believe it. There were gasps of astonishment all round. ‘You mean she’s really been eaten?’ Zara said, looking at me doubtfully. ‘Or are you having me on?’ ‘When have I ever lied to you, Zara?’ I said. Zara grinned. ‘Never,’ she said. ‘Not once. Except maybe when you said you didn’t have a crush on me.’ ‘So she’s gone,’ Mum said quietly. ‘Gone for good.’ ‘Except for the bits of her that are still being digested,’ Peter said helpfully. ‘Like her skull, and her spine, and her ribcage, and maybe her lower intestines . . .’ 194

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Gradually, one by one, we all turned to face the portrait of Professor Kreeb hanging near the entrance of the hall. That familiar warty face glared down at us once more. We stared at it solemnly, each thinking our own thoughts, paying our respects to the dead. ‘She can’t be dead,’ Zara murmured. ‘She’s famous. She’s got her own TV show.’ ‘Dat’s what she said to the wizard,’ Mackerel Bait said. ‘But da wizard didn’t wisten.’ ‘It’s a shame it had to end this way,’ Mum said. ‘I know she was a crazy, sadistic old witch, but she didn’t deserve to die.’ ‘Gone, but not forgotten,’ Dad said. ‘Her name will live on for a thousand years.’ We heard a thump at the end of the hallway. It came from behind the door at the top of the stairwell. The same door we’d walked through only minutes earlier. We turned and fixed our eyes on the door. We heard another thump, louder than the first, followed by a scratching, scraping noise. The doorhandle slowly dropped down. With a creak the door began to open. ‘No!’ Peter muttered. ‘No, please God, it can’t be! . . .’ A thing staggered into the hallway. It was hardly 195

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human. It was blackened and bruised and tattered, and covered in a thick snotlike coating of slime. It lurched down the hall towards us, wheezing and spluttering, and there, cradled in its arms like an overgrown metallic baby, was the Binoculator, also glistening a foul-smelling green. ‘It’s Professor Kreeb!’ Peter cried. ‘Covered in lizard guts!’ ‘She’s brought back the Binoculator for us,’ Mum said. ‘How kind.’ The thing that was once Professor Kreeb raised a slime-covered hand and staggered another few steps. ‘Toby Judge!’ it moaned. ‘Come here and take your punishment! You’ve been a ver-r-r-y nau-u-ughty boy-y-y-y!’ It stopped only a couple of metres in front of us. It swayed gently back and forth. Its glazed, bloodshot eyes gazed out somewhere beyond us. Perhaps it thought it was still in the stomach of the mother sand lizard. Perhaps it thought it was still down in the computer control room, watching its life’s work being destroyed. Perhaps it thought it was back in the Binoculating room, in the dead of the night, strapping a poor helpless child into a chair. Or perhaps, deep inside its hopelessly demented mind, it was still on the stairwell, all alone in the 196

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dark, climbing those many hundreds of stairs. Its knees buckled. With a groan it sank to the floor. The Binoculator slipped from its grasp, and rolled clunking down the front steps of the Correcta-torium, onto the path. In the distance, beyond the open front gate, we heard the first welcome wail of the sirens.

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17 guess what

By nine o’clock that evening it was all over. The police had arrested Professor Kreeb, rounded up her men, confiscated the Binoculator, and closed down the Correct-a-torium for good. All the parents had been contacted. Some had already arrived and taken their children home. All the rest were on their way. An electrician had restored power to the underground levels. A team of vets had arrived to look after Professor Kreeb’s animals and birds. The mother sand lizard was reunited with her babies. She spent one more week in captivity (suffering, the vet said, from a slight stomach ache) before being shipped back to Niberia, where she and her family were set free. The hydrochlorikeets were released in Far North 198

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Queensland. They were last seen heading off into the rainforest, in search of more Tantalus vines. The sabre-toothed koalas were donated to a petting zoo. A sign outside their cage, in Japanese and English, says ‘Pet At Your Own Risk.’ The Patagonian honey-eaters were flown back to South America, where, I’m sad to say, they are being used by military dictators as instruments of torture. All the other animals found wonderful homes in the world’s best zoos, or were returned to their native countries and released into the wild. As for Peter, he was on the phone to his parents for hours that day. They were so glad he was alive and well, they didn’t care any more if he only got 90 per cent in his tests. They promised never to wake him up at midnight to play the violin, or at four o’clock in the morning to spell words like ‘rheumatoid encephalomyelitis’ while they shone a torch into his eyes. Mackerel Bait’s still got his axe. He’s grown pretty fond of it. He’s even given it a name: Lulu-Belle. His dad has started taking him and Lulu-Belle to woodchopping competitions all around the country. He’s still on medication for Attention Deficit Disorder, but the good news is that he’s stopped using the 199

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living-room couch as a fly-swatter. For now, anyway. As for Zara, she’s still pretty much the same outrageous liar she always was. But she’s started writing short stories, and she puts most of her lies into those. The last story she sent me was about a beautiful mermaid princess named Infinity Starlight Magenta who falls in love with a dogfish named Spot, and leaves behind her parents’ four-hundred-room aquacastle to live in a smelly flea-infested kennel at the bottom of the ocean. It won a prize in Italy, she told me. Her boyfriend Gianfranco was very pleased. The police took Emma’s Binoculator to the dump, and put it through the crushing machine. Emma’s still inventing, but she’s a bit more careful about who she sells things to. She used some of her remote-controlled insects during the Sydney 2000 Olympics, by the way. On a secret mission for the Institute of Sport. One of her hornets stung Ian Thorpe on the bum just before he touched the wall for gold in the men’s 4
100 relay. Another hornet stung Jai Turima just before he leapt into the air for his bronze-medal-winning long jump. The hornets gave Jai and Ian that little extra burst of speed when they needed it, and Emma was proud to be able to do something for her country. 200

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As for all the other kids at the Correct-a-torium, last I heard they were doing fine. In the end, Professor Kreeb did them all a big favour, because once the horrible truth about the Binoculator came out, their parents were delighted to have them home safe and sound. They made a huge fuss of them, and took them places, and made them their favourite dinners, and laughed with them – and guess what? In just a few months, nearly all of their bad behaviour disappeared.

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