A Royal Mess (40 page)

‘Calypso?’ Indie asked.

Portia nudged me from my musings and I realised a speech was required, so I blurted, ‘I want to see Freds grovel.’

The girls started clapping and banging their legs on whatever they could. Spurred by this show of
belle esprit
, I continued, ‘I want to rinse him good and proper. Horrible boy, hiding his nasty cruel streak under such lovely sticky-outy hair and kissable lips.’

More cheers went up and my emotions were swept along with the fervour of the crowd. Maybe Freds
should
feel like a pig’s dinner, at least for a bit. I certainly hoped he’d never pull again. That would teach him.

‘Speech! Speech!’ everyone cried.

Feeling rather like Cicero on a good day, I began, ‘Boys and their enormous egos. Who does he think he is? Apart from the prince of the United Bollocky Pollicky Kingdom, I mean. If we let him get away with dumping me, well, it will be open season on all of us!’

The roar of the crowd rivalled any Roman mob. It was a wonder we weren’t being plagued by house spinsters left, right and centre.

Star clapped her hands flamenco-style to call the meeting to order. ‘Right, so basically the honour not just of Calypso, but of the entire school is at stake! Agreed?

There was more banging of feet on the floor, the sides of wardrobes, cupboards, walls or baths as everyone showed their support. Then Star said, ‘Indie has suggested that Calypso bring Freds to his knees by performing The Counter Dump, a manoeuvre guaranteed to knock the stuffing out of the most egotistical of boys.’

Georgina covered poor Tobias’s ears – as a soft toy, he doesn’t like talk about knocking the stuffing out of things.

‘How dare he dump me by txt,’ I said – for like the thousandth millionth time since receiving his horrible txt.

‘At least now you can see him for the enormous idiot he is,’ Star pointed out. ‘I told you that you should dump him after that fiasco with the fake cold in Scotland,’ Star told me.

‘And I told you that I hate being told “I told you so,”’ I replied.

Star blushed. ‘Sorry, darling. Think of it as fodder for your lyrics,’ she advised more gently, chucking me her lip-gloss. ‘We’ll all help you avenge your honour.’

‘Don’t be so culturally insensitive,’ Honey argued hotly. ‘Think of Calypso, poor love; she’s American, and everyone knows they don’t know what honour is.’

Star took off her shoe and threw it at Honey. But our
bete noire
caught it adroitly, looked at the label, screwed up her nose job and chucked it right back.

I know I should have felt insulted by what Honey said, but the horror of it all was, I was worried she might be right! I really wasn’t in the least bit worried about my
bloody honour, or the school’s honour for that matter. I wanted to sob uncontrollably into my pillow and then pretend it was Freds and thump it.

‘Indie’s right, though. The only thing to do is seduce him all over again, and then when he’s down on his knees with love for you, txt him a dump message,’ Fenella said, without looking up from the copy of
Horse and Hound
she was flicking through.

‘I didn’t seduce him in the first place, though – I trounced him at sabre,’ I explained.

‘What’s sabre?’ Perdita asked.

‘It’s like something you do with swords, only not on horseback, darling,’ Georgina explained.

‘Huh,’ Perdita nodded. ‘Like water polo, you mean?’

‘Exactly,’ Star agreed, rolling her eyes at me.

‘So this seduction business, how do we go about it, precisely?’ Portia asked. ‘No offence, but Calypso is no Mata Hari.’

‘I think we’ll need a decoy,’ Honey suggested. ‘Perhaps I could pull Freds to distract him and …’

‘He said he’d call,’ Portia reminded her calmly with the sort of poise only a girl who can trace her title back generations can possess. Like Star, most of the rest of the world just wants to throw shoes at Honey. ‘Let’s presume he’ll be true to his word and call Calypso.’

I grabbed my mobile and checked it was on. ‘But what should I say when he does call?’ I asked. ‘If he actually does call, I mean,’ I added, as doubts engulfed me.

‘Whatever you do, you must not answer it,’ Indie advised sternly.

‘I can’t do that,’ I told her. It was true, I’m not one of those people that can call-screen. I go doo-lally with curiosity.

Star took the phone from me and started pressing buttons. ‘I’ve put it on mute and on mute it will stay,’ she told me firmly, tossing it back to me.

‘Do you think he will leave a message, though?’ I asked.

‘No,’ Perdita said knowledgably. ‘Boys don’t ever leave unpleasant messages. He might just say he’ll call back, or see you at the next polo match or ask you to call him.’

‘On Saturday,’ said Star. ‘When Calypso and posse head into Windsor, we should arrange to meet Malcolm and get him to bring his entourage. That way, when Freds sees you, you’ll be surrounded by friends and fit boys.’

It did sound like a cool plan, but was Malcolm the ideal decoy? ‘What if he doesn’t care that I’m with Malcolm’s entourage and a posse of girls?’ I asked, because really, and I know this is sinfully self-centred, I wanted him to care so much that he’d sob at the sight of me and beg me to take him back. Of course I would spurn him, but still I wanted to know he cared first.

Star chortled, ‘Oh darling, I do love you for being so naive when it comes to boys. Freds may not be deep, but his ego is enormous. He’ll notice you with Malcolm. Remember how jealous he was when you accidentally
climbed into Malcolm’s room at Eades that night in the rain?’

‘But he knows Malcolm and Indie are practically an item. He’ll just presume I’m a cling-on.’

Indie looked shocked. ‘Since when have Malcolm and moi been an item?’

I blinked so hard with confusion I began to get a migraine. ‘Erm, forever?’

‘Are you mad?’ she replied – though clearly the question was meant to be rhetorical. ‘Malcolm’s cool but …’ She shook her braids and said, ‘Portia, you explain.’

EIGHTEEN
It Was All Très, Très, Très Befuddling

All forty-two girls were silent as Portia rolled her eyes and said, ‘Indie’s pulled Tarquin.’

Georgina threw Tobias at her. ‘Tobias can’t bear secrets. Why didn’t you tell us?’ she asked furiously.

The rest of the room muttered their displeasure. Indie kissed Tobias on the nose and threw him back to Georgina. ‘Because you and Star were banging on about how we should stop being so boy-obsessed.’

‘Has no one in this school heard of the word
proportion?’
Star groaned.

‘I thought you and Malcolm were an item, too,’ Perdita added.

‘Buggery slops,’ Star cursed. ‘Anyway, everyone, let’s stay on message.
When
Freds approaches you, seething with jealousy, you have to be really carefree and breezy. Charming but distant, you know, sort of look at him and smile as if you can’t quite remember who he is.’

‘Don’t be
too
obvious, though,’ Georgina warned as she brushed Tobias’s fur. ‘I mean, boys aren’t that clever, but they usually know when they are being played.’

‘That’s true. Be a bit flirty without actually flirting, if you know what I mean,’ Arabella suggested. ‘You know, twirl your hair, pout your lips and titter gaily.’

‘What? Freds will think I’m mad if I start tittering gaily, or tittering in any way for that matter. And as for pouting and twirling my hair, well … he’ll think my madness is out of hand and call for the asylum lorry to take me to an island of loons.’

‘She’s right,’ agreed Honey. Then she looked at me with big blue sad-eyed pity. ‘Poor, poor tragically butch Calypso. I’ll help you learn the art of seduction, darling,’ she advised in a mildly threatening sort of way. ‘Seduction is my middle name.’

The awful thing was, Seduction probably
was
Honey’s middle name. After all, her sister Poppy’s middle name was Minxy-Darling. I swear, Minxy-Darling. No wonder they’re the twisted sisters.

‘The thing is,’ advised Indie seriously, ‘is that you have to get him to want you back really, really badly.’

‘Desperately badly,’ Bells added.

‘And then when he thinks he’s won you back, you have to dump him from a great height,’ Indie explained.

‘And destroy his hopes and dreams of ever being loved again,’ Honey concluded as she admired her reflection in her Chanel compact.

‘Can any of the rest of us pull him, I mean once The Counter Dump is over?’ Clems piped up.

We were all laughing loudly when Miss Bibsmore entered, her dressing gown billowing. She was in a furious mood. ‘I’ve been listening to yous girls from behind the door an’ all. No one’s pulling that little sod again, do you hear?’ she railed, waving her stick around the room, almost knocking girls’ heads off. ‘Treating a lovely girl like Miss Kelly worse than you’d treat a mongrel dog. All the teachers and nuns are behind you on this an’ all. You mark my words. You girls have got to teach this cheeky pup that a Saint Augustine’s girl ‘as pride innit. Boys like His Nibs aren’t for the likes of ladies like yourselves. He’ll be blacklisted by this school and no bones about it neither. I’ve got a good mind to recommend to Sister that we start a hate club like what we did for … well, never you mind about that.’

‘A hate club.’ Honey said the words like they were a dream come true. ‘That would be soooo cool. We could have badges and a Web site and plan attacks.’

‘Yes, well, that sort of thing,’ Miss Bibsmore conceded, clearly perturbed to be on the same team as Honey.

The bearded Miss Cribbe, our house spinster from last year, poked her head around the door. “Ello, dearies, now don’t be a stranger where I is concerned neither. If there’s anything I can do to put His Nibs in his place, you just let me know.’

All the girls cheered and then the nuns appeared.

‘And don’t forget us old things up at the convent,’ piped up little Sister Regina, her face crinkled with years of prayer and concern. ‘We may not have had a great deal of experience
with boys, but we’re all behind you on this. Sister Constance has told us to lend you every support. Though I must say, Freddie seemed like such a lovely young man when we met him at the Nationals. A real gentleman he was.’

I was quite moved. It was all very touching if a little daunting, the realisation that everyone was being so supportive. I know I felt enraged with Freds, but was I really up to performing The Counter Dump?

‘I blame the parents, I do,’ Miss Bibsmore told Sister stoutly. ‘Spoilt and pampered he is, like a prize bull.’

That set all of us off on a chortle jag again, which sent girls tumbling off wardrobes and chests of drawers.

Miss Bibsmore waved her stick at us. ‘Now there’s nothing to giggle at here, girls. The school’s honour is at stake.’

Laughter aside, the bitter sadness of my situation came home after everyone had gone back to their own rooms. I finally found the bottle to answer Sarah and Bob’s txt from yesterday asking about me, my school work and that cur of curs, Freddie.

School is totally pants but I’m bearing up. xxx C. PS: Fred’s fab and sends love.

I mean, I couldn’t exactly tell them that Freds had dumped me by txt, could I? Knowing Sarah and Bob, I bet they would have set off in the car of shame, dragged him from the comfort of his bed at Eades and given him one of their really, really long lectures.

Just the same, writing that lie of lies about Freds sending love made me cry myself to sleep.

NINETEEN
Snoozely Woozely Does It