There were groans of disappointment when Miss Jones told Class 3D that the Upper School would be doing most of the work to find the satellite.
“But we’ve got PE this afternoon,” Harry complained. “Can’t we look for it then?”
“Well, there’s nothing to stop you, although the Chaplain would have to agree.” Miss Jones clapped her hands together. “But first we have double Science. I’d like you to carry on with your projects, please. Alfie—you can help Beth.”
The other children in Class 3D were attaching wires to light bulbs and batteries and buzzers. The lights lit and the buzzers buzzed. But Beth was working on something rather more complicated.
She tipped a mass of wires and cables and circuits and electrical components out of a shoebox and started to plug them all together.
“What are we making?” Alfie asked as he held a wire for her.
“It was going to be a machine to tell you when your toast is done,” Beth said. “When it’s ready, a buzzer sounds and a light comes on. Miss Jones said we had to build something with buzzers and lights.”
“Why not just use a toaster?” Alfie asked. “The toast pops up when it’s done.”
“Because it doesn’t flash and buzz,” Beth pointed out. “Anyway, I’m changing it. It’s not going to be anything to do with toast.”
“Then what is it?” Alfie asked. But when he saw Beth’s wide grin, he guessed: “It’s a satellite detector, isn’t it?”
“Don’t tell Miss Jones,” Beth said quietly. “Or the Chaplain. We’ll test it in PE.”
“Won’t the Chaplain notice?” Alfie asked.
“We’ll have to hide it. Though it will be a bit big. And it will only detect the satellite when it’s very close, so we need to make it portable.”
“Too big and heavy to carry?”
Beth nodded.
Looking at the device that was starting to take shape, Alfie had an idea. “Why don’t we build it into Sam’s wheelchair?”
If the Chaplain noticed that Sam’s wheelchair now had various wires and attachments added, along with a tall radio aerial, he didn’t mention it. He was probably too busy talking about how children today had it easy and it was never like this in Bomber Command.
“I thought you were a fighter pilot not a bomber, sir?” Harry said.
“That too,” the Chaplain barked. “Intrepid pilot. Went on a hundred and three sorties in one month alone. Survived 97 of them. Jerry never knew what was going to happen to him next, I can tell you.”
“Jerry?” Alfie said.
“My co-pilot, Jerry Atkins,” the Chaplain explained. “Right then, today I’ve arranged a short assault course for you.”
Several people groaned.
“It won’t be difficult,” the Chaplain went on. “Just twice round the field, then climb over those bales of hay over there. It’ll make men of you.”
“I don’t want to be a man,” Alice said.
The Chaplain peered at her. “Ah, yes. People then. Oh,” he remembered, “and you’ll have to crawl under that wire mesh over there.”
“Doesn’t sound too bad,” Alfie whispered to Jack.
“Avoiding the machine gun fire,” the Chaplain continued. “Then it’s a quick swing over the pond on the rope I’ve attached to that overhanging branch.”
“Well, at least that should be all right,” Jack said.
“Being careful not to fall in and get eaten by the hundred or so piranha fish I’ve put in the pond.”
As Alfie and the others watched, a duck flew down towards the pond. It hovered just above the water before landing, and gave out a contented quack. Then a blue lightning bolt of electricity zapped up and hit the duck, which fell lifeless into the water.
“And the electric eel,” the Chaplain went on. He hesitated as he saw Class 3D was looking past him, their mouths open. “Problem?”
The skeleton of a dead duck was tossed out of the pond and landed on the grass nearby.
“Good,” said the Chaplain. “Right—off you go then.”
Sam was allowed to whiz round the course in his wheelchair, since he couldn’t crawl under the mesh or swing on the rope.
Beth’s satellite detector bleeped and booped as he moved.
Alfie and Beth kept close to Sam. “Any sign of it yet?” asked Alfie.
“Nothing so far.” Sam waited while Beth and Alfie ducked under the mesh and crawled quickly through. The ground exploded round them.
“See if you can move out a bit,” Alfie suggested. “Cover a bigger area.”
After they’d swung successfully over the pond, Alfie turned to Beth. “How close does the detector need to be to find the satellite?”
Beth sighed. “It’s not easy to get long range with a portable, battery-powered detector you know.”
“How close?”
Alfie frowned. “But that means Sam will have to run over it.”
“Maybe.” Beth looked a bit embarrassed.
“Wouldn’t he see it first?”
“Maybe,” she said again.
As he watched Sam whizzing back and forth across the playground at twenty miles an hour, Alfie wasn’t sure that Beth’s detector was going to be the best way to find the satellite after all.