Chapter 20

Proof

‘If you’ve got proof that Wainscott cheated, then spit it out,’ said Mr  Maclean. ‘Otherwise, I’m giving you both a C for unsportsmanlike behaviour.’

‘Just look at him,’ said Friday. ‘The course is eight kilometres over difficult terrain. He isn’t puffed or sweaty. Even with moderate exercise, the human body will start to sweat after just ten minutes.’

‘What can I say,’ smirked Ian. ‘I’m in superb physical condition.’

‘He doesn’t have scratch marks on his legs or insect bites,’ continued Friday. ‘But he does have dirt, leaves and dried grass on his back. In fact, so does Melanie.’

‘I do?’ said Melanie.

‘Neither of you look like you’ve been running through the bush for the last hour,’ said Friday. ‘Instead, you both look like you’ve been lying on your back amongst leaf litter and dirt.’

‘I have,’ agreed Melanie. ‘Friday is very clever with her deductions, isn’t she?’

‘Yes, she is,’ said Christopher.

‘That’s ridiculous tosh,’ said Mr Maclean. ‘Wainscott has every square punched on his card, using the different unique control punches.’

‘May I see his card?’ said Friday.

Ian smirked. ‘Be my guest.’

Friday studied it intently. His card certainly did have all five squares punched.

‘I think you’ll find everything in order,’ said Ian.

‘Chris,’ said Friday, ‘let me see our card.’

‘Oh, it’s “Chris” now, is it?’ said Ian, raising his eyebrows. ‘I saw you two holding hands as you burst out of the bushes. Perhaps we should be asking what you two were doing in the bush for over an hour.’

Friday ignored Ian and looked at his card. ‘I suspected as much,’ she said. ‘Mr Maclean, did you organise the same end of term assignment for your class last year?’

‘Yes, of course,’ said Mr Maclean. ‘I always send my class out orienteering in the autumn term.’

‘So Ian knew that this test was coming up,’ said Friday. ‘He’s had plenty of time to contact an orienteering organisation and order his own set of control punches, then hide them in the bushes so that he could leave Melanie, make a show of arriving at the first marker then sneak back to his hiding spot, punching the other four holes, before going back to Melanie and finishing the challenge.’

‘That’s very farfetched,’ said Mr Maclean.

‘And entirely unprovable,’ said Ian.

‘Look at his card,’ said Friday. ‘Every single punch mark is cleanly cut.’

‘Proving I went to every marker,’ said Ian.

‘No,’ said Friday. ‘Proving that you didn’t. Because the punch on the fifth marker was blunt, it chewed the card. We had to punch it several times to get the chad out. You did not punch this hole with the same punch we did.’

‘I can’t be punished because I was able to make a tricky punch work better than you did,’ said Ian.

‘No, perhaps not,’ said Friday. ‘Because Mr  Maclean is a lazy man who would prefer not to take this further.’

‘Excuse me?’ said Mr Maclean.

‘I don’t mean it as an insult, sir,’ placated Friday. ‘Just an observation of fact. But definitive proof would be if I found where you hid your box of control punches.’

Ian just laughed.

‘It would be like trying to find a needle in a haystack,’ said Chris.

‘Harder,’ said Ian. ‘Because in this case, the needle is not there.’

‘Perhaps,’ said Friday. ‘But it must be hidden somewhere fairly obvious. Near a landmark that is easily identifiable from a distance, or any angle.’ She scanned the treetops. One tree stood higher than the others. It was the Great Oak. The first tree planted by Sebastian Dowell when he founded the school.

‘There,’ said Friday. ‘The Great Oak.’

‘You mean, we’ve got to go bushwalking again?’ asked Melanie.

‘You didn’t do it the first time,’ said Friday.

‘No, but if I had,’ said Melanie, ‘I’d be most put out.’

‘I am not going traipsing through the forest, looking for hypothetical false punches,’ said Mr Maclean.

‘Why not?’ asked Friday. ‘It would be good exercise for you.’

‘I have to wait here for all the other students to return,’ said Mr Maclean.

Just then Peregrine and Mirabella burst out through the bushes. They were both bedraggled. They looked like they’d spent a month living rough, not an hour going for a walk.

‘The others aren’t coming back,’ announced Mirabella.

‘What?’ asked Mr Maclean.

‘They’ve all given up,’ said Peregrine. ‘They’re refusing to move until you send in a helicopter.’

‘There you go,’ said Friday. ‘The best use of your time now would be to call the emergency services on your mobile. Get them to send a helicopter to start looking for the missing students. While we’re waiting, we can nip over to the Great Oak and look for the punches.’

Even with the apathy of Mr Maclean and Melanie to contend with, it only took the group five minutes to hike over to the Great Oak.

‘This is quite the goose chase, Barnes,’ said Ian. ‘I’m thinking of lodging an official complaint for harassment.’

‘You set me up on terrorism charges,’ said Friday. ‘You can hardly get on your high horse when I simply call you out for cheating. Which I know you did, by the way. That’s the difference. You’ve been naughty, I haven’t.’

‘Just because you don’t actually make ricin in your dorm room doesn’t mean you aren’t extremely irritating in many other ways,’ said Ian.

‘I don’t know how you have the breath to bicker,’ said Melanie. ‘All this walking is exhausting.’

‘So where are these punches then?’ asked Mr Maclean.

Friday scanned the clearing around the Great Oak. ‘We have to think like Ian,’ she said.

‘I doubt you have the imagination to conceive what goes on in my brain,’ said Ian.

‘I don’t need to know all the goings-on,’ said Friday. ‘Just the bits about where you would hide a set of punches.’

‘In the ground,’ suggested Chris.

‘No,’ said Friday. ‘Digging would be too much like hard work.’

‘Under a bush,’ suggested Melanie.

‘No,’ said Friday. ‘Too easy to stumble across. The best hiding spot would be somewhere only Ian could find it. And what unique skill does Ian have?’

‘Handsomeness,’ suggested Melanie.

‘In addition to handsomeness,’ said Friday. ‘He is a superb acrobat.’

‘Really?’ asked Chris.

‘Oh yes,’ said Melanie. ‘His father was a graduate of the Barnum and Bailey Circus Skills University. That was a key fact Friday used to prove he committed a bank robbery and have him thrown in jail for seven years.’

‘Your dad is in jail,’ said Chris. ‘Which jail?’

‘I’d prefer not to discuss my personal issues with anyone at any time,’ said Ian. ‘But particularly not with you now.’

‘He thinks of such clever, rude things to say,’ said Melanie. ‘Friday, you’re so lucky to have found him.’

‘Given his acrobatic skills,’ continued Friday, ‘the best place for Ian to hide the punches would be somewhere high up in the tree.’

‘And how are you going to prove that?’ asked Ian. ‘We all know you’re barely capable of jogging, so you aren’t going to be able to climb the tree yourself. You can’t cut down the tree either, because it’s heritage-listed. So what does that leave? You’ll have to train a squirrel to search for you.’

‘I’ll be your squirrel,’ volunteered Chris.

‘This is getting better than a Mills and Boon plot,’ said Melanie.

Ian made a scoffing noise.

‘Are you sure?’ asked Friday. ‘The lowest branch is eight feet off the ground. And you are pretty …’

‘Short,’ Ian finished off her sentence.

‘I may not be an acrobat, but I do know a thing or two about climbing,’ said Chris. He walked over to the trunk and stared at the bark for a few moments.

‘Are you trying to out-think the tree?’ Ian asked.

Chris ignored him. He kicked off his shoes, reached up and wedged his fingertips into the small gaps in the bark, then pulled his feet up off the ground and tucked his toes into the bark. After a few swift decisive movements, he had pulled himself up to the lowest branch.

‘Wow!’ said Melanie. ‘He must have really strong fingertips.’

‘And toe tips,’ agreed Friday.

‘Climbing is a hobby of mine,’ called Chris. ‘It’s all just a matter of working within the laws of physics.’

‘I think he’s using science talk to flirt with you,’ said Melanie.

Once Chris was in the branches, climbing became much easier and he soon disappeared from sight.

Friday glanced across at Ian. He was starting to look sullen.

‘I’ve found a bag,’ called out Chris. ‘It’s tied to a branch.’

‘What’s inside?’ asked Friday.

‘A box,’ called Chris.

‘And what’s in the box?’ asked Friday.

There was a rustle of leaves and suddenly Chris dropped to the ground, landing with the agility of a cat, right in front of them.

‘See for yourself,’ he said, handing Friday the box.

She opened it. Inside was a brand new shiny set of orienteering punches.

‘You can’t prove they’re mine,’ said Ian. ‘I was framed. She planted them up there.’

‘What I don’t understand,’ said Friday, ‘is why on earth you would want to cheat. If you’d just done the  orienteering properly, you probably would still have won.’

‘Most people at this school don’t care about grades,’ added Melanie.

‘I have to,’ said Ian.

‘What does that mean?’ asked Friday.

‘I need all the As I can get,’ said Ian. ‘I have to maintain my grade-point average or I lose my scholarship.’

‘But you’re the second smartest student in the year, after Friday,’ said Melanie. ‘Surely your grade-point average is fine.’

‘Second smartest isn’t good enough, is it?’ said Ian. ‘When there’s only one scholarship.’

‘I don’t need the scholarship,’ said Friday. ‘I’ve already got $10,000 towards next term’s fees.’

‘Oh, and you think you’ll keep stumbling across crimes to solve and be rewarded for, do you?’ asked Ian. ‘One per semester for the next five-and-a-half years?’

‘I don’t see why not,’ said Friday. ‘It’s worked this far.’

Mr  Maclean sighed and rubbed his eyes while he tried to figure out what to do. ‘Barnes, you and Gianos will get the A++ for finishing first,’ he finally said.

‘Yes!’ exclaimed Chris.

‘Wainscott and Pelly,’ said Mr Maclean, turning to Ian and Melanie, ‘I’m giving you a B+.’

‘What?!’ exclaimed Chris. ‘Aren’t you going to send Ian to the Headmaster? He cheated!’

‘He did have sufficient geographic knowledge and initiative to seek and purchase a set of orienteering punches. Most students wouldn’t even be aware that such a thing existed,’ said Mr Maclean. ‘And he managed to go into the forest, find the oak tree and his way back without getting lost, which may very well turn out to be the second best result in the class. And I can’t give everyone Fs.’

‘That’s ridiculous,’ protested Chris.

‘Actually, I think it shows remarkable good sense,’ said Friday. ‘Very uncharacteristic for Mr  Maclean. Well done, sir.’

‘I’d say thank you, Barnes,’ said Mr  Maclean, ‘but I don’t think that was really a compliment.’