Cy had never known his head teacher to lose her composure. Not ever. Even on the day he had seen her separate two dogs fighting in the playground she had managed to look calm, efficient, and in charge. She didn’t now.
Partly it was because her half-moon reading glasses shot right off and landed on the head of one of the infants sitting in the front row. Otherwise, Cy thought, she might have recovered more quickly. But, by the time the small, quaking child had handed them back up to her, Aten had got to the bit about the camels breaking wind. Cy slid down in his seat as the hall erupted in laughter.
Aten looked puzzled. He had been trying to explain how sensible it was not to be at the end of the camel train when this happened. He called it ‘blowing air’ but, as he had also used sound effects, no-one was in any doubt what he meant. It was soon after that, and just when he had got started on how much his uncle had paid for the slaves he had brought from beyond the Red Land, that Miss Fullbright interrupted to thank Aten very firmly, and say, although all of this was absolutely fascinating, they didn’t have an awful lot of time left, and no doubt Mrs Chalmers had some things which she wanted to show Aten right now. She then signalled urgently for Mrs Chalmers to come and take Aten away. Cy could see his teacher’s shoulders shaking as she walked up the aisle. The Head didn’t look too pleased, but everybody else thought it was brilliant.
Later, when Cy got to his classroom after assembly, Mrs Chalmers had already given Aten some books to look at while she did the morning class work. Cy heard her explaining to Aten that it was not the normal British custom to slap a schoolteacher on the back and shout ‘Morning glory!’ at the top of your voice. Especially not the head teacher, and definitely not in morning assembly.
Nevertheless, Cy had to admit that Aten’s story had been extremely interesting. And, as Vicky pointed out, it had livened up a very boring assembly.
However, it had also done exactly what Cy hadn’t wanted to do. Made everyone notice Aten. Instead of keeping Aten quietly in class for a day until he could ask Grampa what to do, Aten was now the centre of attention. It didn’t help that he was also fascinated by his trouser pockets and kept insisting on pulling them to the outside of the legs.
During break-time everyone they met laughed and called out, ‘Morning glory.’ Even the infant kids whispered and pointed.
Unfortunately it also attracted the type of attention that Cy normally went out of his way to avoid. Just as break was finishing they ran into the Mean Machines in the corridor.
‘Well, hello, camel boy,’ Chloe said nastily.
‘Well. Hello. Yourself,’ Aten replied cautiously.
‘Considering all these famous uncles of yours traded in gold, you don’t seem to have very good clothes to wear,’ sneered Eddie. ‘They don’t even fit you properly.’ He pointed to Aten’s wrists sticking out the sleeves of the sweatshirt which Aten was wearing.
‘Lay off,’ said Cy, in what he hoped was a commanding tone of voice.
Eddie turned to Cy with wide eyes. ‘Oh . . . and who’s going to make me?’ he demanded.
‘You lot behaving yourselves?’ Mrs Chalmers had come up behind them on her way from the staff room.
‘We were just talking to Aten, Mrs Chalmers,’ said Chloe quickly.
‘That’s nice,’ said Mrs Chalmers. ‘The Head will be pleased that Aten is being taken good care of.’
‘Oh, we’ll look after him properly.’ Eddie gave his teacher his most innocent smile.
‘And the water buffaloes will dance with the crocodiles in the corn under a harvest moon,’ Aten murmured.
‘Water buffaloes with crocodiles, Aten?’ said Mrs Chalmers as she walked with them back to the classroom. ‘That’s not very likely, is it?’
Aten gave Cy’s teacher a long look. ‘Exactly,’ he said.
‘Ah,’ said Mrs Chalmers thoughtfully, and her eyes followed Eddie and Chloe as they went back to their seats.
At lunch-time Cy led Aten away from the crowded playground. Avoiding the path that led to the river, which was strictly out of bounds, they walked towards the sports fields.
‘After school I’m going to ask Grampa what to do,’ said Cy, sitting down on the grass and opening his lunch-bag.
‘Yes,’ Aten nodded. ‘The very old are very wise.’
Cy thought for a minute. Although Cy knew that Grampa had fought in the last war it had never struck him before about Grampa being old. ‘I’ll ask him if he’ll let you stay with him while I figure out how to get you back into my dream,’ he told Aten.
‘I day-dream a lot,’ said Aten. ‘Malik, the chief scribe shouts at me all the time to pay attention. I find it hard to concentrate when I am being taught.’
‘Me too,’ said Cy. He offered Aten a peanut-butter sandwich.
Aten took it and, peeling back the top slice, he inspected the filling carefully. ‘What is this, exactly?’ he enquired.
‘Peanut butter,’ said Cy. He bit into his own. ‘Go on,’ he urged, ‘you’ll like it.’
‘One is reminded of following the camel caravan,’ said Aten. He nibbled the edge of his bread very delicately.
They were almost at the boundary fence where the playing-fields of the secondary school ran alongside the primary school.
‘Oh, look,’ said Aten. ‘Your sister Lauren, with some of her friends. How pleasant.’
Cy looked to where Aten pointed, ‘“Pleasant” and “Lauren” don’t belong in the same sentence,’ said Cy. He picked up his rucksack and got to his feet. ‘Let’s go. Fast.’
‘Hey, small person,’ called Lauren. ‘Stop right there. I want to talk to you.’
‘No,’ said Cy over his shoulder. ‘I don’t want to talk to you.’
‘You’d better wait,’ his sister yelled louder. ‘There’s rumours going about that Aten broke up your morning assembly.’
‘So what?’
‘They’re also saying that he’s one of Mum’s foreign exchange pupils. Did you tell them that, little brother?’
‘It’s none of your business,’ said Cy.
‘Oh, yes, it is,’ said Lauren. ‘We’ve found out about him, anyway.’
‘Yeah.’ Baz nodded. ‘We know.’
‘Absolutely,’ agreed Cartwheel.
‘What?’ Cy asked nervously. ‘You know what, exactly?’
‘That Mum didn’t recognize him this morning,’ said Lauren. ‘So that means that Aten shouldn’t be here, not officially, anyway. You’ve been telling lies.’ Cy’s heart gave a terrific lurch and he gazed at his sister. ‘You’d better come clean, Cyberman, and tell us. Who is Aten, and where does he come from?’