‘I hate school dinners,’ said Thomas, chewing his way through a piece of sausage. All around him, Class Three were gloomily sticking their knives and forks into platefuls of sausage, mashed potatoes and peas.
‘We all hate school dinners,’ said his twin brother, Peter, who was trying to
wash down his own tough leathery sausage with a glass of water.
‘That’s right,’ said their friend, Jody. ‘There’s nothing special about you hating them, Thomas.’
‘But I hate them more than anyone else does,’ said Thomas, speaking with his mouth full, because his own bit of sausage refused to go down even though he had been chewing it for about ten minutes. ‘I hate them so much I wake up in the night screaming about them.’
‘He doesn’t,’ said Peter, ‘He sleeps like a log.’
‘Ah, but I have nightmares about them,’ said Thomas. ‘I had a nightmare the other night that I was in the factory where school dinners were being made. It was full of the slimy insides of monsters, mixed up with huge barrels of green sludge marked Poison.’
‘That’s right,’ said Pete. ‘That’s what it must be like in the place where they cook them. Ugh, this sausage has got bones in it.’
‘You’re both being a bit silly,’ said Jody. ‘I know the food is awful, but it isn’t that bad. And anyway, it’s made here in the school kitchen by Cook. If you don’t like it, why not complain to her?’
‘Complain to Cook?’ said Thomas, laughing scornfully. ‘We’d never get a chance. You know who’d stop us, don’t you?’
’Be quiet, you three,’ snapped a voice, ’or I’ll send you outside.’ It was Mrs Chipchase, the dinner lady who, as usual, was very red in the face.
Mrs Chipchase had been in charge of dinners at St Barty’s School for as long as anyone could remember –
since before Mr Potter became head teacher, and long before Mr Majeika had arrived to teach Class Three. Mr Majeika was a wizard, though nobody outside Class Three knew this, and since he had arrived all sorts of exciting things had happened.
Thomas, Jody and Pete thought Mr Majeika was wonderful. In fact, all Class Three liked Mr Majeika – all except Hamish Bigmore, the class nuisance. When Mr Majeika first arrived Hamish Bigmore had refused to do what he was told, so Mr Majeika had turned him into a frog, and since then Hamish had never forgiven him. He’d tried to make life difficult for Mr Majeika at every opportunity, and there had been all sorts of strange magical occurrences as a result of Hamish’s trouble-making. Mr Majeika wasn’t supposed to do magic now that he had become a teacher, but sometimes he forgot this and the most peculiar things happened.
In fact, life had been really very pleasant for Class Three – except that Mrs Chipchase was their dinner lady.
She was always very bad-tempered, and she kept on sending people out for talking or for being cheeky to her, and she made them report to Mr Potter who was supposed to punish them. Mr Potter usually didn’t punish them, because he could see that Mrs Chipchase was horrid to the children. But as she had been at St Barty’s much longer than anyone else, he didn’t like to argue with her.
‘Sometimes,’ whispered Jody, ‘I think school dinners would be all right if it wasn’t for her.’
‘Yes,’ answered Pete. ‘The food isn’t that revolting – it’s having to watch her march up and down, ranting and raving, which makes it so awful.’
‘Right, you lot!’ snapped Mrs Chipchase. ‘I heard that. It’s off to Mr Potter with the three of you.’ And she marched them out of the room still shouting at them, like a dog barking at sheep.
‘Bye, bye,’ said a voice from the corner. ‘Don’t you wish you had a nice yummy lunch like me?’ It was Hamish Bigmore, and as usual he was
eating a large bar of chocolate.
‘That’s what makes it even worse,’ Jody said to Mr Majeika after lessons that afternoon. ‘We have to eat that awful food and be shouted at by Mrs Chipchase for talking, and all the time Hamish is sitting in the corner stuffing chocolate in his mouth.’
‘Chocolate?’ said Mr Majeika. ‘But you’re not allowed to bring chocolate or sweets to school. Surely Mrs Chipchase should report Hamish Bigmore to Mr Potter for that?’
‘Ah,’ said Pete, ‘but you see, Hamish Bigmore doesn’t bring the chocolate to school.’
‘What do you mean?’ asked Mr Majeika.
Thomas, Jody and Pete looked at each other. ‘We don’t like telling tales,’ said Thomas. ‘But you could come and see for yourself, couldn’t you, Mr Majeika? Why not come and
eat school dinner with us tomorrow?’
Mr Majeika sighed. ‘I do enjoy my sandwiches in the staff room,’ he said sadly. ‘I have a very peaceful half-hour in there. Still, if something peculiar is going on…’
‘What d’you mean, there aren’t enough knives and forks?’ Mrs Chipchase snapped at Jody. ‘Trying to teach me my job, are you, after I’ve been at St Barty’s for thirty-five years? D’you want me to send you to Mr Potter?’
‘No, no, Mrs Chipchase,’ said Jody hastily. ‘I didn’t mean to upset you. But Mr Majeika, our class teacher, is coming in to have lunch with us today.’
‘Your teacher, coming to have school dinner?’ Mrs Chipchase said, breathing heavily and looking more red in the face than ever. ‘What’s a teacher doing having school dinner? Teachers don’t have school dinners. They eat their sandwiches in the staff room. I’ll have a word with Mr Potter about this. Teacher, indeed!’
‘Oh, please, Mrs Chipchase,’ said Jody, ‘he’s only coming in here for the one day. And it’s because he’s heard how nice the food is.’
‘Oh?’ said Mrs Chipchase, stopping in her tracks.
‘Yes,’ said Thomas, ‘and we’ve told him how clever you are at keeping order – you know, at telling everyone to be quiet and all that.’
‘Oh?’ said Mrs Chipchase suspiciously. ‘Have you just?’
‘That’s right,’ said Pete. ‘And he says he’s very interested in watching you do it, because teachers often find it very difficult to keep order, and he says he thinks he could learn a lot from you.’
‘Oh?’ said Mrs Chipchase. ‘Does he just? Well, he’d better watch his step and behave himself, teacher or no teacher!’
Ten minutes later Mr Majeika was sitting next to Thomas, Jody and Pete, trying to struggle through the meal.
‘This is awful!’ he whispered. ‘My fellow wizards and witches used to eat plates of juicy wriggling worms in bogweed sauce and it was quite delicious, but this – this looks like worms all right, but they’re dead! We always ate ours alive.’
Pete burst out laughing. ‘It’s spaghetti in tomato sauce!’
‘Be quiet over there!’ snapped a voice. ‘There’s some people in this school as call themselves teachers, when to my mind they’re just trouble-makers. Don’t forget, anyone who makes a noise will be sent to Mr Potter – and I mean anyone.’ Mrs Chipchase looked pointedly at Mr Majeika.
‘You’d better watch out,’ giggled Thomas. ‘You don’t want to be sent to Mr Potter, do you, Mr Majeika?’
Mr Majeika toyed mournfully with his spaghetti. ‘But what about Hamish Bigmore?’ he whispered.
‘Can’t you see?’ answered Jody. ‘He’s not having to eat school dinner, is he?’
Hamish Bigmore certainly wasn’t having to eat school dinner. He was sitting at a separate table all by himself, and in front of him was spread a most delicious packed lunch.
‘He’s brought his own food,’ Thomas explained.
‘But why don’t you all do that?’ whispered Mr Majeika. ‘Then you wouldn’t have to eat these dead worms and all the other awful things.’
‘We’re not allowed to,’ said Pete. ‘The school rule is no packed lunches. It’s a rule that was made before Mr Potter’s time, and I can guess who made it.’
‘Mrs Chipchase?’ whispered Mr Majeika.
Thomas nodded. ‘She and Cook. I bet they made that rule, so that everyone would have to eat Cook’s dreadful food.’
‘So why,’ asked Mr Majeika, ‘is Hamish allowed to bring a packed lunch?’
‘Because he’s Mrs Chipchase’s favourite friend,’ answered Jody. ‘That’s what she always calls him, “My favourite friend.” ’
‘Why on earth?’ asked Mr Majeika, shuddering.
‘Well,’ whispered Jody, ‘it started like this. Hamish’s mum and dad are always fussing over him, and trying to make sure he doesn’t catch a cold and all that sort of thing. They decided that school lunch wasn’t good for him so they insisted that he bring a packed lunch. At first Mrs Chipchase was furious and tried to stop him eating it. But then –’
‘Quiet over there!’ snapped Mrs Chipchase. ‘This is your last warning. Teachers, indeed,’ she muttered to herself. Then she turned to Hamish Bigmore, and a sickly smile crossed her face. ‘And how’s my favourite friend today, eh?’
‘Very well, thank you, Mrs Chipchase,’ cooed Hamish. ‘And look what mummy has given me today, Mrs Chipchase.’ Hamish pointed to the packed lunch he had spread out on the table in front of him.
‘Yum, yum,’ said Mrs Chipchase, licking her lips. ‘What do I see there?’
‘Sandwiches of home-cured ham,’ said Hamish Bigmore, ‘with your favourite tomato and gherkin relish.’
‘Yum, yum,’ said Mrs Chipchase. ‘And what else has my favourite friend brought with him?’
‘A salad of wild mushrooms, garden lettuce and grated carrot, and
a large pot of mummy’s home-made yoghurt flavoured with the very best honey.’
‘Yum, yum, yum,’ said Mrs Chipchase. ‘Well, my favourite friend, you won’t be wanting all of that, will you?’
‘No, Mrs Chipchase,’ answered Hamish Bigmore. ‘In fact, I won’t be wanting any of it. I don’t feel very well. Do take it away.’
‘Oh, may I?’ said Mrs Chipchase, who was almost dribbling at the mouth. ‘Oh, aren’t you just my favourite friend?’ And she scooped up Hamish’s packed lunch, every bit of it, and made for the kitchen door. ‘I’ll be back in a minute, my favourite friend!’
‘The same thing happens every day,’ Jody explained to Mr Majeika. ‘Every day he brings a delicious packed lunch, and every day he pretends he’s ill and gives it all to Mrs Chipchase.’
‘But why?’ asked Mr Majeika. ‘Doesn’t he want to eat it?’
Thomas shook his head. ‘Hamish Bigmore wouldn’t want to eat nice food like that. There’s only one thing that Hamish likes. Ssh! Here she comes again.’
Mrs Chipchase was coming out of the kitchen. ‘I’m so sorry my favourite friend is feeling poorly,’ she cooed. ‘I’ve brought him a little something from Cook and me to make him feel better. Only he mustn’t go giving any of it to the other children, because he knows they aren’t allowed to have any. There you are, my favourite friend.’ And she handed Hamish Bigmore a huge bar of chocolate.
‘Every day?’ asked Mr Majeika, when school dinner was over and they were out in the playground.
‘Every day,’ sighed Jody. ‘Every day he brings a yummy packed lunch, and every day Mrs Chipchase carts it off to the kitchen, and she and Cook eat every scrap of it themselves. And every day, as a reward, she gives Hamish an enormous bar of chocolate.’
‘Dear, dear,’ said Mr Majeika. ‘This can’t go on.’
‘That’s what we’ve been saying for ages,’ said Thomas. ‘But we don’t know how to stop it.’
‘We don’t want to talk to Mr Potter about it,’ explained Jody, ‘because that would be telling tales, and anyway, Mr Potter is just as frightened of Mrs Chipchase as we are.’
‘There just doesn’t seem to be anything we can do about it,’ sighed Pete.
Mr Majeika thought for a moment.
‘Oh, yes, there is,’ he said.
At dinner time the next day, Hamish Bigmore spread his packed lunch on the table as usual.
‘And what has my favourite friend got for me today?’ cooed Mrs Chipchase.
‘Italian salami on rye bread,’ said Hamish Bigmore. ‘A seafood cocktail dressed with pink mayonnaise, and home-baked sesame seed rolls.’
‘Yum, yum, yum,’ said Mrs Chipchase. ‘All my favourites.’
‘Then there’s chocolate dessert made with fresh cream, and a French goat’s milk cheese that mum and dad brought back from a weekend in Paris,.’
Mrs Chipchase rolled her eyes. ‘Cook and I are just going to love that,’ she said. ‘I mean – is there anything you won’t be wanting, my favourite friend?’
‘Just take the lot, Mrs Chipchase,’ said Hamish impatiently, ‘and bring me my chocolate.’
Her eyes popping with greed, Mrs Chipchase stuffed all Hamish’s food back into the bag in which Hamish had brought it, and headed for the kitchen door.
Suddenly she crashed right into Mr Majeika, who was coming out of the kitchen. The packed lunch went flying.
‘Oh I am so sorry,’ said Mr Majeika.
‘I was just saying how do you do to Cook, as we’d never met before. Here, let me pick everything up for you.’ He put the packed lunch together again, waving his hands over it in rather a peculiar fashion.
‘Teachers!’ snorted Mrs Chipchase, when Mr Majeika handed the packed lunch back to her. ‘Teachers!’ she snorted again, and banged the kitchen door behind her.
Hamish Bigmore sat waiting for his chocolate. ‘What are you doing here?’ he said suspiciously to Mr Majeika.
‘Oh, I’ve just come to watch everyone eat their lunch,’ said Mr Majeika cheerfully. ‘All their different kinds of lunch.’
At that moment there was a loud scream from the kitchen. Two screams, in fact: Cook and Mrs Chipchase.
‘Dear me,’ said Mr Majeika. ‘Something seems to be a little wrong. Shall we go and see?’
In the kitchen Cook and Mrs Chipchase were dancing about on top of the table, as if something was trying to eat them.
‘Help!’ they were screaming. ‘Help! Take them away!’
The floor was covered with wriggling creatures. There were worms, snails, slugs, cockroaches, enormous spiders and some very peculiar-looking creepy-crawlies.
‘Help! Help!’ screamed Cook and Mrs Chipchase.
‘What are they?’ Jody asked Mr Majeika. ‘Where did they all come from?’
‘Those,’ said Mr Majeika, pointing at the creepy-crawlies, the worms, snails, slugs, spiders and cockroaches, ‘were in Hamish Bigmore’s packed lunch today.’
‘Where’s my chocolate?’ said a cross voice. It was Hamish Bigmore. ‘Mrs Chipchase, your favourite friend wants his chocolate.’
‘Favourite friend, indeed!’ screamed out Mrs Chipchase, purple in the face. ‘How dare you treat Cook and me like that! What a horrid trick, to put all those creepy things in our packed lunch.
‘But – but it wasn’t me, Mrs Chipchase,’ spluttered Hamish. ‘Really, it wasn’t!’
‘Well, if it wasn’t you,’ shouted Mrs Chipchase, ‘then it must have been the other horrid brats. What a way to treat Cook and me after all the years of service we’ve given the school. I shall tell Mr Potter that we’re leaving right away, and we won’t be back! Oh, won’t he let you have it when he hears about this!’
‘That worked even better than you planned, didn’t it, Mr Majeika?’ asked Jody late that afternoon. Mrs Chipchase and Cook had stormed off, and everyone was feeling very jolly – except Hamish Bigmore, who was sulking in a corner.
‘Yes, it did rather,’ said Mr Majeika. ‘I never guessed she’d walk out. I just thought she’d be cross with Hamish.’
‘How did you do it?’ asked Thomas. ‘Did you magic the packed lunch so that it was full of all those creatures?’
Mr Majeika nodded. ‘I thought it was time that Cook and Mrs Chipchase sampled the sort of thing that wizards eat for their lunch. Actually, they taste very nice – though I suppose they wouldn’t be everyone’s favourite dish.’ He sighed. ‘That was easy enough to do. But I’m going to need some strong magic to help me now.’
‘What do you mean?’ asked Pete.
‘I’ve told Mr Potter I’ll cook the school dinners for a week until a new cook has been found,’ said Mr Majeika.
‘Hurray!’ exclaimed Jody. ‘Good food at last!’
Mr Majeika shook his head. ‘I wouldn’t be too certain about that. The only sort of food I know how to cook is the kind that wizards eat. I’ve really no idea how to make the sort of thing that children like.’
‘It should be easy,’ said Thomas. ‘There’s a menu pinned up on the school notice-board. It tells you what’s going to be served for lunch. You just cook the food it says for each day. And I expect you could find a book to tell you how to do the actual cooking.’
‘Maybe,’ said Mr Majeika rather doubtfully. ‘Anyway, I shall have a helper. I’ve told Hamish Bigmore to be my potato-peeler and washer-up. I thought the hard work would do him good.’
Hamish Bigmore glared at them from his corner.
For four days, from Monday to Thursday, they had marvellous food. Mr Majeika produced delicious fish
fingers, beefburgers, baked beans, chips, ice-cream and all the other things that everyone really liked. ‘It’s quite easy,’ he said. ‘You just buy the things from the shops and read the instructions on the packets.’ He kept Hamish hard at work, pushing the trolley, collecting the empty plates and washing up. Hamish looked furious, but there was nothing he could do about it.
Then came Friday, Mr Majeika’s last day as school cook – Mr Potter had announced that somebody new was coming on Monday. ‘I wonder what Mr Majeika’s made for us today,’ said Jody. ‘I forgot to look at the menu.’
‘I bet it’s marvellous, whatever it is,’ said Thomas. ‘No more bony sausages, no more greasy old spaghetti. Ah, here comes Hamish with it now.’
Hamish was pushing the dinner-trolley out of the kitchen. It was piled high with covered dishes.
‘What is it today, Hamish?’ Peter called out.
‘You’ll see,’ said Hamish, grinning his usual nasty grin.
‘I don’t know what you’ve got to smile about, Hamish,’ said Thomas. ‘No chocolate for you any more.’
Hamish didn’t reply, but went round the tables handing out the dishes. Mr Majeika came out of the kitchen wearing an apron. ‘I do hope it’s all right,’ he said anxiously. ‘It seems rather an odd thing to give to schoolchildren, though wizards would certainly like it.’
‘What is it, Mr Majeika?’ asked Jody.
‘Well,’ said Mr Majeika, ‘you’d better take off the lid and see.’
The children lifted the lids off their plates. They stared at what was on the plates. And beady eyes stared back at them.
‘Toads!’ shrieked Jody. ‘Toads sitting in piles of moss and stones! Is this a joke, Mr Majeika?’
Mr Majeika shook his head sadly. ‘Not at all. Haven’t I got it right? Toad-in-the-hole did seem a funny thing to have on the menu, but Hamish Bigmore said you often ate it.’
‘Yes,’ said Peter, ‘we do, but it’s not supposed to be quite like this, Mr Majeika. Oh dear, it seems that Hamish has had the last word as usual!’