Pencil of Doom! Read online

  ‘That’s him there, Fred,’ said Clive, pointing at Jack.

  ‘I see him,’ said Fred.

  ‘Is there a problem?’ said Jack politely.

  ‘Yes, there’s a problem,’ said Fred. ‘There’s a big problem. You disrespected my brother, Japes.’

  ‘No I didn’t,’ said Jack.

  ‘Yes you did,’ said Fred. ‘He said you called him dumb.’

  ‘I didn’t!’ said Jack.

  ‘Well, he says that you said that he didn’t know anything. So, as far as I’m concerned, that’s as good as calling him dumb.’

  ‘I didn’t say he didn’t know anything,’ said Jack. ‘I asked him if he didn’t. That’s all.’

  ‘Same thing!’ said Clive.

  ‘No it’s not,’ said Jack. ‘That’s how dumb you are . . .’ Jack suddenly realised what he’d just said. ‘Oops.’

  Fred stared at him for a long time without saying anything, then he smiled and shook his head. ‘You know what, Japes?’ he said. ‘Lucky for you I’m in a good mood today. I’m going to give you the benefit of the doubt. In fact, I’m in such a good mood, I’m going to play a little game with you. It’s called Yes Means No and No Means Yes. Do you want to play?’

  ‘No,’ said Jack, ‘thanks, but—’

  ‘Great!’ said Fred. ‘So you want to play!’

  ‘No,’ said Jack. ‘I said no!’

  ‘But no means yes!’ said Fred. ‘That’s how we play the game—I ask you a question, and you have to answer yes or no. Okay? First question . . . hmm, let me see. Do you want me to punch you?’

  Jack opened his eyes wide in alarm. ‘NO!’ he said.

  ‘So you want me to punch you?’ said Fred.

  ‘No!’ said Jack.

  ‘No means yes and yes means no,’ Fred reminded him, ‘so what I’m hearing is that you want me to punch you!’

  Clive sniggered.

  ‘No!’ said Jack. ‘. . . I mean yes!’

  ‘Yes you do want me to punch you or yes you don’t want me to punch you?’ asked Fred. ‘Remember, no means yes and yes means no!’

  ‘Yes!’ said Jack. ‘Yes!’

  Fred looked triumphantly at the group of kids who had formed around us. ‘Did everybody hear that?’ he said, clenching his fist and drawing it back. ‘I asked Jack if he wanted me to punch him and he said yes!’

  ‘I said yes,’ said Jack, ‘but yes means no!’

  ‘What are you talking about?’ Fred frowned for everyone to see.

  ‘The game!’ said Jack. ‘We’re playing the game, remember?’

  ‘I thought you said you didn’t want to play,’ said Fred.

  ‘I did,’ said Jack, ‘but . . . I thought you were playing anyway.’

  Fred smiled. ‘I was playing, but I stopped.’

  ‘Then my answer is no!’ said Jack quickly.

  ‘No, what?’

  ‘No, I don’t want you to punch me!’

  ‘No?’ said Fred.

  ‘No!’ said Jack.

  Fred slammed his fist into Jack’s arm.

  Jack grabbed his arm and fell to the ground. ‘What did you do that for?’

  Fred shrugged innocently. ‘No means yes and yes means no!’

  ‘But you said you weren’t playing that anymore,’ said Jack.

  ‘I started again,’ said Fred.

  ‘That’s not fair!’ said Jack.

  ‘I can’t help it if you can’t keep up,’ said Fred.

  ‘It’s not fair and you know it,’ said Jack.

  ‘Are you calling me a cheat?’ said Fred.

  ‘No.’

  ‘You are calling me a cheat?’

  ‘I said no.’

  ‘Yes means no and no means yes,’ said Fred.

  ‘Then I mean yes!’ said Jack.

  By this time even more kids had gathered around to watch Fred play Yes Means No and No Means Yes with Jack.

  Fred turned to them now. ‘You heard that, didn’t you?’ he said. ‘He just called me a cheat!’

  Some said yes. Some said no. Others just looked confused.

  Fred turned to Clive. ‘I don’t believe it!’ he said. ‘He just called me a cheat!’

  ‘That’s what I heard,’ said Clive.

  ‘No, I didn’t,’ said Jack. ‘Yes means no and no means yes, remember?’

  ‘I’m not playing that anymore,’ said Fred. ‘But would you like to play again tomorrow?’

  Jack was so confused that he said no, but nodded at the same time.

  The crowd laughed.

  Poor Jack. I really did feel sorry for him. But, at the same time, I was glad it was him Fred was picking on and not me.

  ‘I’ll take that as a yes,’ said Fred. ‘See you tomorrow, Japes.’

  He acted as if he was about to walk off, then turned back and punched Jack on the arm again. ‘That’s for calling me a cheat.’

  Jack doubled over in pain, clutching his arm.

  Fred looked at him scornfully. ‘Gee, I hate to think how you’d carry on if I hit you really hard.’

  The bell for the end of lunch rang and the crowd dispersed. Fred and Clive walked away laughing.

  Jack stood up, still rubbing his arm. ‘Those Durkin brothers are going to be sorry they messed with me,’ he said.

  ‘What are you going to do?’ said Gretel, chuckling at Jack’s bravado. ‘Let Fred punch you again?’

  Jack scowled at her. ‘You’ll see,’ he said.

  7

  Jack’s cartoon

  Jack stomped up the steps and down the corridor towards our classroom.

  He was mad. Madder than I’d ever seen him.

  He went straight to his desk, took out a piece of paper and started drawing. I knew what this meant. Jack was going to draw one of his ‘Fred and Clive’ cartoons. Whenever the Durkin brothers annoyed him, he always drew a cartoon of something bad happening to them.

  He divided the page into a strip of eight squares and began attacking it with the pencil. He wasn’t so much drawing as slashing and stabbing the page. In fact, he was being so violent that he broke his pencil in half.

  ‘Can I borrow your pencil, Henry?’ he asked.

  Normally I would have said yes. But I only had one pencil on me . . . and the last time I had lent it to someone, Mr Brainfright had ended up flying out the window.

  ‘I don’t know,’ I said. ‘I don’t think it’s a good idea. You seem, well, a little agitated.’

  ‘I’ll get a little more agitated if you don’t lend me your pencil,’ said Jack, his eyes flashing angrily. ‘I share all my stuff with you, don’t I?’

  ‘Yeah, I guess so,’ I said, reluctantly getting the pencil out of my pencil case and giving it to Jack. ‘Just . . . you know . . . be careful.’

  Jack nodded. ‘Okay, Henry,’ he said. ‘I won’t break this one, I promise.’

  ‘That’s not what I meant,’ I said.

  ‘What did you mean?’

  ‘I don’t really know.’

  Jack shrugged and went back to his cartoon.

  The skull eraser seemed to grin wider than ever as he worked.

  Clive entered the classroom. ‘Who’s the dumb one now then, Jack?’ he said as he passed our desks. ‘You don’t even know the difference between no and yes.’

  Jack ignored Clive and kept drawing.

  Clive stopped. ‘I thought your arm would have been too sore to draw!’

  ‘No, it’s fine,’ said Jack, hunching over his drawing so Clive couldn’t see it. ‘Takes more than a girl’s punch to hurt me.’

  ‘Hey!’ yelled Gretel. ‘I heard that.’

  ‘So did I,’ said Clive. ‘And I’m going to tell my brother.’

  ‘Don’t you ever get sick of running to your brother and telling him what everybody said?’

  ‘No,’ said Clive. ‘And I’m going to tell him you said that too!’

  Jack didn’t say anything.

  He didn’t say anything for the rest of the afternoon.

  Not even when Cl
ive started flicking chewed-up bits of paper at the back of his neck.

  Not even when Penny and Gina, the horse-mad twins in our class, went for a canter around the room on their imaginary horses and bumped into his desk, knocking his cartoon to the floor.

  Instead of getting mad, Jack just picked up his paper, placed it back on his desk and kept drawing.

  I’d never seen him so engrossed.

  He drew all through our free reading period and it was only when the bell rang that he looked up, blinking.

  He picked up his cartoon, stood up and walked over to my desk.

  ‘Wow!’ he said. ‘That’s some pencil, Henry!’

  ‘Really?’ I said. ‘Why?’

  ‘Well, it’s going to sound a bit weird,’ said Jack, ‘but it was like the pencil was doing all the work. Check it out!’ Jack passed the cartoon to me. It was called ‘Flying with Fred and Clive’.

  8

  Flying with Fred and Clive

  Frame 1: Fred and Clive flying in a plane.

  Frame 2: Smoke coming out of the back of the plane.

  Frame 3: Fred and Clive jumping out of the plane.

  Frame 4: Fred and Clive trying to open their parachutes.

  Frame 5: Fred and Clive panicking as their parachutes fail to open.

  Frame 6: Fred hitting the ground.

  Frame 7: Clive landing on top of Fred.

  Frame 8: The plane crashing on top of Fred and Clive.

  9

  An apology and a threat

  ‘It’s incredible, Jack!’ I said. ‘It’s the best drawing you’ve ever done!’ I wasn’t just saying it to be nice, either. I meant it. It was really good. Something about the detail made the pictures look almost real.

  ‘Thanks,’ said Jack. ‘But I can’t take all the credit. This pencil is great!’

  ‘That’s a cool cartoon, Jack,’ said Gretel, who, along with Jenny and Newton, had come up behind us. ‘Serves them both right! And Jack?’

  ‘Yes?’

  ‘I’m sorry for teasing you at lunch.’

  ‘Are you really sorry or are you just scared that Jack will draw a cartoon of you?’ I said.

  ‘Both!’ said Gretel, laughing.

  ‘It’s really good, Jack,’ said Jenny, ‘but I can’t help feeling a little bit sorry for Fred and Clive.’

  ‘You feel sorry for them?’ said Jack. ‘How about feeling sorry for me? I’m the one who got punched in the arm—twice!’

  ‘I know,’ said Jenny, ‘but all the same . . .’ She pointed at the final frame of the cartoon. ‘. . . that must hurt!’

  ‘So did getting punched in the arm!’ said Jack.

  ‘What’s wrong, Newton?’ asked Gretel.

  We looked at Newton. His face was white.

  He was trying to talk, but no words were coming out.

  ‘Is it the cartoon?’ Jenny asked gently. ‘Are you scared of Jack’s cartoon?’

  Newton shook his head. ‘What if . . .’ he said, taking a deep breath, ‘what if Fred and Clive see it?’

  ‘That won’t happen,’ said Jack.

  ‘Won’t it?’

  We turned around.

  Clive was standing right behind Jack. He was shaking his head. ‘My brother’s definitely not going to like this,’ he said. ‘He’s not going to like this at all!’

  ‘He doesn’t have to know,’ said Jack.

  ‘Oh yes he does,’ said Clive, turning and heading off down the corridor. ‘As soon as possible!’

  ‘You know what your problem is, Clive?’ Jack shouted after him. ‘You need to get a life!’

  Clive turned back and smiled. ‘I’ve got one,’ he said. ‘It’s you who’s going to need a life when Fred finds out about this!’

  Jack gulped. He looked even more frightened than Newton, and that’s not easy to do.

  Suddenly, ‘Flying with Clive and Fred’ didn’t seem quite as funny as it had a few minutes earlier. And it was about to get even unfunnier. In fact, none of us had any idea just how unfunny things were about to get.

  10

  Bad news

  The next morning Mr Brainfright called the class to order.

  ‘I’m afraid I’ve got some bad news,’ he said.

  ‘Oh no,’ said Gretel. ‘You’re not leaving, are you?’

  ‘No, nothing like that,’ Mr Brainfright assured her.

  ‘The school holidays have been cancelled?’ I suggested.

  ‘No,’ said Mr Brainfright. ‘Not quite that bad.’

  ‘The school holidays have been extended?’ Fiona gasped.

  ‘What would be bad about that?’ asked Mr Brainfright.

  ‘I love school!’ said Fiona. ‘There’s so much to learn and so little time. The more school the better, as far as I’m concerned.’

  ‘Ah, yes,’ said Mr Brainfright, ‘I couldn’t agree more. But that’s not the bad news. The bad news is that Clive and his brother Fred are in hospital. They are both in a very serious condition and may not return to school for quite some time . . .’

  ‘What happened?’ said Jenny, looking worried.

  ‘Well,’ said Mr Brainfright, ‘apparently they were on their garage roof trying to launch a model aeroplane. Fred fell off the roof and then Clive did too . . . and landed right on top of Fred! And then, to add insult to injury, their plane rolled off the roof and crashed on top of Clive.’

  As he was telling us this, some kids started giggling.

  ‘Come now, children,’ said Mr Brainfright, ‘it’s not funny . . . not funny at all!’

  He was right. It wasn’t funny.

  Newton, Gretel, Jenny, Jack and I stared at each other in open-mouthed astonishment. It was just like Jack’s cartoon! Well, give or take a few small details—but the result was the same.

  I looked out the window and noticed a cloud pass in front of the sun. A sudden wind blew autumn leaves off the tree in a wild flurry.

  I opened my pencil case and looked at the pencil.

  The skull winked at me.

  11

  Nice things

  We went straight from morning roll call to the art room.

  Mrs Rainbow, the art teacher, gave us all a big smile as we came in. Mrs Rainbow loved art and encouraged us to explore and express ourselves in whatever way we felt like. The only way she didn’t like us expressing ourselves was in the form of clay fights, paint fights or running with scissors. Apart from that, it was pretty much anything goes.

  Jenny, Gretel, Newton, Jack and I sat at the collage table in the back of the room but we weren’t doing any collage. All we could think about was what had happened to Fred and Clive.

  ‘It’s just like your cartoon, Jack!’ said Jenny.

  ‘No, it’s not,’ Jack replied. ‘It’s nothing like it! In my cartoon they were flying in an aeroplane and then had engine trouble and had to bail out and their parachutes failed to open!’

  ‘And then?’ said Jenny.

  Jack made a face. ‘Hmmm . . . let me see,’ he said. ‘Well, I think Fred hit the ground and then Clive fell on top of him and the aeroplane crashed on top of them both . . .’

  ‘Notice any similarities?’ Jenny asked.

  ‘None at all,’ said Jack, stubborn as always. ‘Well . . . maybe a couple. What are you trying to say? That my cartoon caused their accident?’

  ‘Way to go, Jack!’ said Gretel. ‘They sure had it coming!’

  ‘It’s not funny,’ said Jenny.

  ‘I didn’t say it was funny,’ said Jack. ‘But it’s not my fault! It’s never happened before with any of my cartoons. It’s just a coincidence!’

  ‘No,’ I said, ‘it’s too close for coincidence. It’s the pencil. There’s something weird, something dangerous about that pencil!’

  ‘Don’t be stupid, Henry,’ said Jack. ‘It’s a really, really good pencil.’

  ‘Not true!’ I said. ‘Remember how it made Mr Brainfright fall out the window and almost choke to death?’

  ‘That wasn’t the pencil’s fault!’ said J
ack, shaking his head. ‘It’s not the first time Mr Brainfright’s fallen out the window. He fell out twice in one day once. Remember? Or are you conveniently forgetting that fact?’

  ‘No,’ I said. ‘But you’re conveniently forgetting the fact that what you drew about Fred and Clive came true!’

  ‘But why would it?’ said Jack. ‘Do you think the pencil is cursed? Is that what you’re trying to tell me?’

  ‘I don’t know,’ I said. ‘Maybe.’

  ‘That’s ridiculous,’ said Jack.

  ‘Maybe,’ I said. ‘But maybe not . . . I once read a story about a writer who had this typewriter and whatever stories he wrote on the typewriter came true. He wrote a story about a really powerful monster that couldn’t be destroyed by bullets or bombs, and then a real monster just like the one he described started attacking the city. In the end the only way to destroy the monster and save the city was to destroy the typewriter that he’d written the story on.’

  By now, Newton’s eyes were practically popping out of his face in terror.

  ‘It’s okay, Newton,’ Jenny said, patting his arm. ‘It’s just a story.’

  ‘But it could happen,’ I said.

  ‘Are you going to destroy the pencil?’ said Jack. ‘Because I won’t let you. I’ve never drawn as well as I did with that pencil. It’s the best pencil ever!’

  ‘How are you all going?’ asked Mrs Rainbow, coming up to the collage table. ‘Have you started yet?’

  ‘Not exactly, Mrs Rainbow,’ Jenny answered.

  ‘Having trouble getting ideas?’ she said.

  ‘No,’ said Gretel. ‘We’re just having a discussion . . . about a pencil.’

  ‘Anything I can help you with?’

  ‘Yes,’ I said, looking pointedly at Jack. ‘What would you do if you had a pencil and you had good reason to believe that whatever you drew with it came true?’

  Mrs Rainbow smiled. ‘A magic pencil?’

  ‘Maybe,’ I said.

  ‘Well,’ said Mrs Rainbow, ‘if I was lucky enough to have a pencil like that, I think I would only draw nice things with it.’

  ‘Nice things,’ I said. ‘Of course! That’s brilliant! Thanks, Mrs Rainbow.’

  ‘Pleased to be of service,’ she said, her attention turning to a loud noise on the other side of the room. Penny had just fallen off the life-sized papier-mâché pony she and Gina had been working on for the last few months.