Secrets at Silver Spires Read online

  About This Book

  Secrets, hopes and dreams… School friends are for ever!

  I wasn’t sure I’d like boarding school when I first started here, but Silver Spires is completely brilliant! I’ve made five amazing friends, plus I get to do loads of my favourite subject – art.

  I’d love to spend more time on my special art-exhibition entry, but my other lessons are such a struggle. And I can’t bear to let my friends find out how stupid I am. How can I keep my secret hidden though, now that I’m being made to go to special classes?

  For the “real” Brian Hodgson – great artist, great friend – with love

  Contents

  About This Book

  Acknowledgements

  Chapter One

  Chapter Two

  Chapter Three

  Chapter Four

  Chapter Five

  Chapter Six

  Chapter Seven

  Chapter Eight

  Chapter Nine

  Chapter Ten

  School Friends Fun!

  Sneak Preview of Star of Silver Spires

  About the Author

  Want to know more about the Silver Spires girls?

  Collect the whole School Friends series

  Copyright

  Chapter One

  “That’s coming on nicely, Jess.”

  I jumped a mile at the sound of Mr. Cary’s voice because I’d been in a world of my own, blending shapes and patterns in a collage. It was my favourite lesson of the week: art. With my favourite teacher.

  Mr. Cary and I both laughed at the way he’d given me such a shock.

  “Sorry, Jess, I forget how absorbed you always get! I’ll cough or something to warn you I’m approaching in future.” He leaned forward and studied my picture carefully, then took a step back and nodded to himself. “Hmm. I like the shape that’s emerging through the colours of the collage.”

  I frowned at my picture because I didn’t get what Mr. Cary meant. I hadn’t intended there to be any shape.

  “Look,” he said, seeing the puzzled look on my face, as his finger drew a line in the air just above the painting. “It’s a shoe!”

  “Oh wow! So it is!”

  “Let’s have a look,” said my best friend, Grace, coming over from her easel. “Yes, it’s a trainer!” she said, smiling to herself. “I think it’s one of mine!”

  I grinned at her. Some people wonder why she and I are best friends when we don’t seem to have anything in common. You see, Grace is the most talented girl in Year Seven at sport and she’s really good at most other subjects too, whereas I’m no good at anything except art. But Grace is a very sensitive person so she understands what it is I love about art, and when I show her stuff I’ve done, she doesn’t just say, Oh yes, very nice. She asks questions and tries to see what I see. And that’s lovely for me because, apart from Mr. Cary, Grace is the only person in my entire life who really understands me.

  “Are you getting ideas for the art exhibition, Jess?” she asked me, her eyes all sparkly. Grace is from Thailand and when she smiles she’s so pretty. Her whole face kind of crinkles and lights up.

  “Just what I was about to ask, Grace!” said Mr. Cary. “I’m looking forward to seeing what you come up with for the exhibition, Jess.” He smiled. “Remember, you don’t have to limit your work to a painting. Or even to craftwork. Last year we had sculptures, pottery, silk screening, installation art—”

  “Installation art?” said Georgie, bouncing over with a paintbrush in her hand.

  “Georgie, you’re dripping!” said Mr. Cary, pretending to be cross, even though everyone knows that Mr. Cary never really gets cross. None of the art teachers do. That’s one of the lovely things about art – there’s no need for crossness. There’s no right or wrong. No horrible words. Just lovely, lovely pictures, and everyone simply slides into the magical world of whatever they’re creating.

  For me personally, I really feel the magic. I’ve always felt it, ever since I was four, moulding a ball of Play-Doh into an elephant at playschool. I can still remember the excitement I felt as I made two thin plate shapes for the elephant’s ears. I was having a little competition with myself to see if I could make the whole elephant without tearing any bits off the dough and sticking them back on again. I was trying to just keep moulding away, teasing out the legs and the trunk and the ears and the tail until the blob of dough turned into an elephant.

  Then the playgroup leader said I had to stop because it was time for milk, and I remember how I cried and cried and stamped my foot until she promised to keep my elephant safe so I could carry on with it the next day. Later, when my nanny, Julie, came to collect me, the playgroup leader told her about me crying, but Julie didn’t even ask to see the elephant, which made me sad.

  After playschool, I got Julie to make Play-Doh at home and I created a whole zoo. I arranged all the animals on newspaper spread right across the kitchen table, and as soon as I heard Mum’s key in the front door when she got home from work – she’s an accountant by the way – I rushed to the hall, grabbed her hand and pulled her through to the kitchen.

  “Look!” I said proudly.

  “Oooh! That’s lovely, Jess!” she said, giving me a big hug. But she hadn’t looked for long enough, and I think that was the first time I realized in some funny little childish way that I could see things that some people couldn’t see. I mean, I’m sure the blobs of dough looked exactly that – blobs of Play-Doh with bits sticking out – but to me there were all sorts of animals in there just waiting to be seen.

  Then, when Dad got home – he’s also an accountant by the way – he hardly even glanced at my zoo. He just patted my head and said, “Very nice. Let’s clear it away now, Jess.”

  As I got older, I realized that there are two kinds of people in the world: those who kind of connect with art (that’s the only way I can describe it), and those who simply don’t. So that’s why I feel so lucky to have Grace. I mean, the teachers at primary must have thought I was quite a good artist because they often praised me, but none of them actually wanted to discuss anything I’d done. Whereas Grace seems genuinely interested and says she loves trying to see the world in pictures like I do.

  “I’ve heard that word ‘installation’ before,” Georgie was saying. “But I don’t get it. I mean an installation is like getting a washing machine or something fitted, isn’t it?”

  Mr. Cary chuckled, partly because Georgie had been waving her brush around while she’d been talking and had accidentally smeared green paint across her nose.

  “Installation art is exactly what it says it is,” said Mr. Cary. “It’s all about installing art within its own specific environment, which might be anywhere. For example, last year,” he went on, staring out of the window, “it was a piece of installation art that won first prize in the senior art exhibition. It was a birdcage hanging from a tree near Beech House, but the student had made it entirely out of natural materials and she’d left the door open to show that the bird had flown. She could have displayed the birdcage on a surface in the art room, but it wouldn’t have made the same impact as it did hanging from the branch of a tree. You see, that student was making a comment about how it’s not natural to keep birds in cages.”

  I felt my heart do the squeezing thing it does whenever I see a piece of art I love. I know I couldn’t actually see the birdcage, but it was just as though I could, because there was such a clear picture of it in my head.

  “That’s a brilliant idea,” breathed Grace. Then we exchanged a look, which meant we both understood about the birdcage.

  Georgie was wrinkling her nose. “Is that art, though?” she said. “I mean it’s very clever and all that, but…”

&n
bsp; “Well, that’s the big debate, isn’t it?” said Mr. Cary. “Some people can’t see it at all. Other people love it. But tell me, Georgie, if you saw an amazing piece of, say, jewellery, and it happened to be hanging from a tree, would you appreciate it?”

  “Yes! Of course!” said Georgie squeakily. “You can wear jewellery. You can’t wear a birdcage!”

  “Jewellery?” said Katy, from the other side of me. She’d kind of jumped to attention. “You mean you can enter jewellery in the art exhibition?”

  “Absolutely!” said Mr. Cary. He gave Katy a quizzical look. “I’m sure I mentioned jewellery when I told you all about the exhibition in the last lesson, didn’t I?”

  “No, you mentioned loads of things, but I would have definitely remembered if you’d said jewellery.” Katy’s eyes lit up. “That’s settled. I’m definitely entering now.”

  “Well, that’s two of you,” said Mr. Cary. “Any of you others from this little group thinking about it?”

  I looked round as Naomi and Mia came over to join us. We six have been friends ever since we joined Silver Spires at the beginning of Year Seven, two terms ago. We all share a dormitory called Amethyst in Hazeldean House, which is definitely the best boarding house in the whole school. Ours is actually the best dorm too, because we all get on so well together. Grace and I are best friends. Crazy Georgie is best friends with Mia, and Katy and Naomi are best friends as well.

  “Well I’m not entering. No way!” said Georgie. “I can’t even draw a sheep!”

  Grace just shook her head. I think we all knew Grace wouldn’t dream of entering. She’s got so much sport going on. The summer term is even busier than the other two terms for that. Grace sometimes gets to miss prep because of tennis coaching, which is a bit worrying for me because, like I said, I’m not very good at any subject except art, and I usually count on Grace to help me when I can’t spell things or don’t understand something I’m supposed to have read. I know I could ask one of the others for help, but I feel a bit embarrassed about being so stupid, except with Grace because she’s used to me.

  Mia and Naomi both said they didn’t think they’d be entering anything for the art exhibition and I wasn’t really surprised. Mia has lots of extra work with her piano practice and Naomi always says she loves other people’s art but doesn’t think she’s much good at it herself.

  “Better get tidied up then,” said Mr. Cary, glancing at the clock, and I felt my usual sinking feeling that the lesson had gone so quickly.

  “I’ll come back after lunch, Mr. Cary. Will you be here?”

  He nodded. “I’m pretty much a permanent fixture in here!”

  “Oh great!” said Georgie. “Can I enter you in the exhibition, Mr. Cary? You could be my piece of installation art!”

  Lots of people heard what she said and the whole room seemed to burst out laughing. Georgie often makes that happen. She doesn’t do it on purpose – she’s just naturally funny. The others kept giggling all the time we were packing away, but I was quiet, because my mind was buzzing away with ideas about what I’d do for the art exhibition. Nothing was clear in my head yet. Half of me wanted to talk to Mr. Cary about it, but the other half wanted him to have a surprise. Mr. Cary’s opinion means a lot to me and I know I’m not the only one who thinks he’s a really good teacher. There are other girls higher up the school who’ve told me his students get fantastic GCSE results. In fact one of the reasons Mum and Dad chose Silver Spires school for me was because of the art department. Well, that’s not strictly true. What happened was this…

  At the end of Year Five, my parents asked me if I’d like to go to boarding school after primary, and at first I said yes, I’d love to, because I’d seen one of the Harry Potter films and I thought it would be really exciting and completely different from ordinary school. But then Mum casually added that if I went to a school like Silver Spires I’d probably get on better with my lessons, so then I wasn’t sure about this whole boarding thing after all, in case Mum and Dad suddenly had much higher expectations of me. I liked the thought of being able to manage my work more easily though, but I knew that couldn’t just happen by magic.

  All through Year Six, when I wasn’t painting or drawing or making things, I worked as hard as I possibly could, spending ages up in my room typing words on my computer and spellchecking them, and reading as much as I could to try and get faster at it. School was just such a struggle for me, and my biggest dread was getting left behind.

  When I told Mum and Dad I didn’t really want to go to boarding school, they showed me the Silver Spires school magazine with all the brilliant art in it and Mum even read out to me what it said in the school prospectus about the wonderful art department. By the time she’d finished, I wanted to go to Silver Spires more than I’d ever wanted anything in my life.

  And now I’m here I’m really happy. I love boarding school. It’s great having Grace and my four other good friends with me all the time, and being able to wander round such amazing grounds and go on trips and outings to art galleries and museums, and eat the most delicious food (especially puddings), and go to the art room at lunchtimes and after school and at weekends. And the classes are smaller than they were at primary, so the teacher can keep an eye on everyone all the time. Actually that’s the only trouble. You see, recently I’ve begun to sense an awful lot of eyes on me, and I’ve got the horrible feeling that the teachers are beginning to realize I’ve got a bigger problem with reading and writing than they might have first thought.

  Just as I was getting lost in all these thoughts, the bell for the end of art rang, bringing me back to the here and now.

  “English next,” said Naomi matter-of-factly as we left the art block.

  For a second my spirits plummeted, but then like a yo-yo they swung back up again as Grace grinned at me.

  “But not long till lunch, Jess. Then you can get back to your lovely art!”

  I gave her a massive smile. She understands me so well. I couldn’t wish for a better best friend.

  Chapter Two

  I looked at my name at the top of the page – Jessica Roud – then I looked at the big clock on the wall and sighed inside. Eight o’clock. We were halfway through prep and I’d hardly done any of my English essay. It’s not that I don’t know what to write. My head is bursting with ideas, but I can’t get them down quickly enough because I have to look up so many words in my dictionary. Nobody else looks up half the number of words I do. I glanced at Grace, beside me. She’s not in my set for English, but she was scribbling away at her own essay. She must have sensed me looking, or maybe my sigh wasn’t as silent as I’d thought, because she suddenly turned to me, raising her eyebrows, and mouthed, “Are you okay?”

  “How do you spell ‘destruction’?” I mouthed back, after quickly checking that Miss Carol wasn’t watching.

  Miss Carol is our lovely housemistress. It’s always either her or Miss Fosbrook, the assistant housemistress, on prep duty, or occasionally Miss Jennings, Hazeldean’s matron. It took me a while to get used to calling homework “prep” and doing it in silence in a room with loads of other girls for a whole hour. After two terms boarding at Silver Spires, though, it feels totally normal.

  Grace wrote the word down on a scrap of paper and slid it across the table towards me. The second letter was e. I would have put i. It’s so much easier when Grace writes words down for me. They stand out nicely on the paper, not like the tiny little words in a dictionary, surrounded by loads of other words, impossible to find and very easy to lose. But I never ask her for easy words, because I feel ashamed about not knowing them and I don’t want her to discover she’s got a complete dumbo for a best friend.

  “All right, girls.” Miss Carol smiled. “You can finally escape this stuffy room!”

  “Hurray!” went up a big cheer. Part of me loves this moment when the silence is over and I can stop concentrating, but today it was only a very small part. My essay was so short and not even finished, and I felt embarras
sed about Miss Carol seeing it. So I got Grace, Mia and Georgie to pass me their prep, then I tucked my own pathetic effort in-between theirs, and handed the wodge to Miss Carol.

  “Let’s go outside,” said Georgie. “I’m boiling hot.”

  The six of us decided to walk down the little lane that runs behind Hazeldean and some of the other boarding houses.

  “Pity the builders have gone home,” said Georgie, with a dreamy look in her eye. “That young one in charge of the cement mixer looks just like Josh from The Fast Lane!”

  Mia laughed. “Georgie! How am I going to keep you under control?” she said, pretending to be shocked, but we’re all used to Georgie with her crazy outspoken ways. Personally, I was a bit fed up with all the building work and restoration that was going on at Silver Spires. It was true that it would be wonderful when the ugly mobile rooms were replaced by lovely solid buildings that blended in with the rest of Silver Spires, but I wanted it to happen quickly so everything would be natural and beautiful and back to normal again.

  “Look,” I said, stopping in my tracks to stare at the streaky sunset.

  “It’s lovely!” said Grace, tucking her arm through mine. “I like green in the sky,” she added.

  Georgie grinned at me and waved her hands in front of my eyes as though she was hypnotizing me. “Are you taking it all in, Jess?” she asked in a low, slow voice, which made the others laugh.

  “I expect in about fifteen minutes’ time we’ll see an exact copy in your sketchbook!” Mia added. “You’re so clever, Jess!”

  I always feel flattered when my friends say things like that, but they’ve no idea how wrong they are. I’m not clever at all. It’s just that I can see the world so clearly through pictures, as though I’m wearing magic glasses that no one else has got.

  “We’d better go back,” said Grace. “Miss Carol will be locking up soon.”

  “It’s good being allowed an extra ten minutes to go outside after prep, though, isn’t it?” said Mia.