Googol Boy and the peculiar incident of the Great Quiz Trophy by John Michael (classic books for 13 year olds txt) 📕

“Yes you dunderhead − I have won The Great Quiz two years in a row and plan to make it three! My name will once again be engraved on that trophy!”

The Great Quiz stemmed back to Ezekiel Quockingpoll’s decision to send his most worthy child to school − he had 28 children and that might seem a lot today but in the olden days children were a great source of cheap labour and Ezekiel needed them to run his chain of brabbensack restaurants. Who else was going to bake, batter, barbeque, blanch, boil, broil, fricassee, grill, pickle, poach, roast, steam, stew, stir-fry all them brabbensacks?

Another reason Ezekiel liked to keep the running of the restaurants within the family was that he was fearful of rivals who wanted to steal his recipe of eleven secret herbs and spices which made his brabbensacks so finger lickin’ good. Surprisingly, all of the 28 children gave it their all during the Great Quiz battle and it was quite a tenacious encounter as they fought tooth and nail to the very end. I know what you’re thinking, why would you bother to win if the first prize was to go to school? When we learnt about this in History class, none of us could figure it out either − we all agreed that the first prize of going to school would have been the biggest disincentive ever! Well, all of us except Savani.

As it turned out, working in the brabbensack restaurants was even worse than going to school. You might have thought that Oliver Twist had it bad but Ezekiel’s children had to work 18 hour days: they had to get up before sunrise to milk the cows and gather the eggs, chop the kindling and light the fire, grind the fat and prepare the lard, knead the dough and bake the bread, wash the dishes and all the utensils, scrub and rinse the pots and pans, slice and dice the vegetables, prepare and cook the meat, and clean and polish the tables and floors.

It wasn’t until some time later that Lord Shaftesbury came to the rescue. Although a regular customer at the brabbensack restaurants, he was also a staunch supporter of children’s rights. The turning point occurred for Lord Shaftesbury when he had ordered black bean brabbensack but got braised brabbensack belly instead. Perhaps he could have let that single mistake slide but then, in his food, he found a bandage... attached to a severed finger! Only a child servant who was super-duper tired could have made such a horrendous mistake like chopping off their own pinkie. Consequently, he became an instrumental force in pushing through the Ten Hours Act of 1833 in parliament, which limited working hours and made school compulsory for all children under thirteen.

It would be an understatement to say that Ezekiel was furious, and as an act of retribution he subsequently banned Lord Shaftesbury from all of his Brabbensack Grill Shack restaurants. Lord Shaftesbury, however, wasn’t all that perturbed − he even lost a few pounds when he stopped eating Ezekiel’s fast food and, as a related bonus, was spared the bubonic plague, which mostly inflicted the Grill Shack patrons. More importantly, he was able to hold his head up high in town, knowing that he had done the right thing. So, I guess that you could say that it was Shaftesbury’s fault that compulsory schooling came into existence. To this day, he is a historical figure who is admired by teachers and parents alike, and disliked by every school student ever (except for Savani, that is).

Nonetheless, before Shaftesbury’s law came into place, the only way to be freed from a life of drudgery and slavery was to have your name etched on the Quockingpoll Flats Great Quiz trophy. In the years to come, other children in the town were allowed to compete in the quiz as it was rather lonely for the sole student at the school − also, it was difficult to dodge questions from the teacher when you were the only one in the classroom.

Eventually the Great Quiz had become the closing event at the Quockingpoll Flats Festival. There were balloons, flags and banners, carousels, pony rides and even a brass band.

These days, of course, the prize for winning the Great Quiz did not involve the honour of getting to go to school as we are all forced to go to school anyway. If that was the prize nowadays, nobody would enter − that would be like giving a kid with chicken pox some mumps. Well, nobody would enter except Savani of course, who seemed to have an unhealthy obsession with school (and with winning).

Nowadays, students received a cash prize and you also became the honorary Brabbensack Ambassador of the year with your picture on the front of The Quockingpoll Flats Gazette. You would also have the honour of presenting the charity funds, in the form of an oversized novelty cheque, to the Orphanage Centre which dated back to the same bubonic plague outbreak which had taken out most of the parents who had eaten at Ezekiel’s many restaurants.

It was no great surprise that Savani wanted the glory of winning the Great Quiz again. She was always up on stage at the school assembly or in The Quockingpoll Flats Gazette for some achievement or another.

Savani finished her visit with a stinging rebuke. “Be warned Sootfell, I shall show no mercy as I wipe the floor with you. I will be victorious and you shall eat my dust!”

Just as quickly as Savani and her gang appeared, they left. Leaving Barney and me wondering what had just happened. My cheek was still stinging.

“Did Savani just challenge me to a duel?” I wondered out loud.

“I think she did,” answered Barney. “Howard?”

“Yes?”

“Did you really cheat with your speech?”

“No Barney... no I didn’t.”

Or at least I didn’t think that I did... but how did that speech just miraculously appear out of nowhere?

“Wait a minute!” I whispered to myself. “Last night...