THE H-BOMB GIRL by Stephen Baxter (beach books txt) 📕

Joel was over, they ran across a stretch of playing field. Joel limped, but kept up.

They came to a side door that led to the changing rooms.

Joel said, “We haven’t got a key.”

Bernadette just walked up to the door and pushed. It was open. She sang, “Ta-da!”

Laura hissed, “How did you know?”

Bernadette put her fingers to her lips. Then she beckoned, and led them into the school.

The old building was a maze of corridors which Laura still hadn’t got to know well, and it all seemed different in the dark. But Bernadette led the way confidently.

They came to the staffroom, the converted store cupboard. Bernadette peered underneath the door. No light showed.

But a little way down the corridor light spilled from a room, and there was a rumble of voices. Joel looked panicky.

Bernadette just pushed open the staffroom door. The three of them crept inside, into the dark, and Bernadette shut the door. Then she clicked on a torch, lighting up their three faces from below.

“Cor,” Bernadette said. “You can tell it’s the staffroom just from the stink of ciggies.”

Joel whispered, “How did you know we could do this?”

“I knew about the meeting. Teachers and governors. They’d leave the school open until it was done. And I knew they would meet in a classroom or somewhere, not in this poky cupboard of a staffroom.” She was grinning, and sounded smug.

Laura admired the way she had thought through all this, and the cool way she was carrying it out. Reading bored Bernadette, and she struggled in class. But she had other skills, organisation and determination and courage, that just weren’t being picked up at school.

“And why,” Joel said, “are we here at all?”

Bernadette said, “They searched our stuff today. So tonight it’s our turn.”

“What are we looking for?”

“Proof of what they’re up to. That or ciggies.” She grinned.

It really was all just a laugh to her, Laura thought. It was a huge risk to be taking. But at least they might find out a bit more.

Bernadette used the torch to find Miss Wells’s name on a locker. The locker was padlocked, as they all were. But Bernadette was prepared for this too. She pulled a hairpin from the lapel of her jacket, and stuck it inside the lock, wiggling it back and forth.

Joel said, “How come you know how to pick a lock?”

“To get money off my mother. She might live on gin. I can’t, or the baby. Mind you we’re that skint we switch the gas off when we turn the bacon over.”

“Oh, you’re funny,” Joel hissed, tense.

There was a soft click. “Aha,” Bernadette said. Delicately, trying not to make a noise, she opened the padlock and lifted it away from the locker. “Open Sesame.” She pulled back the locker door.

She began to lift stuff out. Some of it was uninteresting. A scarf, a pair of tights, pens, a box of chalk. A comb, a “biddy rake,” as Bernadette called it.

Then she found a little leather wallet, which folded out to reveal plastic cards.

They inspected the cards by torchlight. “This one’s pretty,” Bernadette said. “A ‘credit card.’ But what does ‘chip and pin’ mean?”

“Beats me,” Joel said.

“This one says it’s a driving licence,” Laura said. It was a little pink card with a photograph of Miss Wells on it. “I’ve seen my dad’s driving licence. It’s a big bit of paper. This isn’t a driving licence. And what’s this on the back?” It was a row of vertical black lines, all different thicknesses.

“A code, maybe,” Joel said. “A code made of bars.” His voice was quiet.

Bernadette rummaged about some more, and pulled out what looked like a wristwatch, with a gold strap and glass cover. But it had no hands. On its face were numbers that changed as they watched. 20:38:04. 20:38:05. 20:38:06…

Even Bernadette sounded spooked now. “What do these numbers mean?”

Laura couldn’t help smiling. “It’s the twenty-four-hour clock. My dad uses it in the air force. 20:38. That’s, oh, nearly twenty to nine.”

“It’s a wristwatch.”

“Yes.”

Joel held it to his ear. “I can’t hear the clockwork.”

“Whoah.” Now Bernadette pulled out a silver case, the size of a small cigarette packet. “Look at this. It’s cracker.”

“What do you think it is?” Joel asked. “A ciggie case?”

“Maybe. Look, it’s got a hinge.” Bernadette delicately pushed her fingernail into a seam. The gadget opened up easily, and it lit up, silver-blue. In its top half it had a little screen, like a tiny telly, and there were buttons in the bottom half with the numbers 0 to 9 set out in a square, and other buttons with arrows and other symbols. Each button glowed individually, like a tiny jewel.

The soft blue light lit up their faces. Bernadette said, “I want one.”

Joel said, “They don’t even have stuff like this in America.”

Bernadette said, “You know, H-Bomb Girl, I thought you were cracked. I only came here for a laugh. I didn’t think we’d find anything in here but a half-bottle of gin. But there really is something going on, isn’t there?”

Joel was peering at the screen on the little gadget. “But what is it? Look. There’s writing. Beside that green phone symbol.”

Laura looked. There were two lines of text.

PEACE THROUGH WAR

2 incoming calls

“ ‘Peace through war’? What does that mean?” Bernadette asked.

“No idea,” Laura said.

“And, calls? What kind of calls?”

Joel shrugged. “Phone calls, maybe.”

Bernadette snorted. “Don’t be a divvy.” She pointed to the clunky staffroom phone that sat on the table in the middle of the room. “That is a phone.”

“Then you tell me what this little green phone-shaped sign means—”

The door opened. Light flooded into the room. Bernadette snapped the “phone” shut. The three of them ducked behind the table.

Somebody came in, singing “Livin’ Doll.” Laura recognised the voice. It was Mr Britten, the head. He crossed to the table, picked up something, turned and left, still singing as he closed the door.

Joel blew out his cheeks. “He just picked up his fags. He didn’t even notice the locker door swinging