Bad Dreams: Part 5

By ANNE FINE, Illustrator SUSAN WINTER

Now it was her turn to look at me as if I were loopy. "Really?"

"Yes," I admitted. "That's who I'd like to be more than anyone in the world."

And then I showed her how to use the card index in the book corner. And how to stamp the books out and how to tell from the coloured sticker on the spine whether it should go back in Older Readers, or Poetry, or Project Work.

She had a funny way of picking up the books - gingerly, as if they might scorch her. After a few minutes, I asked her, as a joke:

"Didn't you have any of these in your old school?"

She made a face. "Oh, yes," she said. "We have them. It's just that I hardly ever had to go near them."

Strange thing to say. And I was just thinking "No wonder her work's so bad", when, suddenly, I saw her jump.

"Oh!" she said, startled.

"What's the matter?"

"Nothing."

Publisher: Random House, $16.95

Age group: 10-13 years