Archie's Unbelievably Freaky Week
Page 5
Everybody gathered round Archie and Cyd, wanting to hear the story, and then Gary insisted that they be included in the photographs and it was several minutes before Archie was able to say that, much as he would like to stay, they needed to get on.
‘Archie’s taking me somewhere,’ said Cyd, happily. ‘For a surprise!’
‘A surprise!’ Gary beamed down at her. ‘Well, I hope it’s a nice one!’
‘If Archie’s arranging it,’ said Miss Henley, ‘I’m sure it’ll be the best surprise ever.’
As they continued their walk to the station, Archie was a little worried that if anything else happened, there might be no surprise at all, and he was very relieved when they got to the station with two minutes to spare.
The entrance to the railway station had glass doors that opened as you went towards them and closed after you’d gone through. Archie was leading the way and the doors opened as he walked towards them, but then started closing again while he was still going through. Before he knew it, they had slammed together on the backpack he was carrying and refused to budge.
‘I don’t believe it! Not again!’ The ticket collector came hurrying towards him. ‘That’s the second time it’s done that this morning!’
Outside, Cyd was trying to pull the doors apart.
‘You’ll never shift them,’ said the railway man, ‘not unless you’re a professional weight-lifter. You’ll have to wait while I phone for the engineer.’
The man disappeared through a door at the side of the ticket hall and Archie waited, trapped in the doorway. There was a clock on the wall in front of him, and it said the Tornado was due to depart in exactly one minute.
‘Archie?’ said a voice. ‘Is that you?’
Archie didn’t recognize the speaker at first – it was a big woman in yellow shorts and a Hawaiian shirt – but then he saw the tattoo around her neck. It was Miss Hurrell, the teacher who, on Monday, had thought he wanted to kill her, thrown him onto his back in the corridor, and sat on him.
‘Are you all right?’ she asked.
‘He’s trapped in the doors,’ said Cyd, ‘and we can’t open them.’
‘Well, I might be able to help you there,’ said Miss Hurrell. She briefly flexed her fingers, reached out, grabbed a door in each hand and . . . heaved.
There was grinding noise and the doors moved slowly apart. Archie stepped forward, and Cyd followed him through.
‘You are incredible, Miss Hurrell!’ she said. ‘Thank you! Thank you so much!’
‘I’m glad I could help,’ said Miss Hurrell. ‘As a matter of fact, I was hoping for a chance to say thank you to Archie. It’s because of him that I’ve got back into professional wrestling. I don’t know if you heard, but I’ve got this contract in America and—’
‘Would you mind,’ said Archie, ‘if we heard about it some other time?’
‘We have to hurry,’ said Cyd. ‘Archie’s got a surprise for me!’
‘A surprise?’ Miss Hurrell chuckled. ‘Well, he’s good at those, isn’t he? Go on, go for it!’
Shouting thank you and goodbye as they went, Archie started running, and Cyd followed him.
They ran past the ticket office, across the station lobby, along the bridge and then down the stairs that led to the platform. Archie was jumping the stairs two at a time when, halfway down, there was the toot toot of a steam whistle and . . .
. . . and ahead of him he could see the Tornado, in a thunder of steam and noise, pulling gracefully away from the station, to the sound of cheers from the watching crowds.
Archie stopped, his head falling on to his chest in disappointment. That was it. They had missed the train. There would be no surprise for Cyd.
Sadly, he turned to his friend to say how sorry he was, but found she was not looking at the departing steam train. Instead, she was looking at the other platform where a diesel with three coaches had just pulled in. That platform was almost empty, but Cyd was staring at it, frozen to the spot.
‘I don’t believe it,’ she murmured. ‘I don’t believe it!’
With the clouds of steam from the departing Tornado still swirling round the platform, Archie couldn’t see what she was looking at, but then the clouds parted and he could make out the tall figure of a man in army uniform, adjusting the cap on his head, before picking up a kit bag and slinging it over his shoulder.
‘Daddy!’ Cyd’s voice echoed round the station. ‘It’s my daddy!’
Even as she spoke, she was jumping down the last few steps and racing along the platform as fast as her legs could carry her. And then the man in the uniform saw her and his face broke into the biggest smile Archie had ever seen, and as Cyd came flying towards him he dropped the kit bag, held out his arms and caught her, and held her, and swung her round . . .
. . . and round . . .
. . . and round.
Archie watched from the bottom of the stairs as the man eventually lowered Cyd to the ground, and then he waited as the two of them slowly made their way back towards him.
‘This is Archie,’ said Cyd to her father. ‘He told me he had a surprise for me, but I never imagined it’d be this. I still can’t believe it!’
‘Neither can I,’ said her father. He turned to Archie. ‘I didn’t think anyone knew I was coming. I didn’t know myself till this morning. How did you find out?’
‘Well . . .’ Archie wasn’t quite sure what to say.
‘Nobody knows how Archie does these things,’ Cyd answered for him. ‘They just happen.’
‘Do they . . .’ Cyd’s father looked down at Archie and his eyes twinkled. ‘You sound like a good sort of friend to have, Archie!’
‘He’s the best friend to have,’ said Cyd firmly. ‘The very best!’
Archie walked back from the station alone. Cyd and her dad had taken a taxi to go and see Cyd’s mother at work. They had asked Archie if he’d like to come with them, but he had said no thank you. He had a feeling that Cyd and her father might like a bit of time alone together.
Things had not gone quite as he had planned, he thought, as he walked up the path to his front door, but they seemed to have turned out all right. He might have missed his ride on a steam train, but it had been worth it, to see Cyd and her father so happy.
His mother, however, was not at all happy when she saw him.
‘All the trouble I went to getting those tickets,’ she said. ‘And first you tell me not to come with you, and then you don’t even bother to use them!’
‘Honestly!’ She turned on her heels. ‘I don’t believe it, Archie!’
About the Author
Andrew Norriss has written thirteen books for children, including Aquila, which won the Whitbread Children’s Book of the Year in 1997. Over twenty years, he has also written and co-written approximately one hundred and fifty episodes of sitcoms and children’s drama for television (which include The Brittas Empire, Woof! and Bernard’s Watch).
Also by Andrew Norriss
I Don’t Believe It, Archie!
Aquila
Aquila 2
Ctrl-Z
The Portal
The Unluckiest Boy in the World
The Touchstone
Bernard’s Watch
Matt’s Million
Woof! A Twist in the Tale
Woof! The Tale Gets Longer
Woof! The Tale Wags On
ARCHIE’S UNBELIEVABLY FREAKY WEEK
AN RHCP DIGITAL EBOOK 9781446453070
Published in Great Britain by RHCP Digital,
an imprint of Random House Children’s Publishers UK
A Random House Group Company
This ebook edition published 2012
Text copyright © Andrew Norriss, 2012
Illustrations copyright © Hannah Shaw, 2012
First Published in Great Britain by David Fickling Books, 2012
David Fickling Books (RHCP) 2012
The right of Andrew Norriss and Hannah Shaw to be identified as the author and illustrator
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