Fortune Cookie

by Jean Ure

  “Oh, girls. After all your hard work.” Cupcake’s mum sadly shook her head. “You did what you could. You really tried! I think we’ll just have to give the money back, and—”

  “No!” Joey shrieked, and flung his arms across the table, toppling several piles of coins. “Cookie money! I’m not giving it back!”

  “We can raise more,” said Cupcake. “We can!” She glared at me, like defying me to contradict her. “We’ll think of something else. We’ll get the rest of it!”

  I didn’t say anything; nor did Cupcake’s mum. I was just, like, totally deflated. I had been so sure our plan would work! I’d struggled so hard, all day yesterday, not to say so much as a single solitary word, and we hadn’t even managed to raise half the money we needed. I felt so bad! We’d told Cupcake’s mum we’d get the money. We’d promised we’d get it, and now we hadn’t, and how was she going to tell Joey that he would have to be parted from his beloved Cookie? Already he was sobbing as he tried to round up all the tumbled piles of coins.

  “Cookie money! Cookie money!”

  Cupcake said, “Yes, it is. It’s Cookie’s money, and we’re going to get more of it!”

  “Maybe… ” Her mum gazed despairingly round the kitchen. “Maybe we could have a garage sale, or… ”

  Her voice trailed off. Even I could see that there wasn’t anything that could be sold at a garage sale. Not in the kitchen, not anywhere in the whole house. Some rooms were almost bare. Cupcake, for instance, didn’t even have a proper wardrobe, just a rail behind a curtain. My mum and dad are not what you would call well-off, they are always worrying about how to pay the bills, but at least we get to go on holiday every year and have days out now and then. Cupcake doesn’t. So I think her mum must be really, really poor. This just made it worse that we couldn’t even raise enough money for one poor little dog to have his operation!

  Mum asked me, when I got home, why I was looking so glum. “Sky fallen in?”

  I said, “No, but sometimes life is just so depressing.”

  When I told her why, she said that in some ways it was a pity we had ever discovered Cookie. She said that now Joey had bonded with him, it was going to mean heartbreak when they had to be parted.

  “It’s so not fair!” I wailed.

  Mum agreed. She said, “I’m afraid life isn’t. That’s a lesson we all have to learn.”

  I said, “I don’t mind learning it, but why should Joey have to? He has so much to put up with, and he never complains, and all he wants is his little dog! Cupcake says we’ll get the money somehow. She says we’ll think of something. But I don’t know what we can do!”

  “You could always find a treasure map,” said Rosie.

  I hadn’t realised she was there. I turned on her, “Don’t be so stupid!”

  “I’m not being stupid, it’s what people do. They find treasure maps and go and dig up the treasure.”

  “In your dreams!” I said.

  “In books,” said Rosie.

  I made an impatient scoffing sound.

  “Dani, she’s only trying to help,” said Mum.

  She wasn’t trying to help; she was being stupid. I went off in a huff and when she knocked at my bedroom door a few minutes later and demanded to be let in I nearly told her to get lost, except if I had she’d only have gone running to Mum. I opened the door a crack and glowered at her. “What do you want?”

  “I want to give you something.”

  “What?”

  She stuck her hand through the door. “For Cookie.”

  “What is it?”

  “For Cookie!” She pushed a bit of crumpled paper at me. I stared, disbelievingly. It was a five-pound note! My annoying little spoilt brat of a sister had given me a five-pound note.

  “I was saving it up,” she said, “but you can have it.”

  I couldn’t believe it. I asked Mum, later, if it was OK for me to keep it.

  “Of course it is,” said Mum. “I didn’t put her up to it; it was entirely her own idea. And while we’re at it, here’s a little something from me as well.”

  A whole tenner! I cried, “Oh, Mum, thank you, thank you, thank you!” and flung my arms round her.

  “That’s all right,” said Mum. “It’s the least I can do. I just hope you manage to raise the rest of the money.”

  I told Mum that we had to; I was already ashamed of being so negative. I actually rang Cupcake and apologised. “You’re right,” I said, “we’ll get the money somehow. Even if it means robbing a bank!”

  Of course, we didn’t rob a bank; but we were about to embark on our life of crime…

  CHAPTER SIX

  Miracles do happen! I’d said so to Cupcake, and she hadn’t believed me. But they do – and one did! It happened to me and Cupcake the very next day, in Cupcake’s back garden. Not that we immediately recognised it as a miracle. It wasn’t like we suddenly discovered a load of buried treasure or a wad of banknotes tossed over the fence. I don’t think miracles are ever that simple. I think what they do is, they point the way, like a sort of signpost: FOLLOW THIS PATH. And then it’s up to you whether you follow it or not. Sometimes, probably, with a lot of people, they don’t even notice. It just goes to show, you have to be on the lookout.

  What happened with me and Cupcake, we were in the garden playing with Cookie and racking our brains how to make more money. Cupcake had a pen and a notepad and was writing a list. So far the list had three things on it:

  Sponsored run

  Sponsored sing

  Sponsored sit

  The run was my idea; the singing was Cupcake’s. But since I can’t sing and Cupcake’s no use at running, we reckoned we might as well cross them off before we even started. So then we thought maybe we could spend the whole of lunch break sitting absolutely still, like statues, and people could come and watch us and pay us money for every minute we didn’t twitch.

  I said, “That way, the whole school could give us money… we could make hundreds!”

  “Like last time,” said Cupcake. “We were going to make hundreds last time.”

  “Yes, but that was just our year group. This would be the whole school!”

  Cupcake said, “Mm… maybe.”

  I knew I hadn’t convinced her. I wasn’t really convinced myself. I sighed, and tossed Cookie’s ball for him. He scampered after it, on three legs, then suddenly stopped. His tail went down, his head went down. His sides started heaving. Cupcake went into instant panic.

  “What’s happening? What’s happening? What’s wrong with him?”

  It’s just as well that I know about dogs. “It’s all right,” I said. “He’s only being sick.”

  “But why? What’s wrong?”

  “He probably didn’t chew his food properly. It’s what happens with my gran’s dog. If she doesn’t cut his dinner up small enough, he gollops it all down, then brings it straight back up.”

  “But he hasn’t had any dinner! He had his dinner last night. Oh, God, suppose he’s been poisoned?”

  Already Cupcake was on her hands and knees, peering at whatever it was that Cookie had sicked up. Cookie peered, too. His tail wagged hopefully.

  “What is it?” I said. Something repulsive, I bet.

  “Don’t know.” Cupcake broke a twig off a nearby bush and began poking. “Hey, come and have a look!”

  “Do I have to?”

  “Yes! There’s something here.”

  A pile of dog sick. I crawled across the grass.

  “It’s a ring!” said Cupcake.

  “Wow!” I suddenly got excited. I snatched at the twig. “Let’s have a proper look… this could be valuable!”

  “Ugh.” Cupcake shied away. “It’s all black and gungy!”

  “Only cos it’s been inside him. It’s stomach acid.”

  “It’s disgusting!”

  “You were the one prodding at it. Let’s take it back to my place and get it cleaned up!”

  Cupcake said, “My mum’s got cleaning stuff.”<
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  “Yeah, but she’d want to know what we wanted it for. We can be on our own if we go back to my place. My mum’s out shopping.” Mum was out shopping, Dad was at work. In other words, nobody around to ask questions. I just felt, instinctively, that it would be better if our mums didn’t know. The start of the slippery slope…

  “First thing to do,” I said, “is soak it in vinegar.”

  “What for?” said Cupcake.

  “It’s what you do.” It was what my dad had done when he’d dug up an ancient spoon in my gran’s back garden. Not my doggy gran; the other one. The spoon had been black, just like the ring. Dad had been really excited! He’d soaked it in vinegar and cleaned it with special polish, then looked at it through a magnifying glass to see if it was silver.

  “How can you tell?” said Cupcake.

  I said, “I’m not sure… they have these little marks.” Hallmarks; that’s what Dad had called them. “He looked them up on the computer. If it’s got the right sort of marks it means it’s real silver.”

  Gran’s spoon had had the right marks. Dad had wanted to sell it, but Gran had said no, she fancied the idea of having a real silver spoon.

  “But she could have sold it,” I said. “People give you money for real silver.”

  Me and Cupcake looked at each other.

  “How much?” said Cupcake.

  “Dunno, but I think you’d get more for jewellery than for a spoon,” I said.

  We couldn’t wait for that ring to be cleaned up! As soon as we’d soaked it and polished it, so that it was all bright and shiny, I held it at an angle and squinted at it.

  “Is there a mark? Is there a mark?” Cupcake was almost jumping up and down with impatience.

  “There’s a… a thing that looks like an anchor, and a… a lion.”

  “What does that mean? Does that mean it’s real silver?”

  “Not sure till we’ve looked it up. But look! Blue stones.” There was a whole little cluster of them, arranged in the shape of a flower. “They could be sapphires!”

  Cupcake’s eyes went very big and round. “Sapphires,” she breathed. “They’re precious!”

  “Let’s go and look up the marks!”

  We raced to the computer and clicked on to Google. I said, “What shall I put in? Silver, or hallmarks?”

  “Both,” said Cupcake. “What sort of marks did your gran’s spoon have?”

  “Can’t remember… there are loads of them. All different. They tell you where things were made. Look, look!” I pointed jubilantly. “There it is!”

  An anchor, and a lion, just like on our ring. We peered closer at the screen.

  “Made in Birmingham,” said Cupcake. “Is that OK?”

  “Course it is! Doesn’t matter where it’s made, just so long as it’s real silver. It could be worth a fortune!” I turned and scooped up Cookie, who was busy trying to dig a hole in the carpet. “He’s our little fortune cookie!”

  It was a solemn moment. “You honestly think we could get something for it?” said Cupcake.

  “Why not? It’s silver.”

  “But what if someone asks where it’s come from?”

  “It came out of our dog. That’s why he’s our fortune cookie!”

  “Yes, but… before that. Before he swallowed it.”

  “Could have come from anywhere. It’s not our problem, is it?”

  Cupcake said, “N-no… I s’ppose not.”

  “Well, it’s not! We can’t help what he did before we got him. He could have done all sorts of things! You can’t blame us.”

  “No. In any case,” said Cupcake, sounding a bit bolder, “we don’t actually know. Not for certain.”

  I could guess what she was thinking, cos I was thinking it, too. We were both remembering the day we had seen Cookie in the old lady’s garden, tossing something bright and shiny into the air, and the old woman had come running out and shouted and taken it away from him. And then we’d seen him doing it again, a few days later; only this time the old woman hadn’t come out…

  “Still not our problem,” I said. “I’ll tell you what our problem is.”

  “What?”

  “Where are we going to sell it?” It was a big problem. “If we go into a jeweller’s,” I said, “they’ll only cheat us.”

  “Either that, or ask questions.”

  I agreed that questions were the last thing we wanted. It is very difficult, sometimes, being eleven years old. Well, I’m twelve, now, and I can’t really say it’s got any easier. There are just so many things you can’t do! Like selling a valuable ring that has been sicked up by your own puppy without a) being ripped off, just because you’re kids, or b) reported to the police.

  “Cos that’s what they’d do,” said Cup. “They’d think we’d stolen it.”

  “Well, we haven’t,” I said fiercely. “It belongs to us and there’s got to be some way we can get the money for it!”

  “We could try putting a card in a shop window,” said Cupcake. “Mum found Joey’s tricycle from a shop window.”

  “Mm… ” I wasn’t sure I liked the sound of that. “We’d have to give a telephone number. Anyone could just ring up! You could get nutters and all sorts.”

  My dad’s always going on eBay. He’s really into finding bargains! And selling things. But I knew they wouldn’t let me and Cupcake on there. Too young. Like you can’t act responsibly, just because you’re eleven years old.

  “There’s got to be something!” said Cupcake.

  Neither of us suggested going to my mum and dad, or Cupcake’s mum. We both knew what they’d do.

  “Go to the police.” We chanted it, together. “Of course – ” Cupcake said a bit uncertainly – “there might be a reward.”

  I said, “Yes, and there might not. We can’t afford to take the chance!”

  “It’s not really breaking the law,” said Cupcake, “is it?”

  I told her very firmly that it wasn’t. “It’s our ring that came out of our dog and we’re going to get the money for it!”

  We decided what we would do: we would go to the shopping centre and look in all the jewellers’ windows and check out the prices.

  “That way,” I said, “we’ll know a bit better what it’s worth.”

  In the meantime, we had to find somewhere safe to put it. It is amazing how difficult it is to find safe places – that is, places your mum won’t go stumbling into while she’s dusting, or vacuuming, or putting stuff away. I thought maybe it would be best if I wore it round my neck on a piece of string, but Cupcake screamed out in horror.

  “You might get mugged!”

  I said, “Nobody would know it was there.”

  “But they might mug you anyway, and then they’d find it. Or what if the string went and broke?”

  I said, “String doesn’t break,” but she insisted that we had to find some safe place. “Somewhere in your bedroom.”

  “Like where?” I said. “For instance?”

  We both stared round. Cupcake said, “Maybe we could hide it in a drawer… like under a pile of clothes, or something.” But that wasn’t any good. Who knew when Mum might have one of her mad fits and start rearranging things, or “weeding out”, like the time she took my favourite T-shirt to use as a floor cloth?

  “But, Dani,” she said, when I protested, “it was a rag!”

  It might have been a rag, but it was my rag. And I loved it! I was relating the tale with much bitterness to Cupcake when we heard the front door open and Dad’s voice ring out: “Anyone at home?”

  Cupcake squeaked, “Your dad! Do something!”

  I didn’t hesitate. Quick as a flash, I yanked off one of my trainers, stuffed the ring into my sock, down over the toes, and shoved my foot back in. Cupcake watched, open-mouthed. Astonished, I expect, by the speed of my reaction. I think I am quite good in emergencies! I am not one of those people that go all to pieces.

  We went out into the hall. I said, “Hi, Dad!” Cupcake, who is always ver
y polite, said, “Hello, Mr Cassidy.”

  Dad sprang round, in mock terror. “Don’t shoot, I give in!” He put his hands in the air. “Take my money but spare my life!” And then he laughed and said, “How ya doin’, Cupcake? Surprised the police haven’t caught up with you two yet!”

  It is Dad’s idea of a joke; he is always teasing us about being outlaws, like Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid. Usually we joke back, but this time Cupcake went bright red, like we really were wanted by the police. I knew I had to rescue the situation. Cupcake was practically bursting into flames.

  “We’re just taking Cookie back home,” I said, “then we’re off into town to do a couple of bank jobs.”

  “And the best of luck!” said Dad.

  “He thinks it’s funny,” whispered Cupcake, as we left the flat.

  “Well, it is,” I said. “Imagine us marching into a bank!”

  “He wouldn’t think it was so funny if he knew what you’d got in your sock,” said Cupcake. “And suppose you get mugged?”

  I said, “What if I do? Who’s going to look in my sock?”

  “In the hospital, they would. If you had to go there after being mugged!”

  It’s no use arguing with her. Once Cupcake gets an idea into her head, there’s no shifting it. All the way up the road, she was seeing muggers wherever she looked. Black muggers, white muggers. Men, women and children muggers. Even, once, a little old lady mugger. She said, “You read about these things. Some old ladies can be really violent!”

  Not any of the ones we met, though an old lady on the bus, as we went into town, did ask me if I needed to sit down. She thought I’d twisted my ankle! I said, “Thank you, but it’s all right, I just have a bunion.” I’m not quite sure what a bunion is, exactly, except that you get them on your feet and they’re painful. One of my grans is always going on about her bunions. In fact what had happened was that the ring had somehow managed to get itself wedged between two of my toes and was rubbing them raw. I told Cupcake that I was in agony, but she wasn’t the least bit sympathetic. She just said that it was “A stupid place to put it.” Just for that, when we got off the bus I made her stand guard while I took my trainer off and stuck my fingers down my sock, trying to wriggle the ring free of my toes. That really gave her the jitters!