Secrets at St Jude’s: Rebel Girl Read online

  ‘Shhhhh . . .’ Dermot moved his face towards her to kiss again. But then they could both hear footsteps coming up the staircase.

  The footsteps paused in the hallway and a voice called over: ‘Hey, Dermot, is that you?’

  Dermot looked down, over Gina’s shoulder, and saw the questioning grin of one of his school friends.

  ‘Callum!’ he called out. ‘How’s it going?’

  At this, Gina turned. She saw a boy of about Dermot’s age, seventeen, in jeans and a black leather jacket. His hair was jet black and casually spiky and he had a strikingly handsome, smooth-skinned face.

  ‘You’ve got to be Gina,’ he said with a little sideways smile and a raised eyebrow. ‘I’ve heard a lot about you.’

  Contents

  Cover

  About the Book

  Title Page

  Chapter One

  Chapter Two

  Chapter Three

  Chapter Four

  Chapter Five

  Chapter Six

  Chapter Seven

  Chapter Eight

  Chapter Nine

  Chapter Ten

  Chapter Eleven

  Chapter Twelve

  Chapter Thirteen

  Chapter Fourteen

  Chapter Fifteen

  Chapter Sixteen

  Chapter Seventeen

  Chapter Eighteen

  Chapter Nineteen

  Chapter Twenty

  Chapter Twenty-one

  Chapter Twenty-two

  Chapter Twenty-three

  Chapter Twenty-four

  Chapter Twenty-five

  Chapter Twenty-six

  Chapter Twenty-seven

  Chapter Twenty-eight

  Chapter Twenty-nine

  Chapter Thirty

  Chapter Thirty-one

  Chapter Thirty-two

  About the Author

  Also by Carmen Reid

  Copyright

  Praise for the Secrets at St Jude’s series:

  ‘Warm-hearted and hugely entertaining’

  Julia Eccleshare, Lovereading 4 Kids

  ‘Raucous, hilarious and heart-warming . . . from one of the UK’s bestselling authors of women’s fiction. Packed full of friendship, fun, entertainment, love and hope’

  Lovereading 4 Kids

  www.rbooks.co.uk

  About the Book

  At St Jude’s School for Girls, four friends are facing very different problems . . .

  Can Gina still be happy with her boyfriend when there’s such an exciting new guy on the scene?

  How will Amy survive when her rich dad’s money disappears?

  What can tomboy Niffy do to make herself gorgeous?

  And why is Min spending so much time in the study and missing all the fun?

  Sounds like all the St Jude’s friends need to get in touch with their inner Rebel Girl this term!

  Carmen Reid

  MEET THE ST JUDE’S GIRLS . . .

  GINA

  Full name: Gina Louise Winklemann-Peterson

  Home: A fabulous white and glass, architect-designed beach house with pool on the Californian coast

  Likes: Sunshine (sadly not often found in Edinburgh), swimming, Halloween, pointy ankle boots, Prada or anything Prada-esque, Reece’s Pieces, her cell phone, her little brother Menzie (sometimes), coffee, a certain charming part-time waiter at the Arts Café called Dermot O’Hagan

  Dislikes: Slithery octopus-type kisses, the totally gross sludge-green St Jude’s school uniform, deadly dull history lessons, Charlie Fotherington-whatsit, boiled vegetables of any kind (I mean, guys, like, haven’t you heard of stir-fry?)

  Would like to be: A screenwriter – but absolutely no one in the whole world knows about that

  Fascinating fact: Gina has three other best friends at her old school in California – Paula, Ria and Maddison. They still can’t believe she goes to boarding school in Scotland

  NIFFY

  Full name: Luella Edith Millicent Pethurer Nairn-Bassett (no wonder she’s called either ‘Niffy’ or ‘Lou‘)

  Home: The ancient, crumbling, ancestral mansion Blacklough Hall in Cumbria, England

  Likes: Playing pranks, enormous horses and slobbery dogs, all team games, (especially hockey – she’s really good), the St J’s assembly game Banshee Buzzword Bingo (which she invented), her big brother Finn, the odd sneaked glass of expensive red wine, all school food, but especially pudding

  Dislikes: Dresses, dressing up, poncy shoes and fussy clothes of any description, make-up, fussing with her hair, fussing about anything at all, her real name

  Would like to be: A professional rider – an international show-jumper, or maybe a three-day eventer – that way she could do show jumping, dressage and her favourite, cross-country jumping

  Fascinating fact: She can be fully dressed in all her riding clothes and hat in twenty-five seconds flat

  MIN

  Full name: Asimina Singupta

  Home: A big family house with a huge garden in a suburb of Durban, South Africa

  Likes: Running really, really fast and winning, being top of the class in every single subject, doing homework (it’s so interesting when you really get into it), mango lassis, gold bracelets, reading science books, borrowing Amy’s clothes, her mum’s home-made curries

  Dislikes: The sight of blood, Biology lessons, babysitting her little brothers and sisters, the food at St J’s, wearing her hair in plaits, Scottish grey skies

  Would like to be: A medical researcher or medical physicist. She has to do something medical because of her doctor parents but it can’t involve blood!

  Fascinating fact: Min‘s mother taught herself Italian and went all the way to Pisa to get her medical degree

  AMY

  Full name: Amy Margaret McCorquodale

  Home: An amazing penthouse flat in

  Glasgow, Scotland, with a terrace and panoramic view of the city

  Likes: Designer jeans (Iceberg), designer bags (Marc Jacobs), designer boots (Jimmy Choo, but only when her dad is feeling incredibly generous), Edinburgh’s Harvey Nichols (obviously), very handsome boys, diamonds, champagne, dance music, dressing up and going out, her gran‘s mince and tatties

  Dislikes: Penny Boswell-Hackett, Mrs Norah ‘the Neb’ Knebworth, everything in Niffy’s wardrobe, French lessons, people teasing her about her

  Glaswegian accent, oh and Penny

  Boswell-Hackett (have you got that?)

  Would like to be: Officially, she’s going to do a law degree, then join her dad’s nightclub business. Secretly, she’d like to be a famous and fabulous actress

  Fascinating fact: Amy’s mum and dad were teenagers when she . . . er . . . arrived. She was brought up by her dad, her gran and her grandpa. She hasn’t seen her real mum for years

  Chapter One

  LONG AFTER MIDNIGHT, Gina lay wide awake in her narrow dorm bed. It was her first night back at school after the Christmas holidays. Although the eighteen hours of travel which had taken her from California to her boarding school in Scotland had been exhausting, her body clock was still set stubbornly to Pacific Standard Time and she could not get to sleep.

  She listened to the quiet breathing around her and guessed that the three girls who shared her dorm weren’t having the same problem. Amy had travelled to St Jude’s School for Girls in Edinburgh from her home just one hour away in Glasgow, so no jet-lag issues there. Niffy (‘my real name’s Luella, but it stinks’) had come from the creaky, ramshackle family country home in Cumbria.

  Then there was Min, who had flown into Edinburgh from South Africa earlier today, but the time difference between Scotland and her home town, Durban, was only a couple of hours,
so she wasn’t suffering.

  The first night back at school was always weird.

  The small room, the orange street-light shining behind the curtains, the narrow bed . . . everything felt so different from home. Even though Gina knew she would miss her family and the warm, outdoorsy Californian lifestyle, she was still pleased to be back. St Jude’s was her school now and these three girls asleep in their beds beside her were best friends. Yes, she still had three best friends back home in California, but after two whole terms here, the St Jude’s girls had become just as important to her now.

  As Gina lay awake, looking up at the sloping attic ceiling above her head, she suddenly heard an unexpected noise. It sounded like the low rumble of a wooden window being pulled up, but she couldn’t be sure.

  The ‘Iris’ dorm, which Gina shared with Amy, Niffy and Min, was up on the top floor of one of the huge old Victorian houses which formed the St Jude’s boarding house. Now that Gina was straining her ears, she thought she could hear more noises and they sounded as if they were coming from the top of the fire escape.

  ‘Psssst! Are you awake?’

  This whisper had come from Niffy’s direction.

  ‘Yeah,’ Gina whispered back.

  ‘Did you just hear that?’ Niffy asked.

  ‘Yeah.’

  ‘It sounds like something’s happening on the fire escape outside Daffodil dorm.’

  Daffodil dorm, which Gina and her friends had shared last year, had four beds, just like Iris. It was also tucked up under the sloping attic ceilings. The great thing about Daffodil dorm was that it had a window leading out onto the fire escape. On a sunny evening, the top of the fire escape was a forbidden, but nonetheless delicious, place to sit.

  ‘I think we should go and investigate,’ Niffy added.

  ‘I don’t know,’ Gina began. Wandering about the boarding house at night, for any purpose other than trips to the loo, was against the rules. She didn’t like to think of herself as a total stickler for school rules, but she didn’t like to break them unless there was a good reason.

  ‘But what if someone has climbed up the fire escape and is trying to get in . . .?’ Niffy whispered urgently.

  Gina considered: hadn’t the noise sounded like a window being opened?

  ‘What if some burglar or an armed maniac is trying to get into that dorm right now?’ Niffy went on.

  To be honest, if that was happening, Gina would really rather stay hidden in bed.

  ‘We need to go!’ Niffy said, throwing back her duvet and sitting up. She quickly pushed her feet into her slippers, then tied her dressing gown around her.

  ‘Stay here if you like, chicken-licken, but I’m going to take a look.’

  Gina sighed, pulled her own duvet back, then put on her slippers and dressing gown. She did not like the idea of confronting a burglar one tiny little bit, but she didn’t like the idea of Niffy having to confront one on her own either.

  ‘OK,’ she agreed.

  But Niffy was definitely going to go first.

  The two girls tiptoeing out of the Iris dorm looked very different from one another. Gina was dainty, pretty, blonde and tanned. She was wrapped in a delicate silk kimono with fluffy pink mules on her feet. Niffy was tall, gangly, all arms, legs and unruly brown hair, bundled into some shabby brown tartan dressing gown, which had probably once belonged to her big brother.

  Together, they crept out of the dorm, shutting the door quietly behind them. The hallway glowed faintly with the night-lights which picked out the fire exits. Without hesitating, Niffy made straight for the door of the Daffodil dorm. She took hold of the handle and began to push the door open.

  Gina stood behind her friend, her heart hammering nervously in her chest. She did not like this, not one little bit, but she couldn’t stop herself from looking over Niffy’s shoulder into the darkened room.

  It was totally silent and still. Gina could make out the four beds in the room. Three girls, wrapped in duvets, seemed to be fast asleep. The window at the fire escape looked shut.

  But then, all of a sudden, one of the duvet bundles sat up and hissed, ‘Niffy! Is that you?’

  ‘Yes,’ Niffy answered.

  The two other duvet bundles sat up too and someone snapped on a side light.

  ‘For Pete’s sake, go away!’ the first bundle, now very obviously Milly from the Lower Sixth, instructed.

  ‘Why?’ Niffy asked, all fired up with curiosity.

  ‘Go away!’ Anthea, one of the other dorm members, repeated.

  ‘No, she’s OK, she can stay if she wants,’ the third girl, Shyanne, chipped in.

  ‘You know Gina, don’t you?’ Niffy asked as she stepped into the dorm, revealing the friend standing behind her.

  ‘Gina from California? Who goes out with Dermot at the Arts Café? Yup, we know her,’ Shyanne replied.

  ‘Hi,’ Gina said shyly, not sure if she liked being known for just those two things.

  ‘So what’s going on?’ Niffy wanted to know. ‘We heard a noise . . . it woke us up. We thought you were being burgled or kidnapped – something exciting.’

  Milly got out of bed. She was already wearing her dressing gown. ‘Something exciting is about to happen,’ she said. ‘We just thought you were the Neb about to catch us red-handed.’

  At this mention of the fearsome woman who ruled the boarding house, everyone felt a little shiver of nerves.

  But nevertheless, Milly went over to the fire-escape window and threw it open, letting a blast of cold January air sweep through the room.

  Anthea crouched down by the side of her bed and pulled out a neatly rolled coil of bright-blue climbing rope.

  ‘If you’re running away, you won’t need a rope,’ Niffy pointed out. ‘There is a fire escape.’

  ‘Very funny.’

  ‘So what are you doing?’ Niffy had to know, as two of the three older girls stepped out of the window, on to the top of the fire escape and began to tie the rope to the stair-rail.

  ‘Shhhhh!’ Milly insisted. ‘What time is it?’ she asked in a whisper.

  Shyanne glanced at the clock beside her bed and whispered back, ‘Twelve fifty-six.’

  ‘Four minutes till delivery,’ Milly said, ‘and we’ve definitely put the hook end down in the garden, haven’t we?’

  As the girls checked over the rope arrangement, Gina and Niffy looked at one another.

  What on earth was going on? Delivery of what?

  ‘What’s happening? C’mon. Give us a clue!’ Niffy pleaded, determined to wangle something out of someone. ‘And where’s Laurel?’ she asked next, pointing at the empty bed. ‘Broken something skiing?’

  The two older girls came back in through the window and half closed it against the wind. They were obviously waiting for something to happen in the garden.

  ‘Is someone coming? Is something arriving for you?’ Niffy asked.

  ‘Yes!’ Milly said with exasperation. ‘Just keep very quiet. At one a.m. exactly – I don’t want to miss it.’

  ‘And Laurel?’ Niffy asked again in a tiny whisper.

  For a moment no one replied. Gina bumped against Niffy’s arm to try and give her the message to be quiet.

  But then Anthea blurted out: ‘Laurel’s not here because her parents ran a building firm and it’s finally gone bust. She was really worried about them last term and then, over Christmas, well . . . they told her they couldn’t afford to send her back to St Jude’s. So she’s going to some day school in Aberdeen now.’

  ‘That’s tough,’ Niffy whispered, shaking her head in sympathy. ‘That is really tough. I spent half a term at a comprehensive last year and no one there was very pleased to see me.’

  ‘Poor Laurel,’ Gina sympathized. She had worries about family finances too. She knew her mom and her step dad, Mick, were hoping for a really big deal to come off for their software company.

  As Gina’s mom, Lorelei, had put it: ‘Baby, if this happens, we won’t need to worry about money for a while, j
ust about making a great product. But if the deal doesn’t go through . . . we might have to look at making some cut-backs.’

  ‘It’s one o’clock now,’ Shyanne said, pointing at the bedside clock.

  Milly pulled the window further open again and stuck her head out to listen.

  The other girls in the dorm all crowded towards the window too.

  There was definitely a sound coming from the garden . . . someone was down there and that someone seemed to be making a faint clinking noise.

  Gina and Niffy looked at each other with raised eyebrows. Both suspected that the Daffodil dorm was about to get a delivery of bottles. Both guessed that there wasn’t exactly going to be mineral water in those bottles.

  In another bedroom, way over on the far side of the boarding house, but with a window facing onto the back garden, someone else was now waking up. Someone else who was also sure she had heard something in the garden.

  This someone was definitely not going to be amused that bottles full of booze were being clinked in the St Jude’s boarding-house garden at one o’clock in the morning on the first night of term.

  Mrs Norah Knebworth, housemistress at the boarding house for seventeen years, opened her eyes.

  She looked up at the ceiling of her small ground-floor bedroom and wondered what it was that had woken her. Once again, she heard some sort of unusual noise coming from the back garden.

  She listened hard and then sat bolt upright. She was now certain that she had heard clinking: the unmistakable kind of clinking that bottles make when they bang together as someone tries to walk with them.

  Bottles? Bottles!! Only one kind of bottle would be trying to make its way through the boarding-house garden well after midnight.

  Mrs Knebworth raised her formidable bulk from the bed. Even in a ruffled pink and white nightie with a neat regiment of foam curlers organized through her steely blonde hair, she looked like a mighty force.

  Putting her feet into sensible sheepskin slippers, designed to keep the chill of draughty Victorian floors at bay, she hurried over to her bedroom window. She peered through the chintz curtains and right there on the back lawn, underneath the long washing line where jeans and sweatshirts often flapped on breezy days, she saw something which made her mouth drop open with astonishment.