School Ship Tobermory

  A rope came snaking down from above. Fee tied this to the rubber boat, stowed the paddles safely, and then she and Ben began to inch their way up the rope ladder.

  “Ben,” whispered Fee as they began the climb. “Aren’t you just a little bit … scared?”

  Ben, who had started first, looked down at his sister beneath him. His decision to be brave was working. “Don’t be scared, Fee,” he said. “I’m not.”

  But she was. And so would anybody be. The water seemed a long way down below now, and the Tobermory was rocking in the swell of the sea, making the rope ladder swing out from the side of the ship.

  “I didn’t hear you,” said Fee. “What did you say?”

  “I said I’m not scared,” repeated Ben.

  And oddly enough, simply saying that he was not scared seemed to help.

  They were nearly at the top of the ladder now, and he even managed to smile as he saw a pair of hands stretch out over the railings to help him clamber onto the deck. He looked up and saw that the hands belonged to a boy of about his own age, dressed in a smart blue uniform and grinning at him in a friendly way. The boy had a cheerful look to him – the sort of look that makes you think, I hope he’ll be my friend.

  “I’m Badger Tomkins,” said the boy as he gripped Ben’s wrists and pulled him onto the deck. “Who are you?”

  “I’m Ben,” said Ben.

  “I was told to look out for you,” said Badger. “Welcome aboard the Tobermory!”

  Badger now turned to help Fee. “You must be Fee,” he said. “I saw your name on the list of new students. Welcome, Fee!”

  “What do we do now?” asked Ben.

  “We haul up your dinghy,” said Badger. “Then we let the air out of it and stow it away. Everything has to be stowed away neatly on the ship. It’s one of the rules.”

  “Are there lots of rules?” asked Ben.

  Badger laughed. “Plenty,” he said. “Maybe five or six hundred. But don’t worry. You probably only need to know ten. Those are called the big rules. All the others are called small rules, and we don’t pay much attention to them.”

  Fee stared at Badger. “Do you like it here?” she asked.

  Badger thought this a rather odd question. “But of course I like it,” he answered. “This is the most amazing, fantastic, exciting, superb, ace school in … in the entire world.”

  “Are you joking?” asked Ben.

  “Not at all,” said Badger. “You’ll see soon enough.” He paused. “Mind you, I won’t pretend that there aren’t some things that aren’t so great.”

  “What are those?” asked Ben.

  “You’ll see,” said Badger again. He looked at his watch. “We’d better get your boat up. Breakfast is in half an hour and if you’re late all the sausages will be taken.” He made a face. “Some people always try to take more than their fair share.”

  “Who are they?” asked Fee.

  “You’ll see,” said Badger once again. “But let’s not stand about talking. Let’s get the boat up and then I can take you to the Captain before breakfast. We always have to take new people to the Captain when they arrive.”

  “Is he the principal?” asked Ben.

  “He is,” said Badger. “But you never call him that. He’s called the Captain because he’s the captain of the ship. His full name is Captain Macbeth. He’s also a teacher, of course, but his main job is running the ship.”

  They began to haul up their dinghy. Once it was up on deck, they took out the plug, deflated it, and stowed it away in a nearby locker. The locker was full of other dinghies, all folded up just as theirs was. “This is where we keep our personal boats,” explained Badger. “Mine is that red one over there. It has a bit of a leak, I’m afraid, but I don’t use it often now. We have a class in the care and maintenance of rubber boats. They teach you how to stick a plaster over any holes.”

  Badger looked at his watch again. “Right,” he said. “Ready for the Captain? Yes? Well, in that case follow me!”

  A meeting with the Captain

  “This way,” said Badger, picking his way across the deck. “Mind you don’t trip on those coils of rope.”

  There was a lot going on. Here and there on the ship’s wide deck there were groups of people attending to various tasks. Some were washing the decks with buckets of water hauled up over the ship’s side, some were polishing brass railings, while others were sorting out kit-bags piled up near one of the hatches.

  “It’s always like this at the start of a new term,” remarked Badger. “There’s a lot to do before we go out to sea.”

  A boy rushed past Badger, greeting him as he ran off on some errand. “Hi, Badge,” he called out, and then, “Got to go!”

  Badger gave him a smart salute. “That’s the Head Prefect of the Lower Deck,” he said. “We have three decks, you see, where everybody lives. He’s my friend.”

  Fee and Ben felt a little bit overwhelmed. Everybody looked so busy – and also seemed so confident of their tasks. By contrast, neither of them had any idea what to do. It was all very well being used to submarines, but it seemed that a sailing ship was quite different. Submarines had very few ropes, and no sails of course. And their family submarine was so small beside this great ship that seemed to go on forever in every direction.

  Badger was walking quickly, and Ben and Fee had to struggle to catch up with him.

  “You don’t sound Scottish,” said Ben. “Where are you from?”

  “Oh, we’re all from all over the place,” Badger answered. “I’m American. I come from New York. But the school has people from everywhere, really. Poppy, over there, is from Australia. You’ll like her, by the way. She’s also my friend.”

  He pointed to a tall girl with red hair, who caught his eye and waved.

  “If you live in New York,” Ben asked, “then why are you at school over here?”

  Badger frowned. “It’s a long story,” he said. “My parents, you see, are very busy. They work all the time.”

  “In one of those tall buildings?”

  “Yes,” said Badger. “On the forty-fifth floor. And I’m afraid they’re too busy to spend much time with me. They wanted to send me to a boarding school in the woods in a place called Vermont. But you know something? I don’t really like trees all that much. I much preferred the idea of going to a school where you can do sailing. So I did some research and found out about the Tobermory. I had to persuade them – which wasn’t easy – but eventually they agreed. So here I am.” He paused. “I don’t think they really notice whether or not I’m around.”

  Ben was not sure what to say. His own parents had not sent him away because they were too busy – they always had a lot of time for him – and for Fee, too. They were at boarding school because it was difficult to get to school if you spent a lot of time on a submarine, and of course there was also the problem of their aunt’s new job.

  He decided that the best thing to say to Badger was “I’m sorry.” You can never go far wrong if you say you’re sorry.

  “That’s all right,” said Badger. “I’m used to it. And maybe one day they’ll stop being busy and we’ll be able to do some stuff together.” He paused. “You know what I’d really like to do? I’d like to go sailing with them again. We did that once, and I really liked it – just sailing with my Mom and Dad.”

  “I hope you do,” said Fee.

  They had now reached a set of steps a bit like a ladder that led down from the deck into the inside of the ship. “These steps are called the companionway,” said Badger. “That’s something you need to remember. Just about everything on a ship has a special name, and you’re going to have to remember that. If you call things by the wrong name three times in a row you can end up on potato-peeling duty.”

  “Oh,” said Fee. They never bothered with the names of things on the submarine. She had always simply said “that thingy over there” or “that funny-looking handle” and “that red what-do-you-call-it?” But what was this warning ab
out potato-peeling?

  “They make you peel potatoes?” she asked.

  “Yes,” said Badger. “That’s the main punishment round here. That, and extra scrubbing of the deck, but you have to do something really bad to get that. The worst thing that can happen to you, though, is to be made to clean out the bathrooms. We call those the heads, by the way – we never say bathroom on a ship.”

  “I hope that we don’t have to …” began Fee.

  “Oh, don’t worry,” said Badger. “It’s not a strict school. The Captain is kind and the teachers are fine too. You’re not going to be unhappy, you know. We all love this place.”

  They made their way down the companionway. It was rather dark down below, as the only place for light to get in was through the portholes on the side of the ship. But their eyes quickly became used to the darkness, and they could make out that they were in a passageway at the end of which was a large wooden door.

  “That’s the Great Cabin,” said Badger. “It’s the Captain’s office, but it’s also the place where he hangs his hammock and has some of his meals.”

  “What’s he like?” whispered Ben as they approached the door.

  Badger paused before he knocked. “The Captain? Oh, you’ll like him. He’s a large man, and he has a beard. But a lot of the teachers have beards – the men teachers, that is. The women teachers all wear their hair in a ponytail, except Matron, who is an excellent high diver, and has her hair cut short so that it doesn’t get in her eyes when she’s diving.”

  “What do we call him?” asked Fee. “Do we have to call him sir?”

  Badger shook his head. “You can if you want, but mostly we call him Captain,” he said. “And he’ll call you by your name, or, if he forgets that, he’ll call you sailor. The teachers usually call us by our names, except for the Ship’s Cook, who’s married to the Matron, and who calls everybody ‘you’, except for me: he calls me Badger because I think he likes me. And Matron, of course – he calls her ‘Rabbit’, which makes us want to laugh. But we don’t, of course, because the ship’s cook is in charge of how much ice cream we get and if he gets cross with you, then you get a tiny portion of ice cream instead of a normal one. So, never laugh at the ship’s cook. That’s what we call an important rule.”

  Badger reached forward to knock. Almost immediately a voice called out from inside and Badger opened the door. The Great Cabin was before them, and there, behind a large desk on which charts were spread out in confusion, sat the Captain of the Tobermory.

  “Well, well, well,” said the Captain. “Now who do we have here?”

  “They’re new,” said Badger. “They’ve just arrived. We’ve stowed their boat already.”

  “Well done,” said the Captain. “Now you wait outside, Badger, so that I can talk to these two fine young people.”

  Badger left, closing the door behind him. Ben and Fee stood in front of the Captain’s desk, both feeling a bit nervous. They were relieved, though, to see the Captain had a kind face and that he smiled as he talked to them.

  “You must be Ben and Fee MacTavish,” began the Captain. “You’re both very welcome aboard the Tobermory!”

  “Thank you, Captain,” said Ben, trying hard to sound confident.

  The Captain nodded. “I met your parents once, you know. It was a few years ago when they were on their submarine up near Iceland. They were tracking seals, I think, for some big scientific project.”

  “They told us that,” said Fee. “We were staying with our aunt then.”

  “You must have done quite a bit of sea time,” said the Captain.

  Ben hesitated, but then said, “We’re not really experienced, Captain. We’ve been on our parents’ submarine a lot, but it’s completely different. You don’t get to know the sea so well when you’re under it.”

  The Captain thought about this. “Yes, I suppose so. You never see the waves, do you? And you never need to bother about the wind.”

  “So we don’t really know much about sailing ships,” said Fee.

  “I see,” said the Captain. “Well, we’ll set that right.” He paused, and looked at them intently. “So, here you are, right at the beginning of your time on the Tobermory. And I have to ask you something. I ask everybody this question when they first come to us. I make no exceptions.”

  They waited for the question.

  “This is what I need to ask,” said the Captain, looking first into Fee’s eyes and then into Ben’s. “Do you really want to be sailors? Do you really want that, deep down in your heart? Because if you don’t, you know, then it’s best to stop right here. I won’t think any the less of you if you tell me you don’t want to go to sea. There’s a perfectly good shore school in Tobermory itself and they’ll take you, if you prefer to be on dry land.”

  Ben glanced at Fee, and she shook her head. “No,” he said. “This is what we want. We really want to go to sea.”

  The Captain smiled. “Very well. But I must tell you one other thing, and it’s a very important thing. Going to sea can be dangerous. As a member of this school you will face challenges that people who go to school on land never have to face. There will be times when we shall all be in danger – I can guarantee you that. Are you prepared for that?”

  This time it was Fee who glanced at Ben. He did not hesitate to nod. And so Fee said to the Captain, “My brother and I are both prepared to face danger, Captain. We promise you that.”

  The Captain rubbed his hands together. “That’s the spirit! So all you have to do now is find your berths. Mind you, you don’t really have a berth as such, as you will be sleeping in hammocks. But Badger will show you. Girls have their cabins on the starboard side – that means the right-hand side – and boys on the port side – that’s the left-hand side. But of course you’ll know that already from being on your parents’ submarine.”

  Fee swallowed hard. She had heard those terms before, but she always found it difficult to remember which was which.

  “And you can get your kit from Matron,” the Captain continued. “She’ll give you a toothbrush and a towel and things like that. Understood?”

  The Captain called out for Badger, who quickly reappeared from behind the door.

  “Matron first,” barked the Captain. “Then Middle Deck.”

  Badger nodded. “Aye, aye. I’ll take them right away, Captain.”

  Once outside the Great Cabin, Badger turned to Ben and said, “I’m glad you’re on Middle Deck. It’s the best place to be. I’m there. And Poppy too. It’s the best deck on the whole ship.”

  Matron’s a diver

  “Matron’s cabin,” said Badger, “is one deck below, on the starboard side.” He looked at Ben and Fee. “That means: on the right-hand side of the ship as you face the front.”

  Fee nodded. She was beginning to pick up the special nautical words. “Starboard right, port left,” she muttered. And then added, “And the floor’s …”

  “The deck,” prompted Badger. “Well done, Fee!”

  To get there from the Great Cabin they had to make their way along a narrow passageway, and it was there that they saw the dog. They could easily have missed him, though, as he was not very big and was scurrying along rather quickly, with the air of a dog who knows exactly where he is going.

  “That’s the Captain’s dog,” explained Badger. “His name is Henry and he’s quite useful. He carries things around. If you give him a piece of rope and say, ‘Take that to the Captain, Henry,’ he’ll do just that. As long as you use his name, that is. If you forget to say ‘Henry’ he’ll just stare at you and do nothing. He’s particular about manners.”

  Henry disappeared round a corner.

  “He looks busy,” said Ben.

  “He often is at the beginning of term,” said Badger. “But then when we’re out at sea he doesn’t have quite so much to do. You often find him standing by one of the railings, staring down at the water or looking out to sea.”

  Badger paused before continuing, “There’s a str
ange story about him. Would you like to hear it?”

  Ben said that they would, and so the three of them squatted down in the passageway as Badger told them the story.

  “I’m not sure if this really happened,” he began, “but I’ll tell you anyway. I think it may be true, but on the other hand it may not. It’s difficult to say.”

  “We don’t mind,” said Ben. “Please tell us the story.”

  “Right,” began Badger. “Henry was up on the deck one morning. He was on watch, which means he was on duty. You’ll find out all about that. You go on watch for about four hours, then once you’ve done that you’re not on watch for the rest of the day.”

  “What do you do when you’re on watch?” asked Fee.

  “You watch,” replied Ben. “You have to look out and see that the ship doesn’t bump into anything. You also have to take your turn at the helm – that’s the steering wheel, and so on.”

  “We steer the ship?” asked Ben, amazed at the thought of being in charge of so large a boat. Like Fee, he had taken a turn at steering the family submarine, but that was so much smaller than the Tobermory.

  “Oh yes,” said Badger. “You get used to it, although when you’re still new – which you are, of course – you have to be extra careful. There was a boy once who almost took us onto the rocks because he was gazing up at the clouds when he should have been looking where we were going. And there was a girl who took us in a complete circle because she was talking on her phone at the time. The Captain doesn’t like that sort of thing, you know.”

  This reminded Fee of what had happened the last time she had brought the submarine to the surface. “Oops,” she said. “I feel sorry for that girl. I know how easy it is to be distracted …”

  “By looking at seagulls, for instance,” said Ben, giving his sister a sideways glance. “Sorry, Fee, maybe I shouldn’t have said that.”

  Badger, though, was interested to hear about the incident. “What happened?” he asked.