Читать книгу Vets and pets: Jamie and the magic whistle - Helen Brain Nicky Webb Rico Schacherl - Страница 8

Chickenpox for sale

Toby, the eldest of the three Waine children, looked thoughtfully out of his upstairs window. His fingers were fondling a huge pimple on his chin. In his hand he held a small glass bottle containing 37 fresh chickenpox scabs he’d bought for R20 from Rory Rinkelbaker in grade 8.

He watched Tick and Chanza come running past the washing line and disappear around the front of the house. They’re up to something, he thought.

Jamie was also in the back garden. She was trying to teach Fungi to sit and stay on command. She had a pocketful of dog treats she’d “borrowed” from the vet shop. Toby wondered if he should try and blackmail her out of her pocket money. Their mother got very annoyed when they took things from the vet shop without asking.

“You’ll never train that dog!” he called out the window. Fungi was a cross between a Maltese poodle and a Great Dane. He had a long body, short legs, fluffy fur and a goofy expression.

“Yes, I will,” called Jamie. “And stop squeezing your pimples. You’ll contaminate the planet with your toxic pus.”

The pimple popped. Toby held out his finger so she could see the green blob.

“I’m going to wipe this on your pillow!” he called.

But then he noticed that one of the chickenpox scabs was starting to dry out. He needed to get them into his dad’s cryogenic freezer before they became completely useless.

Toby hid the bottle of scabs under his shirt and crept upstairs to the professor’s lab. He listened at the door for the crackling noise that would mean that his dad was in there, fiddling with the Van der Graaf generator.

Nothing. His dad must be out.

He sneaked inside.

Toby opened the cryogenic freezer. A cold mist of liquid nitrogen poured out into the air. He hid his bottle behind another specimen and closed the door. “There you go, little scabs,” he murmured. “Each one of you is worth R50 to me.”

He couldn’t help grinning as he crept down the wooden stairs without the professor discovering him. Jamie was going to try and make money by winning a competition at a dog show with that dumb dog of hers. His plan was a lot more foolproof. He was going to sell his freeze-dried scabs to some of the guys in the chess and computer club. If they rubbed them on an open wound he was pretty sure that they would come down with chickenpox. It was an excellent way for them to get out of sports day.

Toby planned on using a scab himself to get out of the school camp. He chuckled and went back to his room to post an advertisement for his product in his favourite chat room. Soon he would be rich.