The Wizzle War (6 page)

“Oh, Miss Peabody,” called out Mr. Wizzle. “Could I please have a word —”

“You’ve had it! The word was scram!”

The boys from Macdonald Hall turned and ran across the highway, their teachers hot on their heels. Even Mr. Sturgeon,
struggling to maintain his dignity, scurried across the road, slippers flapping.

The girls of Miss Scrimmage’s stood frozen in terror, staring up at the balcony, waiting for the boom to descend on them.

“You’ll be sorry you lost this sleep!” Miss Peabody thundered. “Calisthenics are at six-thirty, as usual! After class you’re all going to run laps!” She paused. All that could be heard was the fire alarm, still ringing. “And someone turn that racket off!”

Miss Scrimmage scurried into the building and in a few moments the alarm was silent.

A number of cars had stopped on the soft shoulder of the highway, and several helpful motorists came forward to offer their assistance.

“Get out of here! Mind your own business!”

A baffled driver turned to Cathy. “Is this a school?”

“Not anymore,” she said bitterly. “It’s an army camp.”

For days following the riot, things were quiet at Macdonald Hall. Bruno, still miffed at being deserted by his committee, ate all his meals alone and lived behind a wall of silence. Mr. Wizzle, finding Bruno fully dressed at Scrimmage’s the night of the riot, had assumed him to be at the heart of the disturbance. The cost: ten demerits, which, coupled with two he had picked up for being seen outside without his tie, brought his total to forty-one. In spite of his isolation, he was never lonely, since all his time was spent writing lines.

Boots, along with most of the boys at Macdonald Hall, was doing his very best to stay out of Mr. Wizzle’s way and avoid getting any more demerits. Boots was not happy, however, because Bruno was still angry, still having nothing to do with him. He was finding the silence in the divided room 306 awfully hard to bear. And the scratching of Bruno’s pen grinding out hundreds of punishment lines did nothing to alleviate the tension.

Meanwhile, Mr. Wizzle was hard at work redesigning the curriculum of Macdonald Hall, sometimes to the shock of the students, always to the dismay of the teachers.

It was a week after the big riot. Mr. Sturgeon was walking down the basement stairs of the Faculty Building and accidentally came upon his entire teaching staff beneath the
stairs, crowded around a dusty card table. The Headmaster raised an eyebrow. “Don’t I get invited to staff meetings anymore?”

Mr. Stratton flushed. “Well, William, we were just having a little discussion about — uh — Wizzle.”

Mr. Sturgeon smiled lightly. “It didn’t look much like a poker game. But is it a revolution?”

“He’s trying to tell me how to teach gym!” blurted Coach Flynn angrily. “He couldn’t manage a deep knee-bend if he practised for a week! Uh — I mean, he doesn’t have the experience and —”

“I know what you mean, Alex,” said the Headmaster. “Any other comments?”

There was a babble of voices.

“One at a time, please.”

Mr. Hubert stroked his beard in exasperation. “He wants me to teach chemistry by computer, so he wrote a program in his blasted WizzleWare to simulate an experiment. He spent the whole class downloading it on my PC, which crashed the second he clicked
Install
. Now he wants me to hold up my lessons until he can get it up and working. What are we supposed to do in the meantime? Make fudge?”

“One of my students has stopped paying attention in class and spends all his time writing lines. He’s been at it for days.”

“You have Walton, too, eh?” said Mr. Stratton. “Wizzle insists that when I teach math I have to explain to my students the practical applications of what we’re doing. I told him to go ahead and he went right up there and told the boys they have to know algebra because at any time in later life they may be
called upon to factor a polynomial by completing the square. They all laughed in his face and he gave a class detention and demerits all around.”

“The English Department has a more serious grievance,” said Mr. Foley, tight-lipped. “Mr. Wizzle has eliminated practically everything that we do.”

“At least you’ve got a department,” said Mr. Fudge, the guidance counsellor. “Wizzle has taken over mine. That WizzleWare has a program to psychoanalyze the students, and you wouldn’t believe what it’s come up with.”

Mr. Sturgeon held up his hands for silence. “Enough. I’ve been bringing matters like this before the Board ever since Mr. Wizzle got here. They are a hundred percent sure he’s a genius, so my hands are tied. We’ll just have to tolerate the situation and do our best to teach under the circumstances.” He smiled thinly. “I suppose it could be worse.”

“Yeah,” blurted Flynn, “we could be at Scrimmage’s. I hear Peabody decided to retrain their phys. ed. teacher and now she’s at Toronto General recuperating from near-fatal exhaustion.”

There was a chorus of laughter. Mr. Sturgeon sighed.

* * *

At Miss Scrimmage’s the atmosphere was just as tense. From reveille at 6 AM to taps at 10 PM, Miss Peabody’s reign of terror rolled on.

When she was not running laps, Cathy Burton was waging war on the new Assistant Headmistress. She could still recall her conversation with Miss Peabody the morning after the big
riot.

“You’re going to run a lot of laps for causing that ruckus last night, Burton.”

“But Miss Peabody,” Cathy had protested innocently, “you’ve got no proof that I had anything to do with it!”

“I’ve got all the proof I need, Burton — a gut feeling that you did it.”

Cathy grinned in spite of herself at the memory of Diane coming back from the cleanup detail outside Miss Peabody’s room.

“Remember all that furniture you piled up there?” Diane had gasped. “Splinters! Toothpicks! Sawdust! Peabody’s a juggernaut! She must know karate or something!”

Miss Peabody had stomped around the corner just then. “It was jiu-jitsu. I learned it in the Marines.” Then she had assigned two laps for each of them.

Cathy had spent her sparse amount of free time that week releasing field mice into Miss Peabody’s room, short-sheeting her bed, greasing her floor and over-spicing her food. All of these things met with a degree of success that matched the number of laps Cathy was slapped with. She had even placed a tape recorder in the Assistant Headmistress’s room. While Miss Peabody slept, it played over and over again the words:
“Tomorrow you will be sweet and nice and kind and not rotten at all.”
But the next day Miss Peabody had been worse than ever, complaining of a restless night and terrible dreams.

Miss Scrimmage, meanwhile, was too terrified to interfere. She had taken to spending all her time reading in her sitting room. Miss Peabody was in charge.

* * *

While Boots was out at track and field practice, Bruno, as always, sat at his desk finishing up the very last of his lines.

There was a sharp knock at the door.

“Go away!” growled Bruno, who didn’t feel like seeing anyone. “I’m busy!”

The knocking resumed, louder and more persistent.

“Oh, all right!” Bruno got up and opened the door. There stood Elmer Drimsdale, his crew cut in disarray, his glasses awry, his tie undone. His face was flushed, and his eyes were rolling strangely.

“Elmer, what happened to you?”

Elmer stormed into the room, slamming the door behind him. “Bruno, I am incensed!”

“Yeah, I know that,” said Bruno incredulously. The normally placid, timid Elmer, who never raised his voice above a whisper, was waving his arms and shouting.

“Are you aware of what happened last night!
Are you aware of what happened last night?”

“Calm down, Elmer. How could I be? What happened?”

“All right, I’ll tell you what happened!” stormed Elmer. “It was an incredibly clear night last night and I had my telescope focused on globular cluster M-13 in the constellation Hercules. It was wonderful. Everything was so clear …” A dreamy look passed over Elmer’s face. “Then Mr. Wizzle caught me. He confiscated my telescope and searched my room! He took away my microscope and all my bacterial cultures! He emptied my bathtub and completely ruined my mollusc experiment! My
hybrid grain experiment went, too, along with most of my plants and all my data! He even took my ant colony! Oh, I’m so mad! I have twenty demerits now! I have to write lines! How demeaning! How stultifying! If I were a violent person, I would kick something!”

“Go right ahead,” Bruno invited.

Elmer reared back and delivered Boots’s bed a mighty kick.

“Feel better?”

“No!” Elmer hopped around the room cradling his foot. “I think I’ve injured all my metatarsals! Bruno, I have concluded that being expelled is nothing compared with being deprived of my experiments! I want you to help me remove Mr. Wizzle from Macdonald Hall!”

Bruno’s face broke into a wide grin. “Now you’re talking! Wizzle must go!”

“Indisputably!” stormed Elmer. “And we’ll start immediately — as soon as we stop by at the infirmary and see about my foot.”

“Right,” grinned Bruno. “We’ll work in your room — I don’t want Boots to know what we’re doing.”

* * *

“He really cleaned the place out,” said Bruno, surveying room 201, in which Elmer lived alone.

“Yes,” agreed Elmer forlornly. “It seems so empty. I never realized what good company my ants were.”

“Hey, Elmer,” said Bruno, pointing at a large grey box with an enormous circular cone speaker, “I didn’t know you had a sound system.”

“It’s not a sound system,” said Elmer. “Mr. Wizzle thought it was, too, and I didn’t disabuse him of the notion, so he left it here.”

“What is it?”

“It’s a low-frequency audio generator,” explained Elmer. “It makes subsonic sounds at very high decibels, but it can’t be heard because the sounds are too low.”

“What good is a sound system that you can’t hear?”

“It’s just an interest of mine,” said Elmer. “I’ve been experimenting with it.”

“What does it do?”

“Well, it can simulate a small earth tremor.”

Bruno’s eyes popped. “You made an
earthquake machine
?”

“Well, I suppose on a very small scale, yes. The sound produced is between eight and nine cycles per second. It is largely inaudible, but will produce overtones in the form of a low rumble. I’m just experimenting with it now, leaving it on for very short periods of time. If left on too long, it could conceivably do some damage.”

“Can it work somewhere else besides here?” asked Bruno.

“Yes, of course. It can be operated from a distance by remote control.”

“Great!” cried Bruno, grinning broadly. “Tonight Wizzle’s getting this in his basement!”

“What for?” asked Elmer.

“Just to shake him up a little,” said Bruno. “If it won’t drive him away, at least it’ll drive him nuts!”

Just after midnight, a tapping at the window of room 306 brought Boots out of a light sleep. He raised the window to admit Cathy and Diane.

“You guys have
got
to save us!” Cathy was moaning, even as Boots was helping her and Diane into the room. “We’ve got to get rid of that monster! Hey, where’s Bruno?”

“I don’t know,” mumbled Boots.

“What do you mean you don’t know?
Where’s Bruno?”

“I think he’s out with Elmer Drimsdale,” said Boots lamely.

“What do you mean you
think
?” shrilled Cathy. Her sharp eyes spotted the tape that divided the room. “What’s going on here?”

“Bruno hasn’t spoken to me ever since I quit his committee,” explained Boots dully.

“You quit Bruno’s committee?” echoed Diane incredulously.

“Wizzle’s here to stay,” said Boots, “but Bruno won’t accept that fact. He’s going to get himself and everyone around him expelled, and that’s where I draw the line.”

“You’re knuckling under!” accused Cathy. “That’s terrible! What would happen if
I
knuckled under?”

“We’d run a lot fewer laps,” said Diane feelingly.

Cathy ignored her. “Poor Bruno! Boots, how could you? He’s out there trying to help everyone, working all alone —”

A dark shape appeared at the window and Bruno climbed inside. “I tell you, Elm,” he was saying, “Wizzle’s as good as gone.”

Elmer Drimsdale was climbing into the room behind him. “Well, it certainly will teach him a lesson, Bruno. Imagine confiscating my experiments! Actually, I found the danger of this evening rather exhilarating. I mean, breaking into Mr. Wizzle’s basement —”

“Shhh! Elm, we can’t let you-know-who know about what we’re doing!”

“But you can tell us,” chimed in Cathy. “Hi, guys. What’s up? And can we use it, too?”

Elmer Drimsdale went immediately mute, as he always did in the presence of females.

“Oh, hi.” Bruno beamed. “I can’t say too much about it, but we’re using science against Wizzle.”

“Can we have some science, too?” begged Cathy. “Like maybe a disintegration ray?”

“Or anything that has a chance against jiu-jitsu?” added Diane hopefully.

“Gee, I sure wish I could help you,” said Bruno. “Of course, we’re a little understaffed here.” He looked pointedly across the room at Boots.

“I’m not listening,” muttered Boots.

“Why don’t you go to Miss Scrimmage?” suggested Bruno.

“We tried that,” said Cathy. “She’s more scared of Peabody than we are. She spends most of her time in hiding.”

“So what?” said Bruno. “It’s Miss Scrimmage’s school.”

“And Macdonald Hall is The Fish’s school. What’s The Fish doing for you?”

“I see your point,” said Bruno. “I can’t really figure out what The Fish thinks of all this Wizzle business.”

“None of this helps us with Peabody,” insisted Diane, “and it’s getting late. Come on, Cathy, let’s go.”

“Why don’t you try the softer approach?” suggested Bruno. “Get the whole school together and have a cry in.”

“That’s a great idea!” exclaimed Cathy. “Peabody’s so military that she probably doesn’t know how to deal with tears! And we can give her buckets of them!”

The girls left and Elmer, his voice restored, whispered, “Shouldn’t we go over to my room? Aren’t we going to test the —?”

“Shhh, Elm!” With his thumb, Bruno motioned toward Boots. “Okay, let’s go.”

“I hope nobody minds if I go to bed,” called Boots sarcastically.

* * *

Walter C. Wizzle was sleeping when the feeling came over him. It was a shaking, a vibration that he felt from deep within his body. He sat bolt upright in bed and looked about the darkened room. Perhaps it was something he’d eaten.

He went to the bathroom to search for a stomach remedy and noticed that the toothbrush was trembling in its glass, the shower doors were shaking, the soap was vibrating in its dish. Even the floor under his feet seemed to be — what was that? Yes, there was a distant roar. What was going on here?

He ran out into the hall. All the fixtures were rattling too, and all the pictures on the wall. He ran into the small kitchen. All the crockery was clacking together. He opened the refrigerator door. A dozen eggs slopped down onto the floor.

Suddenly the roar stopped and the rattling ceased. He rushed to the window and looked at all the other buildings. The whole campus was in darkness. No one else was up. How strange!