Rivalry at Silver Spires by Ann Bryant

butterflies in my stomach, but I had to be brave. For Hannah’s sake.
    â€œIt’s twenty to nine. You know we’re not allowed out after half past eight!” said Jess. “Are you sure you’re thinking straight, Grace?”
    I nodded.
    â€œBut what shall I write?”
    â€œPut, We’ve always known it was you sending pathetic messages but you don’t scare Grace so you needn’t have bothered …” Jess’s eyes were wide. She’d probably never heard me sounding so full of fight. “Yes, and you can say we also know it was her who ruined Grace’s swimsuit and she’s going to pay for it because we’re going to tell. I just need to see her writing with my own eyes, then she won’t be able to deny it. And then I will go and tell Miss Carol, honestly. And you can say that we know she took my sweatshirt too.”
    Jess looked totally stunned. “Is that true, Grace?”
    I nodded and bit my lip. “I couldn’t tell you. You would have made me go to a teacher.”
    â€œBut…what if Georgie comes in and sees what I’m doing?”
    I was itching to get away. If my plan was to work I had to go right now, as fast as I could, before Felissia signed out and went off to bed. But I felt sorry for Jess. I’d dragged her into the middle of a nasty drama. “Say it’s my fault and I’m sorry but it was all I could do to prove it’s Felissia.”
    The lost look on Jess’s face stayed at the front of my mind all the time I was running to Beech House. An older girl was just going out of the big front door and she held it open for me, so I slipped inside and ran along the corridor by the stairs. I knew exactly where the computer room was from when we’d been round all the boarding houses on Chinese New Year’s Day. So far I’d only seen one person and I was nearly there. My plan was working perfectly, apart from my heart thumping too loudly. I was praying that Jess had managed to keep Torpedo Gal talking online, as I gathered together every last drop of courage I possessed and opened the door quietly to see Felissia and Cassie hunched over the first of the computers and Stella on the one next to them. They must have been completely absorbed in what they were doing, because not one of them even seemed to realize anyone had come into the room. I crept forwards on shaky legs until I was close enough to see the words Felissia was typing.
    I don’t care what Grace thinks. She’ll never be able to prove anything.
    And that was when I spoke, in the hardest voice I could manage. “Oh won’t she?”
    I wished that Hannah had been there to see the look of big alarm on Felissia’s face when she swung round and saw me there. Her mouth fell open and the other two went white. For a split second I felt a lovely feeling of power, but then my knees nearly buckled at the sound of an icy voice behind me.
    â€œWhat’s going on here?” I turned to see Miss Walton, the housemistress of Beech House. Her eyebrows were arching high, and when she saw me they went even higher. “I’m sorry, I don’t know who you are, but I do know you’re not from Beech House and as it’s quarter to nine, you know perfectly well you should be in your own boarding house.”
    â€œYes, but…” It suddenly seemed like an impossible job to try and explain that I’d had to do something wrong to make something else right.
    Miss Walton put her hands on her hips and tipped her head on one side, her eyes never leaving my face. “Well?”
    I caught a look of triumph in Felissia’s eyes and just knew that she would have signed out of the chat room by now.
    â€œFelissia’s been posting nasty messages about me in the chat room,” I said, feeling my face flooding with colour as I realized the ridiculousness of what I was saying.
    â€œThat’s a total lie, Miss Walton,