Second Fiddle by Siobhan Parkinson

if I’d told the people at the school that I was coming for the audition.
    â€œToday’s the deadline,” she said, as if I didn’t know.
    I had accepted, of course.
    â€œIt’s in two weeks,” I said, “and I still don’t see how I’m going to get there.”
    â€œWe’ll think of something,” she said. Alarm bells started to ring for me. She was off on her quest again. “We’ll just have to fall back on our own resources, is all. There are lots of things we can try.”
    â€œBut I have so much practice to do,” I wailed. “I should be working six or seven hours a day, and all I do is sit around sending text messages and working out ways to contact Dad.”
    â€œSix or seven hours!” she gasped in amazement. “That’s torture!” You see what I mean. People just don’t understand.
    â€œNo, it isn’t,” I said. “It’s what you do if you are a real musician. I do three, sometimes four. But it’s not enough before an audition.”
    â€œOK,” said Mags. “Tell you what. You concentrate on your practicing, I’ll do the rest.”
    I shook my head, but what could I say? I couldn’t very well stop her, and besides, it would be useful if she found him for me and delivered him like a trout in a net. A trout with a check for a hundred euro in its mouth!
    â€œI have an idea,” she said.
    I don’t like Mags’s ideas. They are all half-baked and come out of books, as far as I can tell. She thinks she’s Hercule Poirot or the Secret Seven or someone.

Mags
    â€œBrendan Regan?” said Grandpa, leaning back in his armchair and giving his toes a delighted wiggle. He loves to be consulted. “Of course I know him. Obviously, I know the locals—I’ve lived here all my life. The Regans, now let me see. Yes, they used to live a mile or two out the road, they had a dairy farm, but after the old man died—terrible farmer he was—they sold up and moved into town, into that new estate over the other side of the woods. Brendan was never interested in farming. Just as well, if he was going to turn out as bad a farmer as his father. He’s in computers, something like that. He has his own business, very successful I believe. Drives a flash car. Married a foreigner, I think. Or maybe she’s from Dublin. What do you want to know for?”
    I hugged myself. “Oh, just making inquiries,” I said.
    My grandfather laughed. “You’re up to something, aren’t you?”
    â€œI wouldn’t say that,” I said mysteriously. “Is he separated?”
    â€œFrom his wife? Hmm, I heard that, yes. She’s peculiar, I believe. An opera singer, if you don’t mind.”
    â€œReally?” I said, remembering Zelda’s beautiful speaking voice. An opera singer was certainly a bit unusual in Ballybeg, but even if she’d been a bank clerk, people would have called Zelda peculiar. “And where does he live now?”
    â€œHow should I know?” Grandpa was turning grumpy again. He only liked questions that he knew the answers to.
    I thought carefully before my next move. There was no point in saying anything that would make Grandpa even grumpier. The thing was not to make him uncomfortable by asking a question he couldn’t answer.
    â€œI bet you could find out, though,” I said at last. “I’m sure you have contacts. You know everything that happens around here, I’d say.”
    â€œOh, I could find out if I really wanted to know,” he agreed.
    I said no more. No point in pushing my luck. I’d wait and see.
    Grandpa came up with the goods, as I had known he would. It was two days later. I was making a jam sandwich in his kitchen. Grandpa always has a good range of jams to choose from. Raspberry today, I thought, though I don’t like the tiny raspberry pips. They stick in your teeth. Someone told me once