When Kaolin and Olive arrived at Half Hitch school one Friday morning they went to Mrs Kipper’s classroom as normal but found all their friends standing outside the locked door.
“What’s the matter, why can’t we go inside?” asked Kaolin.
“We don’t know where Mrs Kipper is!” replied Mateo.
“Someone said she’s gone on holiday to another planet,” said Alexis, excitedly.
“Another planet?” said Olive. “But how?”
At that moment, Mr Bloom, who taught the other Year One class next door, came out of his classroom and approached them, smiling.
“Now, now. Mrs Kipper hasn’t gone on holiday to another planet,” he laughed. “I can see how rumors start in this place. No, she’s not very well, so can’t come into school. SO. Today, all of you will be joining my class. It might be a bit of a squeeze, but I’m sure we can make it work just as well as normal.”
Everyone in Kaolin and Olive’s class entered Mr Bloom’s classroom, which was a similar size to their own, but didn’t have as many trees and plants.
“Oh! Mr Bloom!” said Olive. “Can I go and get Greenleaves, our class turtle? He’ll be lonely all by himself and he’s very useful.”
“Very well,” chuckled Mr Bloom. “But be quick.”
Mr Bloom looked around his classroom. There were now, of course, twice as many pupils as he was used to, and nowhere for Mrs Kipper’s class to sit down.
“I have an idea,” said Mr Bloom. “Just for today, let’s clear all the tables and chairs to the side of the room and make one big special area for us all to use.”
Well, everyone from Mr Bloom’s and Mrs Kipper’s class set about moving ALL the desks and chairs as Olive returned with Greenleaves the turtle and placed him safely in an open drawer so he could see what was going on.
“Now,” nodded Mr Bloom. “I imagine that our normal lessons might be a bit tricky today, what with you not having tables and chairs. So - if Mrs Kipper is feeling unwell, why don’t we spent today making the best gifts we can think of to make her feel better? Then, when she gets back, she’ll know how much she was missed.”
Everyone agreed excitedly.
“You can use anything you find,” said Mr Bloom happily, sitting down behind his desk and opening his favorite book of poems. “And remember to lend each other your materials and ask for help if you’re not sure.”
Olive and Kaolin looked at one another. What were they going to make? Everyone else was scrambling over the cards and glue and sparkle paints. But they had known Mrs Kipper for over a term now - what would it be that she’d REALLY like?
“What’s her favorite thing in the whole world?” Kaolin asked Olive. They thought for a moment before looking at each other and saying together: “Biscuits!”
Mrs Kipper really did like biscuits. She always had one with every cup of tea, and there was a special purple and green tin in her desk that she kept them in.
“Let’s make her the best biscuits in the Universe,” said Olive, seriously. “But special ones too, that make her feel better.”
“That would be excellent,” agreed Kaolin, and turned to Mr Bloom who was happy in his own world, reading his book.
“Mr Bloom! We need to go and get some more materials. Is that okay?”
“What? Oh. Yes! Yes. Please do. Please do.”
Kaolin led Olive into the corridor. But instead of turning left back towards Mrs Kipper’s classroom, they turned right.
“Where are we going?” whispered Olive.
“To Mrs Perrinpeas’ office,” said Kaolin. “Remember Mr Galati, the old headmaster? He had a book of old spells and ingredients. We could put some of those things into the biscuits for Mrs Kipper.”
Olive looked doubtful. “But all his spells went wrong, Kaolin,” she said. “What if Mrs Kipper’s biscuits go wrong?”
“Oh he must have had SOME good idea,” said Kaolin. “We’ll just check.”
In Mrs Perrinpeas’ office, Kaolin and Olive found Mr Galati’s old diary of spells and ideas. They flicked through until they found one call ‘Mag-elixir’.
“Elixir!” Said Olive. “I know that word. It means medicine. Or something like medicine. Like, a potion for making you well.”
They copied down the recipe and put the book back on the shelf. After collecting herbs and spices from the school gardens, they headed for the kitchens and started mixing the butter and caster sugar and egg yolk and flour to make their biscuit dough. Then, they sprinkled in the ingredients from Mr Galati’s book and then cut out the dough into biscuit shapes and put them in the oven.
Twenty minutes later, a collection of ten hot and perfect looking biscuits were sitting on a plate, cooling.
Olive and Kaolin were so excited they stored them in a nice blue box with crumpled soft green paper in it, and then at the end of the day - when everyone was putting their presents for Mrs Kipper on her desk - they both had a better idea.
“Let’s take them straight around to her house,” said Olive. Then they won’t go all hard, because if we left them here all weekend that’s what would happen and -“
“Good idea,” said Kaolin.
Mrs Kipper lived at Number 52, Redleaf Street in the New Town. Kaolin and Olive knew this because they’d waved to her in her front garden when they’d been walking up to play in Sprivers Wood.
That evening, they knocked on the door - a little nervously, because they’d never been to a teacher’s house before - and a man answered.
“Is Mrs Kipper at home,” asked Olive. “We’re in her class.”
“Oh!” said Colin Kipper, Mrs Kipper’s husband. “I’m afraid she’s upstairs in bed feeling a little poorly.”
“We might be able to fix that,” said Kaolin. “Could you give her these. They’re biscuits - to make her better.”
Colin Kipper took the blue box with a grin. “That IS thoughtful. We’d just run out of biscuits.” He read the label on the box. “‘From Olive and Kaolin’. Well, Olive and Kaolin, I’m sure she’ll be thrilled. Thank you.”
As Kaolin and Olive walked home feeling very happy, Mr Kipper went upstairs and showed a very sick looking Mrs Kipper what had just arrived. “Oh, that is sweet of them,” said Mrs Kipper, smiling for the first time all day and opening the box. “Oh, look, Colin! They look wonderful. And they smell wonderful, too!”
She took a bite of one of the biscuits. “And they taste… oh how lovely.” Mrs Kipper ate the biscuit and did begin to feel better when…
WHOMP! The spoon on the saucer of her tea cup at the side of the bed slid across and glued itself to her shoulder!
“What’s going on?”
Then, the lamp from the side of the bed trembled and moved then glued itself to the side of Mrs Kipper’s head!
Mrs Kipper jumped out of bed as every metal object in the room suddenly flung itself at her and stuck to her fast. She was magnetic!
That weekend, Mrs Kipper ran around the house with everything from the toaster to the rake in the garden sticking to her. It was only on Sunday evening, after two very uncomfortable night’s sleep, when the effect began to wear off.
On Monday morning, Kaolin and Olive and the rest of their class saw that the door to Mrs Kipper’s classroom was open. She was back! They all took their seats whilst Mrs Kipper looked at them all silently.
“I would like to thank you for my presents,” said Mrs Kipper. “It is very, very thoughtful of you. But Kaolin and Olive… I do have a question about your present. Your biscuits…”
Kaolin and Olive looked at each other. Did she not like them?
“They,” began Mrs Kipper. But as she spoke, a little sound could be heard from behind one of the plants, and then a pair of metal glasses slowly slid out from behind it, travelled by themselves across the room, and jumped up onto Mrs Kipper’s hand.
“My favorite glasses!” said Mrs Kipper. “I’ve been searching and searching for these!”
“But - our biscuits?” said Olive, nervously.
Mrs Kipper adjusted her glasses and looked at them both.
“Your biscuits… were… Well. They were the best I’ve ever tasted,” she said, taking her glasses off for a good polish, smiling, and standing to teach the first lesson of the day.
