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Twelve
YIPPEE!
    It was the next evening, a Sunday, and
I was standing in front of the Dockery
Gang outside their den, explaining what
had happened.
    'You sat on the rotten egg?' Dockery was
laughing so hard that tears rolled down his
fat face.
    'And you said you'd had an accident, so
the old bat probably thought you'd pooed
your pants,' added Larkin, a big line of slimy
drool dangling out of his mouth.
    'It wasn't funny,' I said. 'My mum had
to throw my trousers away because of
the smell. They were my third favourite
pair.'
    The whole lot of them were bent double
by now, laughing like hyenas.
    'OK, boys,' said Dockery at last. 'I say he's
in. I haven't laughed so much since Miss
Bridges slipped and broke her arm in the
playground last year.'
    'I didn't think that was very funny,' I
said.
    I liked Miss Bridges. She was kind and
also good at doing the voices when she
read us a story.
    'Yeah, well, that shows what you know,'
Larkin replied, stepping up close to me.
'Because it was funny. But not as funny as
this.' Then he tried to push me in the chest.
But this time it didn't work. I'd noticed one
of the others had moved behind me, and I
knew they were going to do the same trick
again. When Larkin shoved, I dodged to
one side, and he stumbled forward and fell
over Furbank, who was the one kneeling
down. They ended up sprawling together
on the floor.
    I thought I might be in for it from the
others, but they laughed even harder than
they had when it was me falling over or
getting rotten egg on his trousers. Weird sort
of gang, I thought, where they're not even
nice to each other.
    Dockery dragged them both up off the
ground and gave them a little shake.
    'Enough messing about, boys,' he said,
still chuckling. 'We've got to have a little
celebration to, er, celebrate our new
member.'
    'Good idea,' said Larkin. 'Sweets and
Coke, that's what we want.'
    Dockery loomed over me. 'Right, give us
two pounds then,' he said.
    'Two pounds!' I exclaimed. 'What do you
mean?'
    'Three pounds then. It goes up every time
you complain.'
    'I'm not complaining, I just didn't realize
I had to pay to be in.'
    'Four pounds. Do you want to be in this
gang or not?'
    Actually, I wasn't sure any more. I'd
decided that there might be worse things
in life than not being in a gang, especially
if the gang tried to make you be horrible to
old ladies and then gave you smelly trousers.
But it was hard to say that when Dockery
was looming over me like an evil German
zeppelin bomber airship.
    So I nodded.
    'Cough up then,' said Larkin.
    'I haven't got any money with me.'
    'Well, you'd better go and get some
then.'
    So I went home, got the four pounds
out of my talking robot piggy bank, and
brought it back. Then Dockery sent me to
the newsagent's to get the supplies. I wasn't
allowed to have any of the Coke or sweets
because that was the rule.
    But it was done.
    I was in.
    I was officially a member of the Dockery
Gang.
    Yippee.

Chapter Thirteen
THE SHOE
    I was sitting by myself at break time the
next day. I was reading my space-dinosaur
book, which is one of my favourites. It's
about dinosaurs in space. They fight other
dinosaurs, who are also in space. It's one of
the best books ever written about dinosaurs
in space. But for once I couldn't concentrate
on it. Jenny, Noah, The Moan and Jamie
were chatting together. I wanted to go and
talk to them, maybe hang out for a bit.
I even closed my book, using a piece of
cabbage I'd hidden in my pocket to keep
my page. (I'd hidden the cabbage in my
pocket because otherwise Mrs Muffit, the
dinner lady, would have made me eat it at
lunch time.) But then, before I'd had time
to get up, Alfie joined them, and he said
something. They all looked at me quickly
and giggled.
    It was because they were laughing at
me that they didn't see Dockery and his
gang come sneaking up. They had to
sneak up these days because of Jenny.
Jenny was a black belt at every martial
art you've ever heard of, including tae
kwon do, karate, bum-kicking and