The Great Rabbit Revenge Plan (4 page)

Fridz with a D

After Sunday comes Monday. Too bad. There it is and there is nothing to be done about it. Konrad has known this for ages. Peter knows it too, but on some Sunday evenings, he still asks what day tomorrow is. Maybe he thinks that it changes every five years, and the next change might be that Saturday is going to start coming after Sunday.

This Monday is not so bad, though. Because it's still the holidays, so Konrad has the whole day to fill in his list of children. Everyone in The Dransfeld is on holidays. Elsewhere people go jetting off all over the world in every direction on the first day of the holidays, leaping around like cows that have been bitten by ants, to take their so-called vacations in places where there is no one for their children to play with. The Dransfelders, however, will not be going anywhere for years because they have to pay off the mortgages on their lovely houses. That's what Dad says at breakfast with a sigh.

‘Mortgages?' asks Konrad.

‘Mortgage' is a word that means you don't have
more
, you have less, because you have to keep paying for your house. You don't have enough to pay for it all at once, so you pay for it in little bits for a very long time until it's all paid for, and
while you are paying it off, you have less money for other things. ‘Just like us,' Dad had said, and then he and Mum had looked sadly at each other.

There is something else that's good about this Monday. Konrad doesn't have to take Peter with him, because Peter has to go to the dentist with Mum, straight after breakfast. That's rough on Peter, but he is in good form. He's never been to the dentist before and hasn't got a clue what awaits him. Mum and Dad have strictly forbidden Konrad to talk to Peter about teeth and dentists. There'll be plenty of time for that later.

When Mum and Peter have left, Konrad takes a quick look at his list. Then he sticks The Dransfeld notebook in the right-hand pocket of his trousers and off he goes.

On Saturday, he'd got as far as number 27b. That means it's number 28a today, which is at the end of Dransfeld Crescent. Number 27b had been something of a disappointment. He'd got in without being noticed, but then there were two girls' names on the children's doors, two very similar names: Lena and Lisa. Konrad is clued in to this sort of thing: they have to be twins! He was out of there like greased lightning. Luckily, no one saw him. Two girls! And twins to boot! Unthinkable! A girl is bad enough, and two girls are more than twice as bad as one, but twin girls – that takes the biscuit for terribleness!

He doesn't quite know why girls are so awful, and why you can't play with them. But all the boys at school are always saying so, and if everyone says so, then it has to be true. In fact, Konrad did once play with a girl. It was in second
class, and it probably happened by mistake. He'd probably forgotten for a moment that boys just don't play with girls. Konrad remembers it well. It was during break one day, when it was raining. This girl Charlotte came up to him. She sat two desks away from him and she usually wore her hair in plaits.

‘Will you play dots-and-boxes?' she asked. And he, Konrad-head-in-the-clouds, said, thick as anything, ‘Yes', and he played away at dots-and-boxes with her, not thinking anything of it, until Philip came by, tapped him on the arm and said, ‘Ha ha!'. Then, of course, he came to and realised he was playing with a girl, and that was the end of that.

Konrad is outside number 28a now. But hey! What's wrong here? Number 28a looks just like the other houses in The Dransfeld. But right next door, number 28b – that's a house that's in a class of its own! Konrad can see that at a glance. For example, there is no tiny little beech hedge growing along by the path to the front door. In fact, there is nothing at all growing in the front garden, and the lovely black earth is just lying there, all driven over by the construction vehicles. Konrad takes a closer look. The kitchen window has no flower-patterned net curtains. There is no artistic nameplate at the door, just a lump of sticky tape with the name ‘Frenke' written on it with a marker. And instead of a mat saying ‘Welcome' there's a dirtyish rag on the doorstep. Good heavens!

Konrad takes a few steps towards the garage. Unbelievable! There is no Passat in the drive, no hatchback of any description, only a weird, clapped-out, boxy contraption
that hardly looks like a car at all. A bit like an upturned old-fashioned pram. And in the garage? Konrad goes past the clapped-out car. In the garage there is no rack where you hang your gardening tools nice and tidily. And no wheel around which you coil your garden hose. But there's something else! Right at the back of the garage is a cage made of wood and wire meshing. It has three levels and little doors and it is mounted on six legs. A cage in a Dransfeld garage! Konrad is so surprised that he goes right up to it, without thinking, to take a closer look.

At first, he thinks the hutch is empty. It's quite murky in the garage. But then he sees THE BEAST! It's probably some kind of rabbit, but Konrad has never seen a rabbit like this. It's so big! Unbelievably big. It's sitting in the middle storey of the cage, right at the back, in a corner, and it is not moving. It's just doing something with its nose. It probably can't move, it's so huge. It can't even prick up its enormous ears, because they would bang against the ceiling of the cage.

Konrad's eyes are gradually getting used to the dark. Ah, so that's what the creature is doing with its nose. It's eating a carrot. Beside it there are more carrots, more than Konrad could eat in a lifetime. But the way this giant rabbit is putting it away, there's probably just about enough to keep it going for half an hour at most.

‘Hey, you,' says a voice suddenly, and a hand touches Konrad's head from behind. Just as he turns around, Konrad notices that he is blushing. Hopefully there is not going to be trouble. It's not exactly polite to go stomping into other people's garages. But when Konrad has fully turned around,
he realises that there isn't going to be trouble. The woman standing in front of him looks completely different from the other Dransfeld mothers – and Konrad is sure she isn't going to be cross with him. The woman is very slim and she has very long dark red hair. Her face is pale and she's wearing very dark lipstick. Her eyes are also heavily made-up. She's wearing purple trousers and a T-shirt with so many crazy flowers on it that it nearly makes Konrad laugh. All the same, the woman looks kind of sad.

‘Have you come to visit us?' she asks.

Konrad nods.

‘You're Konrad, aren't you?'

How on earth does she know that? Konrad shrinks back a bit. Are his Dransfeld investigations common knowledge? Just to be on the safe side, he puts his right hand over his pocket so that there is no way his notebook can fall out.

‘I haven't got much time at the moment,' says the woman. But he can go on in, she says. Fritz is upstairs.

Konrad can't think of anything to say to that. So he just makes a little gesture with his hand and goes on into number 28b.

He can hardly believe his eyes! Inside, it's just as different as outside. For a start, the packing cases are still lying around. Imagine: packing cases! After three whole weeks. Mum and Dad Bantelmann are still talking about how they had completely unpacked all their crates within thirty-six hours of moving in. And folded them up.

That's not the only thing. The furniture in the hall and in the large living room of number 28b looks as if it hasn't been
put in its proper place yet. It's standing around in groups, probably discussing how it should spread itself around. Moreover, there is not the smallest picture hanging on the wall, and there isn't a single plant on any of the windowsills. Not to mention a china goose lit from within, or a bunch of tulips made of painted wood.

Otherwise, Konrad feels quite at home. Up the stairs he goes to the two doors. At least this much is the same as in all the other houses. But now there's another problem. There are, of course, no names on the doors. Konrad thinks. The mother mentioned a Fritz. And if this Fritz were either much too young or much too old for him, then she'd surely have said so. So Konrad knocks first on the door to the left.

‘Come in!'

A perfectly ordinary ‘Come in!' Or maybe not? Konrad turns the handle and goes in, and – there on the floor is a girl holding a doll in her hands. Oh no! How bad can it get! But it's too late to get out of this one. He just has to get on with it.

‘Sorry,' says Konrad. ‘I'm looking for Fritz.'

‘I'm Fridz,' says the girl. ‘My real name is Friederike. Friederike Caroline Luise Frenke. But Friederike is for later, when I'm old and dead.'

‘Hmm,' says Konrad.

The girl stands up. ‘Until recently, I was called Fritzi, a very common short form of Friederike. But I can't have that any longer! You know, that silly i at the end – other girls can keep it. Now I'm called Fridz. But with a d, to make the difference. D'you see?'

‘Ah,' says Konrad. He sees nothing.

Fridz reaches out and shakes his hand. ‘And who are you?'

‘Konrad,' says Konrad. ‘Number 17a.'

‘Number 17a?' says Fridz. ‘That's not much of a name either.'

‘What?' says Konrad.

‘Joke.'

‘Oh, right.' Konrad stands and stares. This Fridz looks quite like her mother. She's very pale, she has the same long, red hair and her T-shirt is covered in crazy flowers. Though she also has freckles and she doesn't look sad. Cheeky, more like.

‘And you?' she says. ‘What do they call you? Konni, maybe?'

Oh, for goodness' sake! What on earth has he let himself in for?

‘No,' says Konrad. Come off it! It's been years since he got his mother to stop calling him Konni. He can't let it all start up again now!

‘Radi maybe?'

Hell's bells! It's about time the subject was changed. Otherwise, things are going to get more and more embarrassing. But how is he going to make this happen? Ah, yes!

‘Is that your rabbit?' asks Konrad. ‘The one down in the garage?'

‘Hmm,' says Fridz.

Does ‘Hmm' mean the same thing when she says it as when he does? Hard to know.

‘It's pretty fat,' says Konrad.

‘D'you want to see him?'

Well, it's worked. Because now Konrad can say, ‘Sure, I want to see him,' and then they can go downstairs, and then he'll be outside again. The rest will be easy, and in five minutes at the most he'll be able to get out of here. Lucky!

‘Sure, I want to see him,' says Konrad.

Fridz throws the doll on the bed. ‘Right then, let's go.'

Downstairs, they meet her mother again. She's sitting at a table that almost totally blocks the doorway from the hall into the kitchen. How stupid is that! thinks Konrad. At home, they're always saying how handy this wide doorway is. And here they block it up with a table!

The mother has a piece of paper in front of her, a letter, which she is reading. She's holding her head up with her hands and her long red hair falls to the left and right of the letter onto the table.

‘We're just going out,' says Fridz.

‘Go ahead,' says her mother. ‘But don't forget, we have to leave in ten minutes.'

In the garage Fridz opens one of the doors of the rabbit hutch. The great, big, fat rabbit drops his carrot and takes a leap that shakes the whole cage. But Fridz is faster, and she's got him by the back. Now the animal is quiet again and lets itself be taken out of the cage.

‘There,' says Fridz. ‘Hold him for a minute!'

And before Konrad has time to think, never mind say anything, he is holding the gigantic rabbit. He needs to use two hands and press the thing against his chest. It's heavier than a schoolbag.

‘No need to be afraid,' says Fridz. ‘He won't do anything.'

That's obviously a lie. His head, with those enormous ears, is lying just beside Konrad's head and the creature immediately starts doing something to Konrad's ear with its nose. Something that sends the owner of the ear totally crazy. Because firstly, he is suddenly overcome by the fear that his ear is going to be gobbled up like one of the carrots, and secondly, it tickles so much that he wants to roar laughing. And thirdly, he knows that there are two things he absolutely must not do: roar and drop this monster rabbit. Which means that he has to keep still – even if it costs him his ear.

‘Here, give him back to me,' says Fridz at last, grabbing the rabbit and bundling it back into the cage.

‘It's a Flemish Giant,' she says. ‘There used to be five. This lad here is the last of them.'

‘Oh, right,' says Konrad, wishing he could wash his ear. But he doesn't say this out loud. He's glad that at least it is still attached to his head. ‘Is he yours?' he says instead.

‘Yes and no.'

And then Konrad puts his foot in it. Probably because he's so happy that he has managed to hang onto his ear. He doesn't say, ‘Well, goodbye then!' or something like that so he can clear off out of there. Instead he asks, ‘What's that supposed to mean, “yes and no”?'

‘Yes and no means yes and no,' says Fridz. ‘No, because the rabbits actually belong to my father. And yes, because my father has left us, and since he can't bring himself to part from this one, I have to look after it.'

So that was it! Her father had gone off. Konrad is really up to his neck in it now. And now he can't possibly just say, ‘Well, goodbye then!' and scoot off. That would be rude. Worse, that would be cold and horrible.

‘Hmm,' he says. ‘Your father has left you?'

‘Yeah,' says Fridz. She takes a not quite fresh-looking lettuce out of a box, tears a few leaves off it and throws them into the hutch.

‘Just like that?' says Konrad.

‘Just like that? Just like that! Are you thick or what?'

‘I'm only asking.'