Free Maya's Secret by Holly Webb Page B

about it – get people to sign the petition.”
    “I found a video all about cotton picking in Uzbekistan, but I don’t know how we’d show it.” Maya looked hopefully at Mr Finlay. She knew he was good with things like that.
    “Laptop and projector, Maya, no problem. You could have the whole presentation on the screen, with photos of the factories and things.”
    “Will you help?” Maya asked hopefully. “We wondered if you might be able to sort out lights.”
    Mr Finlay nodded. “Yes, if we’re allowed to do it I’ll definitely help – I should think Mrs Angel will say you need some staff involved anyway.” He sawEmily’s disappointed face. “Don’t worry. No one will take over your idea, girls. You’ll still be in charge.”

    “I don’t know if our uniforms are Fairtrade or not…” Mrs Angel murmured the next morning. Mr Finlay had left the rest of the class with Miss Grace, so he could explain to Mrs Angel that he would help too.
    “I think they probably aren’t, then,” Maya said politely. “They’d make a thing of it, if they were Fairtrade, wouldn’t they?”
    Mrs Angel nodded. “Yes, of course.” She smiled at Mr Finlay. “This wasn’t what I was expecting when you told me your class were doing projects on Fairtrade.”
    Mr Finlay smiled proudly. “I know. They’re thinking big.”
    “There is quite a lot that could go wrong, though.” Mrs Angel looked down Izzy’s list. “However. If you can sell enough tickets in advance to cover paying Mr Sampson to keep school open for the evening, you can have your show. Mr Finlay, can you go through the diary with Mrs Brooker, and find a good date? About three or four weeks away, perhaps.”
    “And we can do a presentation about Fairtradecotton, and ask people to sign the petition?” Emily asked hopefully.
    Mrs Angel nodded. “That kind of thing has to be decided by the governors, though. Get lots of signatures and we’ll see.”
    “Thanks, Mrs Angel!”
    The girls hurried out of the office, and hugged each other in the corridor. Maya even felt like hugging Mr Finlay.
    “I’ll email Tara tonight and tell her we can do the show!” she said excitedly. “Then she can get her daughter started on finding models.”
    “Let’s go and get a date set then.” Mr Finlay went into the school office, and started explaining to Mrs Brooker, who was surprisingly enthusiastic.
    “I’ve seen that lovely new shop,” she told the girls, who were clustering round the door. “And this is the uniform catalogue. See if you can find anything about Fairtrade.” She passed them a thick catalogue, marked with sticky notes here and there, and they leafed through it.
    “It doesn’t say anything about where the cotton comes from,” Maya muttered. “Nothing about Fairtrade at all.” She sighed. “So we’d have to find someone who could make jumpers with theschool logo on.”
    “I’ll put it on my list,” Izzy said, and Maya laughed.
    “You sound so organised! But I suppose we need to be.” She gave a little shiver. She could hardly believe that Mrs Angel had said yes. Suddenly Izzy’s list looked very scary.

    “This is so exciting!” Tara sounded delighted. Maya had decided to phone the shop as soon as she got home from school, rather than emailing. “Tuesday the nineteenth. Just over three weeks. Right. I’ll get Leah finding some models. But what about the girls’ clothes, Maya? Will you and your friends model those? It would be nice, seeing as it was all your idea.”
    Maya gulped, feeling suddenly stupid. They hadn’t even thought about that! Of course, if they were doing a show at school, all the girls would want to see the clothes for them too. “I’m not sure…” she faltered. “We might have to do back-stage stuff. But we can find people, definitely.”
    They agreed to meet up at the shop again on Saturday, and Maya put the phone down, feeling worried. Who should they ask? She loved the idea of modelling, but she had agreed