Five Fall Into Adventure Read Free Page B

lunch they lazed on the beach till it was time for a bathe again. It was a happy day for all of them - warm, lazy, with plenty of fun and romping about.
    George looked out for the ragamuffin girl, but she didn’t appear again. George was half sorry. She would have liked a battle of words with her, even if she couldn’t have a fight!
    They were all very tired when they went to bed that night. Julian yawned so loudly when Joan came in with a jug of hot cocoa and some biscuits that she offered to lock up the house for him.
    ‘Oh, no, thank you, Joan,’ said Julian at once. ‘That’s the man’s job, you know, locking up the house. You can trust me all right. I’ll see to every window and every door.’
    ‘Right, Master Julian,’ said Joan, and bustled away to wind up the kitchen clock, rake
    out the fire, and go up to bed. The children went up, too, Timmy, as usual, at George’s heels. Julian was left downstairs to lock up.
    He was a very responsible boy. Joan knew that he wouldn’t leave a single window unfastened. She heard him trying to shut the little window in the pantry, and she called down:
    ‘Master Julian! It’s swollen or something, and won’t shut properly. You needn’t bother about it, it’s too small for anyone to get into!’
    ‘Right!’ said Julian, thankfully, and went upstairs. He yawned a terrific yawn again, and set Dick off, too, as soon as he came into the bedroom they both shared. The girls, undressing in the next room, laughed to hear them.
    ‘You wouldn’t hear a burglar in the middle of the night, Julian and Dick!’ called Anne.
    ‘You’ll sleep like logs!’

    “Famous Five 09 - Five Fall Into Adventure” By Enid Blyton 10
    ‘Old Timmy can listen out for burglars,’ said Julian, cleaning his teeth vigorously. ‘That’s his job, not mine. Isn’t it, Timmy?’
    ‘Woof,’ said Timmy, clambering on to George’s bed. He always slept curled up in the crook of her knees. Her mother had given up trying to insist that George didn’t have Timmy on her bed at night. As George said, even if she agreed to that, Timmy wouldn’t!

    Nobody stayed awake for more than five seconds. Nobody even said anything in bed, except for a sleepy good night. Timmy gave a little grunt and settled down, too, his head on George’s feet. It was heavy, but she liked it there. She put out a hand and stroked Timmy gently. He licked one of her feet through the bed-clothes. He loved George more than anyone in the world.
    It was dark outside that night. Thick clouds had come up and put out all the stars. There was no sound to be heard but the wind in the trees and the distant surge of the sea -
    and both sounded so much the same that it was hard to tell the difference.
    Not another sound - not even an owl hooting to its mate, or the sound of a hedgehog pattering in the ditch.
    Then why did Timmy wake up? Why did he open first one eye and then another? Why did he prick up his ears and lie there, listening? He didn’t even lift his head at first. He simply lay listening in the darkness.
    He lifted his head cautiously at last. He slid off the bed as quietly as a cat. He padded across the room and out of the door. Down the stairs he went, and into the hall, where his claws rattled on the tiled floor. But nobody heard him. Everyone in the house was fast asleep.
    Timmy stood and listened in the hall. He knew he had heard something. Could it have been a rat somewhere? Timmy lifted his nose and sniffed.
    And then he stiffened from head to tail, and stood as if turned into stone. Something was climbing up the wall of the house. Scrape, scrape, scrape - rustle, rustle! Would a rat dare to do that?
    Upstairs, in her bed, Anne didn’t know why she suddenly woke up just then, but she did.
    She was thirsty, and she thought she would get a drink of water. She felt for her torch, and switched it on.
    The light fell on the window first, and Anne saw something that gave her a terrible shock. She screamed loudly, and dropped