Читать книгу Shock for the Secret Seven - Enid blyton - Страница 3

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‘When are you having a meeting of the Secret Seven again?’ asked Peter’s mother.

‘I don’t know. Why, Mother?’ asked Peter, looking up from his book.

‘Well, because if you do, I don’t think you ought to meet in that old shed of yours,’ said his mother. ‘It’s such very cold weather. You’d better meet up here in the house.’

‘Oh no, Mother,’ said Janet, joining in. ‘It wouldn’t be a secret meeting then. We must meet in the shed.’

‘Well—you’ll have to heat it up a little then,’ said Mother. ‘I can’t have you down with colds just at the end of the Christmas term. Can’t you do without meetings till after Christmas?’

‘Not very well,’ said Janet. ‘We’d half thought it would be a good idea to take the Christmas presents we’re making down to the shed—all seven of us, I mean—and have a sort of Making Presents meeting. We thought we could all wear our coats.’

‘You’d be frozen!’ said Mother. ‘I’ll lend you my new little Safety-First stove—even if it’s knocked over, it’s safe! Then I shan’t be afraid of the shed catching fire.’

‘Oh, thank you, Mother!’ said both children together, and Scamper the golden spaniel barked loudly, as if he thoroughly agreed. Janet grinned. ‘He say’s he’ll be jolly glad of a stove too,’ she said. ‘He’s a real old lie-by-the-fire these days—aren’t you, Scamper?’

‘Well, you should take him for a good long walk,’ said Mother. ‘He’d love that. You’re getting fat and lazy, you two!’

She went out of the room, and Janet and Peter looked at one another. ‘What with exams and one thing and another we haven’t really had much time for the Secret Seven,’ said Peter. ‘It would be nice and cosy in the shed with that stove—we could take all the Christmas things we’re making, and do them down there—and not have to keep taking them off the table just because meals have to be laid.’

‘We’ll tell the others tomorrow,’ said Janet, happily. ‘We shall have to have a new password—it’s so long since we had a meeting. What shall we have?’

‘Custard pudding!’ said Peter, grinning.

‘What an idiotic password!’ said Janet. ‘Why not ham and eggs? Or toad-in-the-hole—or ...’

‘Toad-in-the-Hole—that’s rather a good one!’ said Peter. ‘It’ll make the others laugh. Jolly good, old girl!’

‘Don’t call me “old girl”,’ said Janet. ‘I keep on telling you not to. You sound like Uncle Bertie. He always calls Auntie “old girl”.’

‘All right, young girl,’ said Peter. ‘Toad-in-the-Hole—ha, nobody will forget that! Let’s see—that’s sausage in batter pudding, isn’t it?’

‘Of course it is!’ said Janet. ‘How can you forget that, seeing that last time we had it, you ate four “toads”—four sausages, and felt jolly queer afterwards.’

‘So I did,’ said Peter. ‘Scamper—the password is Toad-in-the-hole. Don’t forget!’

‘Wuff!’ said Scamper, and wagged his tail.

Next day at school Peter called Colin, Jack and George into a corner. ‘Secret Seven meeting on Saturday at ten o’clock in the shed,’ he said. ‘The password is “Toad-in-the-Hole”. You know—sausages in batter.’

‘What a password!’ said Jack. ‘I’ll never remember such a silly one. I’ll have to write it down.’

‘No, don’t. That awful sister Susie of yours might find your notebook and see the password,’ said Peter.

‘All right. I’ll try and keep it in my head. I’ll make up a rhyme about it—that’ll help me to remember it,’ said Jack. ‘Let’s see—Old King Cole was a jolly old soul, his favourite dinner was “Toad-in-the-Hole!” Ha—I’ll remember it all right now.’

‘You heard the time of the meeting, didn’t you?’ said Peter. ‘You look a bit scatty this morning.’

‘Well, I feel it,’ said Jack. ‘What with exams and things—and preparing for old Bony—he’s coming to stay with me, you know—and ...’

‘Old Bony—who on earth is he—a skeleton or something?’ asked Peter, with much interest.

‘Ass! He’s a French boy—the one I went to stay with in France last year,’ said Jack. ‘His name is Jean Bonaparte—no relation of the great general! He’s—well, he’s awfully serious and earnest, and I can’t say I’m much looking forward to his coming. I’m hoping Susie will like him and take him off my hands. She rather fancies herself with foreigners.’

‘Don’t you tell Susie anything about the meeting on Saturday,’ said Peter. ‘You pack her off somewhere with Bony.’

‘I suppose you wouldn’t let me take him to the meeting?’ asked Jack, not looking very hopeful. ‘I mean—Mother’s sure to say I can’t leave him alone on Saturday—he’s coming on Friday, you see, and it will look a bit rude to rush off by myself the very next morning.’

‘You don’t seem very keen on coming to a Secret Seven meeting,’ said Peter.

‘Don’t be an ass! Of course I want to come—but my mother isn’t like yours. She doesn’t think the Secret Seven is at all important. But I will come if I possibly can,’ said poor Jack, looking scattier than ever.

‘All right. But don’t you let Susie know, now—and don’t tell her the password,’ said Peter, sternly. ‘I hope you’ve not forgotten how she and Binkie, that awful giggling friend of hers, once got into our shed before a meeting, and locked the door on the inside so that we couldn’t get in—and asked us for the password!’

Jack gave a sudden grin. ‘Yes. It was awful of them—but honestly it had its funny side. All right—I won’t give our meeting away. Trust me! I’ll come somehow, even if I have to park Bony in an ice-cream shop and buy him half a dozen ices to keep him quiet! By the way, tell me the password again, Peter.’

But Peter had gone. Blow—what was that password now—Old King Cole? Sausages? Dinner-time? Jack went off frowning. What with his sister Susie, and exams, and Christmas looming up, and that ass of a Bony, life was very, very difficult!