The Sleepover Mystery E-Book

Holly Webb

• Herausgeber: Little Tiger Press
• Kategorie: Für Kinder und Jugendliche
• Serie: Museum Kittens
• Sprache: Englisch

Seitenzahl: 70

Veröffentlichungsjahr: 2022

Beschreibung

Brave, clever and never more than a whisker away from adventure! When the museum's visitors are gone for the day, it's time for the cats to come out to play…The kittens can't wait for the museum's first ever sleepover! Especially Bianca, who loves being fussed over. So much so that when she goes missing, the others worry that she may have run away with the children. But the rats have also been sniffing around the school party. Could the kittens' old enemies be the ones behind Bianca's disappearance?The third in a charming new series from Holly Webb. Purr-fect for fans of the OTTOLINE books and THE ROYAL RABBITS OF LONDON.

Leseprobe

For my mother, thinking of our dolls’ house – HW

For George and Ted – SL

Contents

Title PageDedicationMuseum MapChapter OneChapter TwoChapter ThreeChapter FourChapter FiveChapter SixChapter SevenChapter EightChapter NineChapter TenAuthor’s NoteAbout the AuthorCopyright

Chapter One

The kittens were lazing away the afternoon around the courtyard fountain, resting before their night shift. Ever since they’d managed to save the precious Egyptian Gallery from a flood a few weeks earlier, they’d been given their own guard shifts at the museum. All four of the kittens were very proud of their new duties. They loved prowling around the galleries, sniffing for rats and mice, and maybe even burglars.

But although they didn’t work as many hours as the older cats yet, they were all getting short on sleep. It was making Boris grumpy. The ginger kitten and his fluffy white sister Bianca seemed to spend most of the time snapping at each other. Tasha, their tabby sister, was worried that the pair were going to get them all into trouble with their constant squabbling. She had to keep reminding Bianca and Boris that they were supposed to be quiet and well behaved when the museum was open…

Peter, the black kitten, was just keeping out of it. He hadn’t been living at the museum for very long, so he tried not to get in the way when Boris and Bianca fought. He knew he was a proper museum cat now, but that didn’t mean he was actually one of the family.

Boris and Bianca were being even snappier than usual this week. The Egyptian Gallery was open again, but the flood had caused a lot of damage and it had been really expensive to tidy everything up. So the Museum Director had thought of a brilliant way to bring in lots of visitors. At the end of the week, the museum was having its first school sleepover. Sixty children were going to stay overnight in the Dinosaur Gallery! The whole museum was full of staff having the jitters and arguing over the tiniest things, and now Boris and Bianca were joining in too.

“It’s your turn!” Bianca hissed.

“No, it isn’t.” Boris curled his tail round his hind paws. “Definitely not.”

“I did it last week!”

“Mmmm, well, I can’t remember when I last did it, but it’s absolutely not my turn.” Boris yawned.

“Oh!” Bianca mewed in frustration. “You’re so lazy! Just because you don’t like the China and Glass Room. Because it doesn’t have boring old suits of armour, or motor cars like in the Transport Galleries. You can’t pick and choose, you know.”

“That’s nonsense.” Boris shook his whiskers and yawned again, then collapsed down into a patch of sunlight. “I guard all the different galleries when it’s my turn. And right now it isn’t.” He opened one eye to peer at Bianca. “Are you saying Ma’s got the shift rota wrong?”

“I’ll do it,” Tasha put in. Her tabby ears were flickering back and forth as she listened to her brother and sister sniping at each other. She hated it when the other kittens argued.

“Excellent,” Boris purred. “I’ll take the Dinosaur Gallery then.”

“No!” Bianca glared at Tasha. “Don’t you dare!”

“But I thought you wanted someone to guard the China and Glass—” Tasha started to say.

“I want him to do it, because it’s his turn! Ma hasn’t got the rota wrong, he’s just not listening because he doesn’t want to do as he’s told!” Bianca was practically spitting with fury now, and Tasha could tell that Boris was deliberately provoking her. He had his eyes almost closed as if he was asleep, but she could see a bright amber flash every so often as he sneaked glances at Bianca.

“But does it really matter, so long as someone does it…” she tried to say to Bianca.

“Yes, it does. It isn’t fair!” Bianca snarled. “Oh, how can you be so stupid!”

“Hey! Don’t call her that.” Peter sat up, his whiskers bristling.

“But she’s doing exactly what Boris wants!” Bianca wailed. “Look! Look at him – he thinks it’s funny!”

Tasha and Peter looked obediently. Boris was shaking with purry laughter.

“You still shouldn’t say Tasha’s stupid.” Peter came to stand beside the tabby kitten. “She was only trying to help.”

“And I like the China and Glass Room,” Tasha said. “I don’t mind guarding it.”

Boris opened his eyes. “No one likes the China and Glass. It’s the boringest room in the whole museum. Except for the one with those ear trumpets.”

“The what?” Peter blinked. How could anyone play a trumpet with their ears?

“Ear trumpets,” Tasha explained. “An old lady left loads of money to the museum in her will a few years ago, but she said they could only have the money if they found a room to put her collection of ear trumpets in. It’s along the balcony, next to the Manuscript Room.”

“Oh … those things. I wondered what they were.” Peter nodded politely. “Do they sound nice?”

Boris yawned. “No idea. No one ever plays them.”

Tasha wrinkled her muzzle. “Boris! You know they aren’t that sort of trumpet. They’re for helping people who can’t hear very well,” she explained to Peter. “You put one end in your ear and people shout into the other end. But I’m not sure they ever actually worked. No one uses them now.”

“Mmmnnnn…” Boris let out another yawn. “I just guard the museum, Tasha, I don’t read all the labels.”

Even Tasha was giving her brother an irritable stare now and Bianca was looking smug.

“Anyway,” Boris went on. “The China and Glass Room is very, very boring. Pots. And vases. And teensy little wine glasses. Who wants to look at those when they could have a big, shiny suit of armour? That school sleepover that’s happening in a couple of days – the children aren’t sleeping in the super-exciting China and Glass Room, are they?”

“It is exciting!” Tasha put in. “China is made of bones.”

“Bones? No, it isn’t,” Boris said. He’d clearly decided that today was his day to be as annoying as possible.

“It is! Bones and clay and some other things. Ground up very fine.”

“Is it really?” Peter asked, feeling slightly more interested in the china now.

“Yes, but only the kind that says bone china on the label,” Tasha admitted.

“Goodness.” Peter shuddered. “I never knew that.”

“And glass is made out of sand,” Tasha went on.

The other three kittens stared at her.

“It can’t be,” Bianca said. “It would fall apart. Anyway, that’s not the point. Whatever the stuff’s made out of, it’s Boris’s turn to be on watch in there and he has to do it.”

“Nope.”

“Yes, you will!” Bianca screeched, losing her temper. “You will, you will, you will!”

“Can’t make me.” Boris yawned again, sneaking a sideways look at his sister.

The thick white fur stood up all the way along Bianca’s spine and her tail fluffed out like a feather duster. She arched her back and jumped up and down on all four paws, like one of the strange springy jack-in-the-boxes in the Dolls’ Houses and Toys Gallery. Tasha edged away, convinced for a moment that there were sparks flying off her sister’s fur.

Bianca yowled and leaped on Boris.

Boris was so surprised that for a few seconds he sat there like a lump – with Bianca clinging on to his back. Then he hissed and stood up, shaking himself wildly from side to side to fling Bianca off. The white kitten went flying and Boris spun round, glaring at her.

Unfortunately, he forgot that he was delicately balanced on the edge of a fountain. His claws scrabbled and slid – and he splashed into the basin with a shriek of fury.

Bianca peered down at him, looking shocked, and then her whiskers twitched with delight. She hadn’t actually meant to push Boris into the pool, but he deserved it!

“Good!” she sniggered. “You were looking very grubby.”