Five Do It All Over The Place - Part 4

As you may recall, the girls are stuck in a tunnel, Timmy has been struck unconscious and the boys have been trussed up by a rosy-cheeked farmer's wife who is, in fact, their disgraced Uncle Quentin. Uncle Quentin intends to take over FiveWorld, the money-making theme park, owned by the children and will stop at nothing in his bid for economic domination. None of them have eaten for several minutes.

Uncle Quentin slipped the gag from Dick's mouth in order to feed him a small rock cake and some ginger-ale. The boy's hearts were warmed to know he still retained some semblance of humanity (and it also made the following conversation far more easier).

'How do I know it's really you?' said Dick. 'These blindfolds make identification far too difficult. For all I know, you could be a sinister twist in the plot.'

He felt something placed in his hand.

'Do you remember this from your visits to my study at Kirrin Cottage?'

Of course I do,' replied Dick, running his hand around the familiar object. 'How could I ever forget the fun I had with that? It's the yoyo you won at the 1936 Naturist Choirboy Convention! So it's really you, Uncle Quentin. Why, oh why can't you just let us go?'

'Boys, I'm afraid that there will be no happy ending for you; you've had your last adventure! Now I'm off to go and find those pesky girls before they wreck my dastardly plans.'

Meanwhile, the girls were still in the tunnel.

'Oh, George,' said Anne 'it's so lucky I have my clockwork torch with me.' and cranked away merrily as they wandered down the tunnel frantically looking for an escape.

After a while, and having had no luck in finding an escape route, they sat down and disconsolately ate some delicious ham sandwiches and a small Victoria sponge whilst discussing their predicament.

'Anne, old thing, I know you're a girl and will be terribly worried so I'll try not to frighten you.'

'Frighten me, George? What on earth do you mean?

'Well, I'm afraid we seem to be lost and may well die a terrible and lonely death by starvation - our bodies lying here forgotten and cold forever.'

George heard the gentle trickle of liquid and realised that her bid to break the news gently had failed.

'Oh, George,' sobbed Anne, 'this means we'll never see the boys again and, for all we know, our lovely theme park will be taken over by a consortium led by somebody who won't care about anything other than making money....and I had such plans for another 7 home-made cake concessions.' Oh, if only we could miraculously find some way to escape?'

As she idly squeezed her torch, she noticed a sign on the wall opposite.

'Look!' she squeaked. 'There's a sign on the wall opposite.'

Sure enough, illuminated by the dim glow was a large sign which said "In the event of losing your way, there is an escape exit through this door >>>>"

They quickly headed through it and found themselves once more on the moor. Wasting no further time, they headed back to the farm. Imagine their surprise when they saw the boys lying on the bed. They were even more surprised to find several bottles of wonderful lemonade which they drank thirstily.

'Mmmm, that was super but I suppose we'd better untie the boys now.'

Julian explained about his Uncle's plans for their demise, his apparent loss of reasoning and how George's Father was soon to become her second mummy and proffered his sympathies to poor George. 'Oh, never mind about all that, there is far worse news' and explained about Timmy. As she remembered her bestest friend, a small tear came to her eye.

Dick noticed it and gently teased her; 'Girly, girly, George is a gir....ooomph!' He lay back clutching his scrumptious macaroons, realising that perhaps he had gone too far.

They quickly decided to head down the tunnel once more and find some way of rescuing their canine companion. Pausing only to pack a few pies, pasties and a simply enormous chocolate cake, they rushed off to the barn and were soon back in the tunnel.

As they stood there, they heard voices and headed rapidly in the direction of the sound. They reached a large excavated area and realised that they had reached the nerve centre of Uncle Quentin's operation.

George's face took on an expression of rather butch ferocity. 'This must be where Timmy is! Quick, check all the side rooms.'

In a flash, they looked in all the rooms but no sign of poor Timmy. As they stood in the last room, they gazed idly at the industrial mincer, assortment of cleavers and the Korean recipe book. Something was glinting under the table! Anne pounced on it and exclaimed 'Oh, look, it's Timmy's identity disc!

''You know what this means,' said Julian slowly.

Their eyes widened as the news slowly sunk in. 'You mean that they are going to close all the scrummy cake stalls and sell foreign food? At our theme park? gasped Anne. 'I'm afraid so.' said Julian glumly.

As they realised that their world had fallen apart, George gazed fondly at the identity disc. It was all she had left of her beloved Timmy and they were still no further forward in locating his whereabouts.

'I say,' she said, 'I think there's a clue on this disc.' and read the words written thereon, as if for the first time:

"Timmy the Dog. If you find this, please check the cupboard just to the right of the Tupperware display."

On a hunch, Dick pulled open a cupboard, just to the right of the Tupperware display and, sure enough, Timmy looked up at them, his tail wagging feebly at seeing his friends once more.

Oh Timmy, you're safe.' cried George. 'No, please don't lick my face.'

'Sorry,' said Dick, 'but there was a couple of crumbs there and I'm absolutely starving!'

At last, the Famous Five were together once more.

'Right,' said Julian fiercely, 'now let's go and kick bottom!'

The Five headed out into the main room once more and stopped dead in their tracks! There, spread out in a line, were a dozen, desperate-looking men armed with an assortment of semi-automatic weapons, grenade launchers, Patriot missiles and a cake slice. In their centre stood Uncle Quentin, a sardonic smile upon his face.

'Oh....................bollocks!!!' said Anne.

To be continued.

Copyright: BertieBassett Enterprises Inc. 2008 This article cannot be reproduced in full or part without written permission of the author