Vive le Sleepover Club! (4 page)

We all stood there staring at the note for about two minutes in silence, our eyes nearly dropping out of our heads. We could hardly believe what we were reading.

“It can’t be real!” Lyndz said at last. “It must be a joke!”

“But who wrote it?” Frankie asked, frowning at the piece of paper.

“Oh, it’s obvious, isn’t it?” Kenny snorted. “It must be the M&Ms!”

Fliss was shaking her head. “No, it couldn’t have been. The note wasn’t here
when we went out this morning and locked the door.”

“And we’ve been out all day and so have they,” Lyndz pointed out.

“Yeah, there’s no way it could have been them,” I agreed.

“It must be real then!” Fliss gasped. “Who do you think is up there?”

We all stared fearfully up at the bedroom ceiling as if we were expecting someone to drop through it like Father Christmas! It was weird to think of someone being held prisoner right over our heads.

“I told you I heard something up in the attic last night!” Frankie reminded us breathlessly. “It must have been that person, whoever it is!”

“I bet it’s something to do with that spooky maid, Chantal.” Fliss shuddered. “She looks like something out of a horror film – maybe she’s a witch!”

“Or a vampire,” Kenny suggested, baring her teeth. “And the attic’s where she keeps her victims! We’ve got to go and find out.”

“But we’re not allowed up those stairs,” I reminded her.

“Oh, knickers to that!” Kenny snorted. “Of course they don’t want anyone going up there if they’re keeping someone prisoner! But that’s not going to stop us, is it?”

“Well, actually…” Fliss began, looking absolutely terrified, but she stopped when Kenny glared at her.

“Look, if we wait till everyone’s asleep, we’ll be fine,” Kenny said urgently. “Someone could be in real trouble up there.”

We all looked up at the ceiling again. Kenny was right. If someone was in trouble we had to try and help

“Come on, let’s go down and get something to eat.” Kenny went over to the door. “We can’t do anything till tonight, and I’m starving!”

Frankie hid the note under her pillow just in case Scary Chantal came in, and we all went down to the dining room. The M&Ms were already in there, and they started giggling and whispering about us as we
walked in. They obviously thought Kenny had no hope of getting Danni Hart’s signature, and they were looking forward to making Kenny keep her part of the bargain when we got home.

“Hey, Kenny!” called Ryan Scott, who’s in our class. As we went past his table, he stuck out his foot, trying to trip one of us up. We all glared at him, except Fliss who giggled. She’s had a bit of a thing about Ryan Scott for ages. “Did you enjoy your
trip
today?”

Then he and his best mate Danny McCloud roared with laughter, and the stupid M&Ms joined in. So did all the other kids from our school.

“Oh, ha ha, very funny,” Kenny said shortly.

“Yeah, I thought so!” Ryan spluttered.

“Bet Danni Hart didn’t though!” Danny McCloud pointed out, and everyone laughed even harder.

“I’ve got to get that autograph!” Kenny said grimly as we sat down at our table looking gloomy. “If the M&Ms get one over on us, we’ll never hear the end of it.”

“Oh, let’s forget about the M&Ms!” I said. “I want to enjoy our sleepover tonight.”

The thought of the sleepover cheered us all up a bit. While we ate our dinner, we talked about what we were going to do that evening. We were also busy squirrelling away bits of bread and cheese to have later at our midnight feast. Mrs Weaver was sitting quite near us, so it was a good laugh trying not to let her see us stuffing bits of French bread into our pockets!

The hotel had a big games room, and after dinner we all piled in there to play table tennis and watch TV. We couldn’t really understand much of the TV though, because it was all in French! Anyway, we were only filling in time before our sleepover, so when the teachers came to round us all up for bed, we were quite pleased. At least it meant we got the M&Ms out of our hair.

“I can’t
wait
to find out who’s in the attic,” Kenny muttered as we went upstairs to our room. “Maybe we can help them to escape!”

“If we do find someone, I think we should tell Mrs Weaver,” said Fliss firmly. “‘Specially if that Chantal’s got anything to do with it!”

“Yeah, yeah, ‘course we will,” Kenny assured her. “I reckon Mrs Weaver can sort Chantal out, no problem!”

“Ssh! Someone’s coming down the stairs!” I hissed.

We turned the corner and came face to face with Pascal. He nodded and smiled politely at us.

“Bon soir, bon soir”
he said.

We all looked at each other blankly.

“I think that means goodnight,” Frankie said with a frown.

“Bon soir,
Pascal!” we all chorused, and he looked quite impressed!

“Hey, Pascal, come with me.” And Kenny suddenly grabbed Pascal’s arm and started pulling him up the stairs.

“Kenny, what are you doing?” I asked as we all chased after them. Pascal looked a bit bewildered to say the least.

“I just want to show him the staircase to
the attic,” Kenny called back over her shoulder. “He might be able to help us!”

“Kenny, he doesn’t even speak English!” Frankie grumbled. But Kenny ignored her. She took Pascal to the bottom of the staircase outside our room, and pointed upwards.

“What is up there?” she asked slowly.

Pascal stared at us. He looked really scared all of a sudden. Then he shook his head, gabbled something in French and dashed down the stairs, nearly falling over himself in his hurry to get away.

“What’s up with him?” Fliss said in a quavery voice. “He looked really frightened!”

“That settles it!” Kenny said, sounding very determined. “There is
definitely
something weird about that attic – and we’re going to find out what. Tonight!”

“
Bonjour,
everyone, and welcome to our French sleepover!” Frankie announced, bouncing up and down on her bed in her bright purple pyjamas.“Ça
sent très mauvais ici!
”

“What does that mean?” Kenny asked as we all looked impressed.

“I read it in my phrasebook.” Frankie grinned. “I think it means ‘I hope you all have a very good time’!”

“No, it doesn’t, Frankie, you fibber!” Lyndz announced after flipping through the phrasebook. “It means ‘There is a very bad smell in here’!”

“Oh, well, I must have got it wrong!” Frankie yawned. We all attacked her with our pillows, and ended up in a tangled heap on her bed.

“What shall we do now?” Fliss asked.

“Let’s have our midnight feast,” Lyndz suggested.

“We could write our diaries,” I said.

“Nah, let’s do the Can-Can!” Kenny grinned.

We all thought that was a great idea, so we stood in a line between the beds and linked arms.

“OK, right leg first!” Kenny instructed us as we began high-kicking into the air. “No,
right
leg, Fliss, you dummy!”

We all tried to hum the Can-Can tune as we kicked our legs up, but we were giggling so much we were nearly choking. Then Lyndz tried to kick her leg a bit too high. She overbalanced and fell back on to the bed, pulling the rest of us with her.

“I think we need a bit more practice!” she spluttered. “Hic!”

“No hiccups allowed!” Kenny thumped Lyndz on the back.

“Yeah, if you hiccup, you’ve got to do it in French!” Frankie added. Lyndz started laughing and that seemed to cure her!

“Can-Can dancers do the splits as well,” said Fliss. “Can anyone do them?”

We spent about ten minutes all trying to do the splits, but it was pretty hopeless. Then Frankie managed the splits after all – she split her pyjama trousers right along the middle! The rest of us nearly died laughing. Finally we had our midnight feast, and we scoffed all of Fliss’s chocolate and all of the bread and cheese.

“What shall we do now?” I asked.

“Ssh!” Kenny hissed as she snaffled the last square of chocolate. “Listen!”

We all listened hard.

“What is it?” Fliss asked fearfully. “I can’t hear anything.”

“Neither can I!” Kenny grinned at us. “Which means that everyone’s asleep. So come on!” She bounced off her bed, and grabbed her torch from her bag. “Let’s go and explore the attic!”

We all climbed off our beds, and followed Kenny over to the door. My heart was thumping hard. I think everyone else’s was too, by the looks on their faces.

“I’m not going first,” Fliss said in a shaky voice. “Or last.”

“I’ll go first,” Kenny said bravely. “Follow me!”

We all tiptoed out of our bedroom door – Kenny first, followed by me, Lyndz, Fliss and then Frankie. We looked up. Above us, the old dusty staircase wound out of sight into the darkness.

“Maybe we should just tell Mrs Weaver about the note,” Fliss suggested weakly as
Kenny put her foot on the first step. It creaked like mad.

“SSSHHHH!” the rest of us hissed.

“OK, don’t panic!” Kenny whispered back. She put her foot on the second step, and it creaked like a door opening in a horror movie.

Then we all froze in terror as we heard another noise. Footsteps were coming swiftly up the stairs behind us which led to our room. We could see a long, thin shadow on the wall, getting closer and closer… Someone was coming! We were so shocked we couldn’t even nip back into our bedroom.

“Quick!” Kenny gabbled, trying to rush down the stairs and only succeeding in bumping into the rest of us. “Let’s get out of here!”

But it was too late.

“Qu’est-ce que vous faites là, exactement?”
said a loud, angry voice.

Chantal the scary maid was standing there, glaring at us, hands on her hips. We were all rooted to the spot.

“
0ù allez-vous?”
Chantal snapped angrily.
“Retournez à votre chambre immédiatement!”

We couldn’t understand what she was saying, but we could tell by the look on her face that she wasn’t offering us a nice cup of tea! We all scurried down the stairs and back into our bedroom. Chantal stood in the doorway with her arms folded, glaring at us as we scrambled into bed. She didn’t move
until we were all under our duvets. Then she sniffed loudly and turned off the light, closing the door behind her.

“Whew! That old battle-axe definitely does not want us looking in the attic!” Kenny bounced out of bed and rushed over to switch the light back on. “Why do you think
that
is?”

“It’s probably where she keeps her broomstick!” I said with a grin.

“Ssh, she might be listening outside the door!” Fliss shivered. “I nearly died when she came round the corner!”

“She must know that there’s someone being kept prisoner up there,” I pointed out. “That’s why she was so mad.”

“What are we going to do?” Lyndz asked. “If there
is
someone being kept prisoner in the attic, we can’t just leave them there.”

“We’ll have to give it another go,” Frankie decided. “Tomorrow night. Chantal can’t possibly watch us the
whole
time.”

“Cool!” said Kenny. “We’ll show Chantal she can’t mess with the Sleepover Club and get away with it!”

I was the first one awake the next morning. I sat up in bed yawning and rubbing my eyes. Everyone was still flat out, and Fliss and Lyndz were snoring a bit.

I pushed back the duvet and swung my legs out of bed. Then I stopped. I’d just noticed something. There was a piece of paper lying on the floor. Someone had pushed another message under our door in the middle of the night!

“Hey, wake up you lot!” I yelled as I dived across the room and grabbed the piece of paper.

“Urgh!” Kenny mumbled, pushing the duvet off her head and sitting up.

“Oh, shut up, Rosie!” Frankie yawned.

“It’s not time to get up, is it?” Fliss moaned.

“That cheese has given me a stomachache!” Lyndz groaned.

“Be quiet, you lot!” I gabbled, as I read the note through quickly. “The prisoner in the attic has sent us another note!”

That got them all going!

“What!”
Kenny and Lyndz both jumped
out of bed and collided slap-bang with Frankie and Fliss who were already charging across the room towards me.

“Yeah, she pushed it under our door last night while we were asleep!” I waved the piece of paper at them.

“She?”
Lyndz repeated, “Who is it then?”

“Listen!” I read the note aloud. “Hello, my friends. My name is Jeanne. I am a prisoner in the attic, and I am only set free during the day when everyone is out and at night time when everyone is asleep. I have to do all the cooking and cleaning round here. Come to the attic tonight at midnight. Please help me – you are my only hope!”

We all stared at each other in amazement.

“We’ve got to help her!” I said.

“We will,” Kenny said firmly. “We can’t let that horrible Chantal get away with this!”

“Maybe we should take the note to Mrs Weaver,” Fliss suggested for the third time.

“Fliss could be right,” Frankie agreed solemnly. “This is getting pretty serious!”

“Mm, but we ought to check it out first,”
Kenny insisted. “We’ll look pretty stupid if it turns out to be a fake!”

“Kenny’s right,” Lyndz said. “And we’re not exactly Mrs Weaver’s favourite pupils at the moment either…”

“I don’t think it
is
a fake.” Frankie studied the note carefully.

Kenny nodded. “Neither do I. Look, all we’ve got to do is check it out first. If it’s true, then we’ll have to let the teachers know.”

“OK,” we all agreed.

“What are we going to do then?” Fliss asked, her teeth chattering.

“We’ll go up to the attic again tonight,” Kenny said grimly. “And this time nothing’s going to stop us. Not even Scary Chantal…”

We were all feeling pretty fired up about going to the attic to rescue Jeanne that night, so we were a bit rowdy at breakfast. It wasn’t until Mrs Weaver gave us the evil eye a few times that we calmed down! Anyway, there wasn’t anything we could do until the
evening, so we just tried to enjoy ourselves and forget about it for a bit.

Until the M&Ms came in and sat down at the table next to us, that is.

“I wonder where the
Westwood Street
actors will be filming today,” the Queen remarked in a loud voice as she nibbled a croissant.

“Miles away from wherever we are, I hope!” the Goblin said gruffly, and they both roared with laughter as if Emily had just made the joke of the century.

Kenny groaned, and buried her nose in her glass of orange juice.

“I’d almost forgotten about the bet, what with all that stuff last night!” she said. “Remember, you lot, we’ve got to keep our eyes open for the film crew!”

We all nodded.

After breakfast everyone piled into the minibus again for another day’s sightseeing. Mr Tate drove us to Montmartre, which is a really pretty part of Paris. It had lots of little streets, and a big white church called Sacre-
Cœur, which we were allowed to go into and look around. We were allowed to go shopping too, and we bought loads of souvenirs and postcards. Then we all got back on the minibus, and we were taken to the most famous museum in Paris, the Louvre. It was so big that we were only going round bits of it.

“Right, you’ll all recognise this famous picture,” Mrs Weaver announced as she led us into one of the rooms. We couldn’t see much though, because there was a big crowd of tourists round the famous picture, whatever it was.

“I can see it!” Frankie announced excitedly. She’s a right beanpole, so she could just about see what was hanging on the wall if she stood on her toes. She looked over the heads of a big crowd of Japanese tourists. “It’s the Mona Lisa!”

“Well done, Frankie,” said Mrs Weaver approvingly. “Yes, it is the Mona Lisa.”

“What’s Lisa moaning about now?” Kenny giggled, nudging me in the ribs.

“Oh, very funny!” I nudged her back as
some of the other tourists moved away and we managed to edge our way forward. “But you’re right – she doesn’t look very happy, does she?”

We looked at some of the other stuff in the museum, including a statue of a lady with no arms that Mrs Weaver said was the Venus de Milo. Then we were taken into a park to eat the packed lunches the hotel had prepared for us. We were starving, so we all got stuck in. All except Fliss, who started opening her sandwiches and peering into them as if she expected to find a slug or something!

“What
are
you doing, Flissy?” Kenny asked in amazement.

Fliss looked nervous. “What if it was Chantal who made the sandwiches?”

“What if it was?” Frankie asked, looking puzzled.

Fliss looked around, and lowered her voice. “Well, she might be trying to poison us!”

“Don’t be daft, Fliss!” said Frankie. Lyndz and I giggled, but Kenny frowned.

“You could be right, Fliss! Come to think if
it, I’m feeling a bit funny – urgh!” Kenny clutched her throat and fell over backwards, sprawling out motionless on the grass. Fliss squealed, and the rest of us howled with laughter.

“Oh, very clever!” Fliss poked Kenny in the stomach, and Kenny sat up, laughing her head off.

“No sign of the film crew yet today,” remarked Emma Hughes smugly as she and Emily Berryman went past us. “Looks like you won’t be getting that autograph after all, Kenny.”

Kenny stopped laughing and stuck her tongue out at the Queen’s back. “The Queen’s right, for once,” she said gloomily. “I just hope we catch up with the filming again soon …”

Guess what? We did! After lunch we went to see the famous cathedral, Notre Dame. We’d seen it from the boat the day before, but now we had a chance to look at it properly, and go inside. It was a really big, impressive building with lots of funny
gargoyles and other carvings on the front. But the very first thing we noticed was that the film crew were there again, along with the actors Danni Hart and Liam Darcy. And they were shooting a scene outside the cathedral!

“Cool!” Kenny exclaimed in delight. She pulled a face at the Queen and the Goblin, who’d also spotted the film crew and were looking like thunder. “This is where I really rub Emma’s nose in it!”

“Kenny, I don’t think you should be the one who gets the autograph,” Frankie said firmly as Mrs Weaver and the other teachers ushered us over to the cathedral entrance, keeping us away from the filming.

“What?” Kenny said with a frown. “Why not?”

“If Mrs Weaver catches you, you’re dead,” Frankie explained. “And if Danni Hart recognises you, you’re dead too.”

“Frankie’s right,” I chimed in. “One of us had better do it.”

“No way!” Kenny said crossly. “It’s
my
bet!”

Just then Mrs Weaver looked round an fixed Kenny with a grim stare. “Laura, I don want to see you going anywhere near the film crew today. Are you listening to me?”

“Yes, Mrs Weaver,” Kenny muttered.

“See?” we all chorused.

Kenny shrugged. “Weaver wouldn’t see me if I—”

“Do you really want to miss the trip to Disneyland and stay in the hotel all day writing lines?” Fliss interrupted her in severe voice.

Kenny pulled a face. “No.”

“OK, then, Rosie and I will do it.” Franki looked at Lyndz and Fliss. “Take Kenny into the cathedral, and don’t let her out of your sight!

“Come on, Kenny!” said Lyndz. She an Fliss each took one of Kenny’s arms and dragged her off. Kenny went very reluctantly but she went. Most of the others had already gone inside, except for Mr Tate who was rounding up the stragglers, and the M&Ms, who were obviously hanging around to see what was going to happen.

“So you’ve chickened out, have you, McKenzie!” Emma Hughes gloated as Kenny, Fliss and Lyndz went past them into the cathedral. “I knew you didn’t have the nerve!”

“I haven’t chickened out!” Kenny retorted. “Frankie and Rosie are going to get the autograph!”

The Queen looked superior. “That wasn’t the bet – the bet was that
you
were to get it! That means you’ve lost!”

“No way!” Kenny retorted. “Do you want this autograph or not?”

We all looked at the Queen, who was obviously thinking about what she was going to do. In a way, she was right. She
had
made the bet with Kenny, so we were breaking the conditions. But I could easily tell what Emma Hughes was thinking. She was thinking that this was a great chance to get some of the rest of the Sleepover Club into trouble,
and
still win the bet!

“All right,” Emma Hughes said at last.

“So you agree that Frankie and Rosie can get the autograph?” Kenny asked.

The Queen and the Goblin both nodded. Then they turned round and grinned evilly at me and Frankie. “This I’ve got to see!” said Emma Hughes smugly.