Strawberry Thief

by Sally Rippin

  ‘You’re right!’ Billie says excitedly. ‘Come on! Let’s go find the boys!’

  Billie and Mika find the two boys a little way down the street.

  ‘I think we’ve found the thief!’ Mika squeals.

  ‘Really?’ Jack and Alex say, looking excited. ‘Who? Who?’

  ‘Someone really scary looking…’ Mika says, giving them a clue. ‘She lives in a big scary house and has long white hair.’

  ‘Andrea?’ Jack frowns. ‘She’s not a thief.’

  ‘She’s been making strawberry jam,’ Mika says. ‘Lots of it! She made enough to have some left over for Alf to sell in his shop. Where do you think she got all those strawberries from, huh?’

  Mika puts her hands on her hips to show that she has made up her mind. ‘She’s our strawberry thief. I’m sure of it!’

  Jack shakes his head. ‘I don’t think it’s Andrea,’ he mumbles. ‘She wouldn’t do something like that.’

  ‘Only one way to find out!’ Alex says, his eyes lighting up with excitement.

  He and Mika run along the footpath towards the big scary house at the end of the street.

  Billie looks at Jack. She was as excited as Mika before. She felt sure they had discovered who the thief was. But now she sees Jack’s worried expression, she’s not so sure. ‘Come on,’ says Billie gently, taking Jack’s hand. ‘Let’s catch up with the others.’

  The four of them arrive at Andrea’s house, a little out of breath. Now that they are standing in front of the big spooky house, Alex and Mika don’t look as brave as before.

  Billie remembers that only she and Jack have ever been inside Andrea’s house. Mika and Alex have only heard about it from them.

  Jack walks past them all and knocks on the door. They all stand quietly, listening to the footsteps clomping down the hall towards them. Andrea pulls open the door and blinks into the sunlight. She looks as scary as ever. Today she is wearing a long white apron with red smears all down the front of it.

  Even though Billie knows there is nothing to be afraid of, Andrea still makes her shiver a bit.

  ‘Well, well, well!’ Andrea says, grinning. ‘You kids have arrived at the right time! I’ve just taken a batch of scones out of the oven to have with home-made strawberry jam. Come in! Come in!’

  Mika jabs her elbow into Billie’s ribs. ‘Thank you!’ she says, her voice sounding extra brave. ‘I love strawberry jam!’

  Then she steps past them all and follows Andrea into the house.

  As they walk along the corridor, Billie can smell a sweet fruity smell coming from the kitchen. ‘Is that the jam I can smell?’ she asks Andrea.

  ‘Yes!’ says Andrea. ‘My brother runs a strawberry farm and he brought me three crates of ripe strawberries yesterday.’

  ‘Oh!’ says Billie looking at Mika.

  Andrea opens the door onto the kitchen. There on the sticky wooden table are two empty crates covered in pink stains and one crate full of big fat strawberries.

  ‘I knew I’d need a lot of strawberries to make jam, but I think I ordered a few too many.’ Andrea grins. ‘I’ve got strawberry jam coming out of my ears and I still haven’t been able to use them all up. Will you kids take some home with you?’

  ‘See?’ Jack hisses in Mika’s ear. Mika looks down at the floor, her cheeks turning as red as berries.

  ‘Sit down, sit down,’ Andrea says, pointing to her big wooden table. ‘And I’ll get some scones for you all. They’re fresh from the oven.’

  Billie and her friends sit up at Andrea’s kitchen table feeling downhearted. But they can’t stay glum for long. Fresh scones with strawberry jam and cream is enough to cheer anybody up!

  Walking back to Billie’s house, swinging plastic bags full of strawberries and jam, Billie and her friends talk about their next move.

  ‘Well, we’ve ruled out the neighbours,’ Alex says, counting people off his fingers. ‘Nobody saw anyone or heard anything that night. And besides, you can’t get into Mika’s backyard without going through the house.’

  ‘And the back fence is too high for anyone to climb over,’ Jack adds.

  ‘It wasn’t birds,’ Alex says.

  ‘Or any other creature,’ Jack says. ‘Otherwise the net would have been disturbed.’

  ‘It might just have to remain an unsolved mystery, Mika,’ Billie says kindly, draping her arm over her friend’s shoulder. ‘We can’t solve everything.’

  ‘Yes we can!’ Mika says angrily. ‘You are all giving up too easily.

  You think just because it’s strawberries and not something important that was stolen, it doesn’t matter. Well, it matters to me! There’s a new lot of strawberries about to ripen and I’ll bet the thief will be back any day now. And it will happen again and again if we don’t catch them. I thought you were my friends! I thought we were a team!’

  Billie, Jack and Alex all look at Mika in shock. Mika hardly ever loses her temper.

  Mika is always the quiet one. The one who lets other people make all the decisions. The one who is always happy to go along with what other people say.

  Billie understands now how important it is to Mika. That’s why we can’t let her down, she thinks.

  ‘Well, I guess there’s one last thing we can try,’ Billie says slowly. ‘But it might be scary. And it will definitely be risky.’

  ‘What?’ say the others, their eyes growing wide.

  ‘We set a trap,’ says Billie. ‘To catch the thief.’

  The others hoot with excitement. Billie grins. She is the most excited of them all.

  The Secret Mystery Club has to wait a whole week until they can put their plan into action. Every day at school they discuss the details underneath the peppercorn tree. Every afternoon they meet in the treehouse to go over their plan.

  Finally, the day they have been waiting for arrives. Mika’s mum helps them set up Billie’s tent in the backyard where they can keep a lookout over the strawberry patch.

  Mrs Okinawa is very happy to have all of Mika’s friends stay the night, even if she does think it’s a little strange that they all want to sleep outside. What she doesn’t know is that deep inside Billie’s backpack is a plastic bag full of Andrea’s juicy strawberries.

  When Mrs Okinawa has gone inside, the four of them lift up the edges of the netting and scatter the ripe strawberries among the strawberry plants.

  Mrs Okinawa’s own strawberries are still pale and hard, but Billie hopes that the ripe strawberries will tempt the thief to come back into the garden. If they can catch the thief that night, they might be able to save Mrs Okinawa’s next batch of strawberries.

  The last thing Billie does before they snuggle down into their sleeping bags for the night is to attach a little bell to the netting, just like the one Alf has on his shop door. If anything or anyone disturbs the netting, they will hear the bell ringing from inside their tent.

  Billie has brought along her camera. If they hear the bell she will go outside as quickly as she can and snap photos with the flash on.

  It’s a brilliant plan and the Secret Mystery Club are convinced they will catch their thief.

  But it has been a long week and detective work is very tiring business! Billie can hear her friends’ voices getting sleepy as they chat in the dark. One by one, Alex, Jack and even Mika fall asleep until Billie is the only one awake.

  Her ears feel like they are almost growing bigger as she listens to the sounds outside the tent.

  She hears the whisper of the wind through the leaves, the rustle of birds in the trees, even the bubble and glop of the fish in the pond. But no thief.

  Billie’s eyes become scratchy with tiredness. Her eyelids become as heavy as stones. Just as Billie feels herself sliding into sleep, there is a sound that snatches her eyes open.

  A bell. Ding-a-ling!

  There it is again!

  Billie sits up and grabs her camera. She gently lifts the tent flap and points her camera towards the strawberry patch.

  Flash! F
lash! Flash! Her camera goes off and Billie hears a squeal and scuffle as the thief makes its getaway.

  ‘Wake up! Wake up!’ Billie tells the others, shaking them in their sleeping bags. ‘I got it. I got it! It’s here! Look, on my camera!’

  Billie switches on a torch as the others wake up, rubbing the sleep from their eyes. They crowd around Billie as she presses the button on the camera so they can see what she has photographed.

  Billie’s heart is beating so hard she can feel it in her ears. The first photograph comes on display. They see the fence, the big tree, the strawberry patch and all the netting. And there, shining out of the dark, five pairs of eyes stare back at them.

  ‘I can’t believe it!’ Mika gasps.

  The others snort with laughter. There is not one strawberry thief, but five! Billie zooms in and the photograph clearly shows five cheeky possums, their mouths stuffed with strawberries.

  At school on Monday morning, Billie, Jack and Alex are still laughing about the strawberry-stealing possums as they wait for Mika. She arrives just as the bell goes and the four of them walk to class together.

  ‘So, did Gus fix the hole in the fence?’ Alex asks Mika.

  Mika grins. ‘He sure did! Mum called him over after you went home and he hammered a piece of wood over it. I can’t believe we didn’t see it there when we were looking for clues that first day.’

  ‘I guess we didn’t think of looking at the fence,’ Jack says. ‘The netting was attached to it so well, who could have known there was another way in?’

  ‘So, are you happy we caught the thieves?’ Billie jokes, poking Mika in the ribs.

  Mika shrugs. ‘Yeah, I guess. But Mum and I feel kind of sorry for the possums, too. We left some apple cores by the strawberry patch. They’re probably not as yummy as strawberries, but at least the possums can still feed their babies.’

  ‘Another mystery solved!’ Alex says, as they walk into class. ‘I wonder what will be next?’

  ‘I hope we don’t have to wait too long,’ Billie says happily. ‘We’re getting pretty good at this. I’m ready to solve another one already!’

  They pull up their chairs and sit down at their desks, chatting together while they wait for Mr Benetto to arrive. It’s unusual for him to be late. Usually he is already sitting at his desk when the class wanders in.

  Finally, he strides into the room, his face as dark as a storm cloud.

  Billie has never seen him look like this before. The rest of the class notices too, and one by one they fall quiet.

  When Mr Benetto opens his mouth to speak, his voice comes out low and angry. ‘I have just come from a meeting with our principal and I have some very grave news to share,’ he begins. ‘Something valuable has been taken from her office and someone in this school is responsible.’

  Billie feels a shiver pass through her. She glances briefly at Jack, then Mika, then Alex. She knows that none of them would dare to look back at her in case Mr Benetto catches them, but she is certain she knows what they are thinking.

  The Secret Mystery Club has another mystery to solve. And this one might be the most serious yet!

  Strawberry Thief

  published in 2014 by

  Hardie Grant Egmont

  Ground Floor, Building 1, 658 Church Street

  Richmond, Victoria 3121, Australia

  www.hardiegrantegmont.com.au

  This ebook is also available as a print edition in all good bookstores.

  All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system or transmitted in any form by any means without the prior permission of the publishers and copyright owner.

  A CiP record for this title is available from the National Library of Australia.

  eISBN 9781743582091

  Text copyright © 2014 Sally Rippin

  Illustration copyright © 2014 Aki Fukuoka

  Series design copyright © 2014 Hardie Grant Egmont

  Design by Stephanie Spartels

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