Tthe Sleepover Club on the Beach by Angie Bates Page A

didn’t look too convinced. But quite accidentally, Auntie Roz saved our bacon. My aunt came hurrying into the kitchen, looking for the salad servers or something. And galloping after her, with one ear stylishly inside out as usual, came gorgeous Gizmo.
    He immediately began snuffling around his water bowl.
    “That’s
it
!” Frankie shrieked. “That’s the noise. Oh, I feel so-o embarrassed!”
    “Yeah, whew,” mumbled Kenny. “It was the puppy all the time.”
    “Well, now that little mystery’s cleared up, we’ll go and get changed,” I said brightly.
    “Good idea,” said Mum drily. She sounded deeply suspicious.
    We just made it out of the kitchen before we collapsed in total hysterics.
    “So are we going to open it now?” asked Rosie eagerly.
    “I think we should do it tonight at our Sleepover feast,” I said.
    “Yeah,” said Frankie. “We’ll do it in style.”
    “My deah,” said Fliss in a posh voice. “We do
everything
in style!”
    Uncle Phil had built a proper barbecue pit in the meadow at the back of the house. He and my aunt were like, barbecue experts (I suppose they ate barbecue all the time in Australia). But we still didn’t get to eat anything for ages. I think that’s an ancient barbecue law or something.
    I lurve barbecues. Grown-ups keep handing you delicious savoury goodies as soon as they come off the grill, still sizzling and smelling of charcoal, which somehow makes it heaps more exciting than food which has been cooked indoors. It’s kind of like
outlaw
food!
    Don’t worry, there were plenty of delicious veggie options for Frankie.
    But she spent most of the evening madly rushing around, taking pictures with her camera. And we all obliged by striking mad poses among the wild flowers. Gizmo’s in most of them, because guess what! He’d recently started to follow
me
around, instead of Auntie Roz.
    “You can be
my
faithful dog any time, Giz,” I whispered to him, as I tickled his tum.
    The Sleepover Club is always up for a party as you know, and we all had a really enjoyable evening. But I think we were all terribly conscious of trying to save ourselves for our grand Sleepover feast.
    After all, this one was a biggie. We kept exchanging excited glances. And I knew what my mates were thinking, because I was thinking the same thing. We were finally going to open the bottle. Tonight we’d know for sure what was in that message!
    But it’s surprisingly hard to leave a barbecue when the charcoal is still glowing. It’s that Robin-Hood-camping-in-Sherwood-Forest thing. So we lingered in the meadow, chatting, until it was almost dark. But then the midges started biting and it grew seriously breezy, and suddenly Kenny faked this huge yawn.
    “Blimey!” she said, rubbing her eyes. “I’m SO sleepy. Must be all the fresh air.”
    This was our cue to yawn as well. “Me too,” I said. “Thanks for tonight, Uncle Phil and Auntie Roz. I’ve had a great time.”
    We all gave Gizmo a last passionate cuddle, and Auntie Roz grabbed on to him to stop him following us as we went racing through the twilight.
    I grabbed at a piece of honeysuckle as I flew past, and sniffed deeply. I think heaven must smell of honeysuckle, don’t you?
    We got ready for bed so fast, it was exactly like one of those comical old movies. All of us rushed about, tripping over each other and bumping heads, totally keyed up!
    Finally Mum came up to say goodnight. “Any idea what you’d like to do on your last morning?” she asked. “I thought we could go to that museum at Dunwich.”
    “That kind of depends,” I said vaguely.
    “Oh,” said Mum, sounding slightly miffed. “On what?”
    Well, Mum, the fact is that by tomorrow, we just might be millionaires!
    But I couldn’t exactly say that, so I just said, “Let’s see what the weather’s like.”
    Mum switched off the light. “Sleep tight.”
    We waited until Mum was safely inside the main cottage, then we all switched on our torches, giggling