Mega Sleepover 7: Summer Collection. Narinder Dhami

Чтение книги онлайн.

СКАЧАТЬ I suppose it was my fault a bit as well… Anyway, I knew I’d have to speak up and tell the truth, because I couldn’t let the others take the blame when they’d had nothing to do with it. So I cleared my throat.

      “Er – Mrs Poole, I—”

      “Mrs Poole, I tell you what happened,” Isabella interrupted me, and I glared at her. I reckoned Isabella was now going to drop me right in it by telling Mrs Poole all about how she’d won the Dalmatian and I’d switched the tickets round!

      “I buy some tickets,” Isabella said in a loud voice. “I ask Maria to help me pull them out and she have her hand stuck in the tombola.”

      Mrs Poole frowned. “So why were she and Kenny fighting over it?”

      What’s going on? I wondered with a frown. Why wasn’t Isabella dropping me in it? I just couldn’t understand it.

      “They weren’t fighting, Mrs Poole,” Frankie said quickly. “Kenny was just trying to pull Maria’s hand free.”

      “Yes, and the tombola break,” Pilar added.

      “And that’s when all the tickets flew out,” Lyndz finished off.

      “We’re really sorry, Mrs Poole,” said Rosie.

      Mrs Poole looked slightly less furious. “Is that what happened, Maria? Kenny?”

      I glanced sideways at Maria. She looked pretty sulky, but Pilar was nudging her in the ribs.

      “Yes, Mrs Poole,” she muttered.

      “Yes, Mrs Poole,” I said, heaving a silent sigh of relief. It looked like I wasn’t going to be banned from the trip after all, but I just couldn’t understand why. Maria had had the perfect opportunity to get me into trouble big-time and she hadn’t taken it. Why not? Now that Isabella had helped me out too, I felt really bad that she’d hadn’t got the Dalmatian in the end. Maria had dropped the winning ticket in all the fuss after the tombola had broken.

      “Well, if it was an accident, I think I can overlook it just this once,” said Mrs Poole. “But I want you all to spend this morning writing letters of apology to Mrs Pontefract. And I want them given to me by the end of the morning. Is that clear?”

      We all nodded. We’d got off pretty lightly, considering we’d annoyed the Mayoress and the headteacher! And at least we were all still going on the class trip. We all filed out of Mrs Poole’s office trying not to grin at each other with relief.

      “Whew, that was close!” I said to Frankie as soon as we were outside in the corridor. “I thought I was going to miss out on WonderLand!”

      “Well, you were lucky Isabella thought fast and came up with a good excuse!” Frankie told me. “You owe her one!”

      “Yeah, OK…” I muttered. Then I noticed the other Sleepovers staring hard at me. “What?”

      “Isabella got you out of trouble,” said Fliss pointedly. “You could say thank you!”

      I pulled a face. “Oh, all right then…”

      “And maybe you and Maria can make friends now,” Lyndz added eagerly.

      I didn’t say anything. I was beginning to feel a bit ashamed of myself for messing about with the tickets the day before. Maybe if I asked Mrs Poole nicely she’d let Isabella have the Dalmatian after all…

      The Spanish girls were crowded round Maria, who still looked sulky, and they were having a go at her in Spanish. I reckoned they were telling her to make up with me. If she wanted to, well, so would I.

      “Er – Isabella, thanks for coming up with that story for Mrs Poole,” I muttered. “It was really nice of you.”

      Isabella grinned at me. “It is OK!”

      “And I’m really sorry about changing the ticket on the Dalmatian,” I went on. “I’ll tell Mrs Poole you won it fair and square, and maybe she’ll let you have it.”

      For some reason Isabella stopped smiling and looked over at Maria. “Do you tell her or do I?” she asked sternly.

      “Tell me what?” I asked, puzzled.

      Maria was staring down at her feet. “I did not have the winning ticket,” she muttered sheepishly.

      “What?” My mouth fell open. “But you had number 500!”

      “No, it was not 500,” Maria said. “I just say I had it to make you angry! I knew you do not want to give Isabella your best prize!”

      “What a stupid trick to pull!” I was so furious I could hardly speak. “I nearly lost out on the class trip because of you!”

      “Well, you should not change the tickets!” Maria snapped.

      “I wouldn’t have had to if you hadn’t told that fib in the first place!” I retorted.

      “Oh, you’re both as bad as each other!” Frankie cut in. “Why don’t you just give it up and make friends?”

      “Yes, and then we forget all about this!” Pilar added.

      “I’ll be friends with Pilar, Elena, Anna and Isabella,” I said pointedly, “but I’m not going to be friends with her!”

      “And I am friends with Frankie, Fliss, Rosie and Lyndz,” Maria said, “but I am not friends with her!”

      “Fine!” I snapped.

      “Fine!” agreed Maria.

      And we turned on our heels and stalked off in opposite directions, leaving the others behind us.

      

      “WonderLand, here we come!” I said as I climbed on to the coach behind Fliss. “This is going to be cool!”

      We’d just had another weekend without a sleepover because of the Oldies still making a fuss about the food fight, so this trip to WonderLand would make up for that.

      “We only just made it, though!” Frankie pointed out.

      “Yeah, so don’t do anything crazy today, Kenny!” Fliss warned me.

      “Me! Why should I be the one to do anything crazy?” I asked innocently, poking Fliss hard in the back. She squealed and nearly whacked Emma Hughes on the head with her rucksack as she went past her seat.

      “Watch where you’re going, you idiot!” Emma snorted.

      “Yeah,” chimed in Emily Berryman, who was sitting next to her. “You could have taken Emma’s head off!”

      “That would have been an СКАЧАТЬ