Mystery for Megan by Abi; Burlingham Read Free Book Online

garden.
    ‘Just going to the treehouse with Freya,’ she called.
    ‘Be back by seven o’clock,’ Megan’s dad called after her.
    Megan raced to meet Freya at the end of the wall.
    ‘Have you got the book?’ Freya asked.
    Megan lifted up her cardi to reveal the book, all snuggled up underneath.
    ‘I’ve got mine too,’ said Freya.
    They skipped eagerly through the buttercups, which were still glowing brightly, and across the garden to the treehouse.
    Megan pulled out The Book of Strange Tales , putting it on the rug between them. It suddenly seemed like some very precious thing that they dare not touch. At last, Megan opened the old
crumpled cover, and inside, on the front page, was a list of titles – the names of different tales. Then, Megan saw it.
    ‘Freya, look!’ she said.
    ‘What is it?’ asked Freya.
    Then Freya saw it too:
    The Tale of Buttercup          p.14
    The girls looked at each other in amazement, then eagerly turned the pages until they reached page fourteen. And this is what it said:
    The Tale of Buttercup
    Gretton is a quiet village in the south of England and is typical of many villages. However, what makes Gretton different is that there have been stories
    of sightings in the village of a beautiful golden dog and a large black cat. What is particularly strange is that the same animals have been seen over many years.
    The first sighting of them was in the late nineteenth century, around 1886, when a farmer’s son walking his dog spotted the animals together near the woods.
    No one knows why the animals appear or where they come from. The only thing that is known for certain is that the sightings are always reported by children, and that when
    buttercups appear, the big golden dog also appears. Thus he has earned himself the name ‘Buttercup’, and the big old house close to where the animals have been sighted has come to be
    known as Buttercup House.
    ‘That’s my house!’ squealed Megan.
    ‘And the buttercups are here, just like it says,’ said Freya excitedly. ‘We have to show Granny.’
    The girls raced over to Freya’s house and found Granny in the kitchen.
    ‘Granny, you’re not going to believe this,’ said Freya in a whisper. ‘We found this book in the library and there’s a story in it about Buttercup.’
    ‘Really?’ said Granny, quickly drying her hands.
    They all sat around the table and the girls showed Granny The Tale of Buttercup .
    ‘You see, it is something to do with children,’ said Granny. ‘I think the animals come to help children and to look after them. And look, if Dorothy and Buttercup were
first seen in 1886, they are both much older than we thought.’
    Freya, Megan and Granny all looked at each other in silence. They were all thinking the same thing. How on earth could an animal live to be well over one hundred years old?

The rest of the week was sunny and got warmer and warmer. Megan’s mum said it was the warmest spring she could remember and even bought Megan a new sun hat. It was her
favourite colour – yellow – with a big purple butterfly on the front. She loved it!
    Megan kept looking out for Buttercup, but she couldn’t see him anywhere. And yet the garden was still covered in buttercups. He must be around somewhere, thought Megan. She looked
out of her bedroom window every morning, but all she saw were the trees against a big blue sky and small fluffy clouds drifting across the wide open space.
    Megan tried to think of something to do to keep herself busy. Then she remembered Emily and Beth. She still hadn’t written to them. She had meant to, but one thing had happened after
another, and then she didn’t know how to say what she wanted to say. But now she started to miss them all over again. I know, thought Megan, I’ll send them an email and
I’ll do it right now!
    She rushed into her dad’s office – it was empty, just as she had hoped. She turned on the computer and opened up a new email.
    Dear Emily and