The Secret Hen House Theatre by Helen Peters Read Free Book Online

edge of the thicket now. They stopped, and Lottie tightened her grip on Hannah’sarm even more. Funny how Lottie, so confident at school, could turn into a gibbering wreck when put into a field at night.
    Hannah shone her torch over the thicket. It was a mass of bare black thorny twigs, crowded together like living barbed wire.
    “There must be a way in somewhere. Let’s investigate.”
    They walked the whole way around the thicket, scanning it from top to bottom with their torches. But there was no way in.
    “I don’t understand,” said Lottie. “Your mum must’ve got in to feed the chickens.”
    “That was ten years ago. It’s just got really overgrown, I guess. We’ll have to push our way through.”
    “But there’s no gaps.”
    “Follow me.”
    Hannah ducked under a branch. Holding the torch in her mouth, she inched forward, snapping twigs and moving brambles aside with her gloved hands. The gloves were thin and the thorns pierced through them. Brambles clawed into her coat and hat and she had to keep stopping to pull herself free. Lottie followed her, letting out shrieks and moans as twigs sprang back and scratched her face.
    “What will they say at school tomorrow? We’re going to look like we’ve been in the First World War trenches.”
    Hannah wriggled under a hawthorn bush and out the other side. She shone her torch in front of her,expecting more brambles. But the beam illuminated what looked like a hedge of ivy.
    Hannah’s heart raced. “Quick. Shine it over here.”
    Lottie squeezed through the bush and got to her feet, rubbing her bleeding face. She moved the beam of her torch up and along the ivy-covered surface.
    “Oooh!”
    “Do you think it is?”
    Lottie pulled at the ivy tendrils.
    “Look! A wooden wall! It’s a shed, I know it is!”
    She turned to Hannah. They could just see each other’s faces in the glow from the torchlight.
    “I can’t believe it,” said Lottie. “It’s been here all this time and we never knew it existed.”
    Hannah said nothing. Goose pimples sprang up all over her body.
    “We have to find the door,” said Lottie.
    They felt their way along the low ivy-covered wall, shining their torches slowly all over its surface. Suddenly Hannah’s beam lit up a metal runner, near to the ground. Her heart thumping, she moved the light to the top of the wall. Another runner. She zigzagged the beam downwards and across, searching, searching.
    And then she saw it. A rusty iron door handle.
    “Here! It’s here!”
    Hannah held the torch steady and they stood there for a few seconds, just staring at the handle.
    “Wow,” said Lottie.
    Hannah looked at the door, her stomach churning. What was inside?
    “Do you dare to open it?” whispered Lottie.
    “You do it.”
    “No way. It’s your farm. You do it.”
    It was clear from Lottie’s tone that she wasn’t going to change her mind. Hannah would have to go in first.
    It was only rats that frightened her. If there weren’t rats, it would be all right.
    She banged hard on the door with her fist and held her breath.
    No sound at all. She banged again. Still silent.
    “OK. I’m going in.” She grasped the handle and braced herself to pull the door along its runners. But it didn’t move.
    “It won’t budge. There’s too much ivy.”
    They started to rip off the clinging tendrils. And then, reaching out to grasp a stem, Hannah’s gloved hand hit metal. She shone her torch on to it.
    It was a horseshoe. A large iron horseshoe, carefully nailed to the door.
    A lucky horseshoe.
    It was a sign.
    A sign from Mum.
    This had been Mum’s shed.
    And now it was meant to be theirs.
    Suddenly Hannah was desperate to get inside. She had to see what was there. She grasped the handle again and yanked it.
    “It still won’t budge. It must be rusted up.”
    She dug her heels into the ground as if for a tug of war and pulled with all her strength. Slowly she feltthe door start to give. It creaked back on its rusty runners,