Adam Ashby peered around the corner, then, seeing nobody, he ran quickly across the grass and dived under a thick green bush. He lay on his stomach and pulled branches across his face so that he was as concealed as possible. Then he positioned his gun up by his shoulder, and waited, watching carefully.

He was soon rewarded. A brown-haired head was peeping out from behind the shed. Adam pumped the handle on his gun. As the brown haired figure made a dash for the cover of a large tree Adam opened fire. The figure changed course towards Adam, and lifted his gun from his side and squirted Adam with a heavy stream of extremely cold water. Adam gave a yell and struggled out from underneath the bush, laughing and gasping with the shock of the cold water at the same time. Both boys shot water until the guns were empty, then they sat down in the hot summer sun, laughing.

"That cooled me down a bit," said Oliver.

"Yes," agreed Adam.

Anyone observing Oliver and Adam would think that they were twins. They looked identical, with short brown hair and blue eyes. However, despite being identical, they were not twins. They were part of a set of quadruplets.

At that moment their sisters Jennifer and Laura came round the side of the house, tugging the garden hose between them. Before the boys had time to get up they had turned it on full pelt and the boys were soaked to the skin.

"That’s hardly fair!" cried Adam, gasping as his cold clothes stuck to his body. "If we did that to you, you would complain to Dad and we’d get in so much trouble."

"Oh come on, it’s so hot, you don’t really mind," laughed Jenny. She and Laura sat down next to their brothers. It was the summer holiday, and they had no school ahead of them for six wonderful weeks. Laura and Jenny had similar features to their brothers, with their brown hair and blue eyes. Both of the girls hair was shoulder length and they always tied it back in the same way. They were not identical like their brothers though; it was fairly easy to tell them apart. Oliver and Adam had no obvious discerning feature, but after knowing them a long time, there was something about their faces generally that was slightly different. Jenny and Laura could tell them apart without difficulty, but most people at school could not. Even their voices were the same.

"I think I can hear Dad’s car," said Laura. Sure enough, the children heard a car door slam and footsteps walking up the front path. They ran around to greet their father, who was returning from work. He looked at the four dripping children with a mixture of disapproval and amusement.

"You had better dry off before you come inside," Mr Ashby said. "When you do, there’s something I need to tell you."

"Tell us now!" they all said, but he shook his head.

"I want to get out of this suit and into some shorts!" he said. "Come in when you’re dry!"

The children wrung out their T-shirts as best they could then ran around playing Tag until their clothes were dry. "I need another water fight to cool me down now, I’m really hot again," complained Oliver. "Come on, let’s see what Dad wanted to tell us."

They went inside. It wasn’t much cooler in the house. A wasp was buzzing around the kitchen, and Laura flinched. She didn’t like wasps. Mr Ashby had poured them all iced drinks, and they drank them gratefully. Then they looked at their father expectantly. He sighed. "This isn’t good news. I have to go on a business trip, and as you know, you aren’t old enough to be left in the house on your own."

"Hey, we’re perfectly capable of looking after ourselves!" said Adam indignantly. "We’re very responsible!"

"I know you are," said their father, "but not to live alone for two weeks. I shouldn’t really leave you alone while I go to work, but babysitters are too expensive, and I know what a fuss you would make."

"Yes we would!" said Oliver. "We don’t need looking after!"

The children got on very well together. Adam, despite them all being the same age, appeared older, and probably because he was the loudest one, was sort of a leader for the four. He could have a short temper at times. Oliver was very similar, but Adam usually had the last say in matters. The girls were quieter, but still wanted to be heard: they would not let themselves be too bossed around by the boys! Both were fairly tomboyish due to playing with their brothers all their lives. They enjoyed climbing trees and playing outside just as much as their brothers, and both always wore trousers. They were always seen together, and people called them the Ashby Quads.

"Even so," said Mr Ashby, "you cannot stay here alone. So I am afraid you will have to stay with Auntie Betty and your cousins for a couple of weeks."

The children looked at each other, aghast. Aunt Betty was very strict and their two cousins were terribly cruel and played nasty tricks on them all the time. They felt perfectly capable of taking care of themselves. Ever since their mother had died when they were young they had had to be responsible and grow up quickly.

"You can’t!" exclaimed Jenny suddenly. "Holidays are meant to be a fun time! Where are you going to, can’t we come with you?"

"The trip is to Lanzarote, I hope to make lots of contacts there for the company. And before you interrupt-" he said, as their faces lit up hopefully, "-it is not practical for me to take you lot. There will still be no one to look after you in the day, and it would make it very expensive."

"Oh but Dad," said Oliver, "we know Lanzarote okay, we’ve been there twice before. And you would be there in the evenings. We’d only want to play in the swimming pool in the day. We wouldn’t need anyone to be there."

"And we haven’t had a holiday in ages," said Laura.

"Yes, it could be our holiday," agreed Jenny. "Please Dad, we wouldn’t be any trouble."

"You won’t hardly know we’re there," said Oliver.

Their father hesitated. The quads grinned at each other. They knew they had won. "Easy!" Adam mouthed to Oliver.

"Well, I suppose so. I had been thinking about it," said Mr Ashby eventually. "But it is a business trip, not a proper holiday, so don’t expect a huge pool all to yourselves or anything special. It will probably have to be a small place somewhere."

"We don’t mind anything," said Adam, still grinning.

They only had a week before they were to set off, but the week went very slowly. The children packed everything they could and they still had five days to wait. They were very excited. "Don’t forget the blow up dinghy!" reminded Laura. "It’s so much fun."

Mr Ashby had rented a small villa on a quiet complex in the town of Puerto del Carmen. It was about a ten minute walk from the sea front, away from the main tourist area. There was a swimming pool; the only feature the children had insisted was absolutely necessary. It was shared between the surrounding villas, but the estate agent had said that it was a quiet area and they would probably normally have it to themselves.

The day of the flight came at last. Mr Ashby drove them to the airport and parked in the long stay car park. They carried their bulging suitcases onto a shuttle bus that would lead them to the check-in. It was early morning so they ate breakfast at an airport restaurant. They were all still rather sleepy so there was not a lot of conversation. They soon woke up once their flight was called and started chattering excitedly. Mr Ashby led them to the correct gate, and they walked through a tunnel directly onto the aeroplane.

"Hooray, we’re all sitting together!" said Jenny.

"Bags me window seat," said Oliver.

"Okay, well bags me it on the way back," said Adam.

"That’s if we get a window seat on the way back."

"Jenny and I want to sit together, we’re in the middle of a crossword," said Laura.

"Hurry up you four, you’re holding people up," said Mr Ashby. They sat down and Oliver got out a pack of cards. They began to play as the plane took off. Mr Ashby busied himself reading some documents from work in preparation for his first meeting. The children watched the film that was shown. It was fairly boring but once it had finished there was only a few minutes to go before they landed.