The day dawned bright and sunny, with the sea breeze blowing into the children’s bedrooms. Anne sat up and gazed lovingly out of the window towards Kirrin Island and sighed contentedly.

"Oh I say, George, do wake up!" she exclaimed. "You are missing such a glorious morning. Do smell the wonderful sea breeze!"

George awoke at once. "I think we should go to Kirrin Island and see if there are any adventures to be had," she said. Timmy woofed his agreement. "Let’s tell the boys."

They went into the boys room to say good morning, but their beds were empty and even made.

Anne gave a scream. "Oh, how simply awful! It looks as though their beds haven’t been slept in! Whatever could have happened?"

George was pale and shocked. "It looks like they have been kidnapped," she said seriously. "We must look for clues." Timmy obligingly sniffed about under the bed.

Suddenly an ominous voice sounded just behind them. Anne felt a shiver of fear run down her spine and George whirled around, ready to tell Timmy to pounce. "What are you doing?" the voice boomed.

Dick took the paper tube away from his mouth and grinned. "Makes my voice sound deeper, what?" he said. "What are you doing?"

"Oh Dick!" cried Anne, and flung herself on him, tears coming into her eyes. She pulled out a hanky and wiped them away.

"Steady on, old thing," Dick said, rather startled. "We just went to get Ginger Beer for breakfast. We both woke up early feeling so fresh from that sea breeze. I must say, we are frightfully famished with it too."

"And there’s some glorious smells wafting up the stairs," put in Julian. "So buck up you girls. Although, guess what? We’ve something awful to tell you."

"What?" cried George. "Mother’s not fallen ill has she?"

"No, its much more shocking that that," said Dick gravely. "There’s still no ginger beer."

Anne brought out her hanky and wept bitterly. "Oh I can’t bear it!" she sobbed. "And my hanky is still wet from my earlier cry!"

"Have mine," Julian offered, comfortingly.

"Thanks, Ju," she said in a small voice.

"But golly, that doesn’t made an ounce of sense," said George, puzzled. "We saw the ginger beer van there last night making a delivery."

"I know, old thing," said Dick. "Jolly baffling, isn’t it?"

"I jolly well thought those men were suspicious," George said with a frown. "By Jove, I think there’s an adventure to be had!"

"Well said!" said Julian. "Mrs Featherhead was rather suspicious this morning when we asked her about the ginger beer."

"What did she say?" asked Anne, sniffing.

"Well, she said there still hadn’t been a delivery of the jolly old ginger beer," said Dick. "We said we’d seen a van delivering it, and she said we must have been awfully mistaken."

They looked at one another for a minute, aghast. "I just will not believe old Mrs Featherhead would lie!" said George. "We’ve known her for absolutely years."

"Well she was certainly acting jolly shiftily," said Dick. "Oh, and look." He pulled something purple out of his pocket. "There were a shockingly frightful number of these blowing about on the wind again. Remember we saw them before?"

"It’s a clue! How fabulous!" said George.

Timmy barked quietly to show his agreement.

"Well, I think this should be our plan," said Julian formulating a plan at once. "Dick and I will keep watch like hawks this evening for the van and see if it comes again, and we’ll jolly well get close enough to see what they are unloading."

"I will be there too," said George firmly.

"Gosh, no old thing," said Julian. "It will be much too dangerous for you two girls."

"You are not leaving us out of this," said George.

"Absolutely not," said Anne, but she didn’t sound too sure.

"Well, all right then," said Julian after some thought. "It is rather sporting of you to be willing to face such peril, but you must do what I say."

A voice came up the stairs. "Are you coming for your breakfast dears?" called Aunt Fanny. "You are usually down as soon as it hits the table. You’d better hurry, Timmy’s already made a start on the sausages."

"Oh I say, in all our excitement I’d completely forgotten about breakfast!" said Dick, quite alarmed. "Hurry up and get ready you two! I’m feeling thinner already!"

The day passed slowly as they waited for the van to come again. They spent most of the day lingering around the shop area, in fact most of it in the shop eating the scrumptious buns and drinking refreshingly cool lemonade in case the van came earlier than the day before. "I must say, lemonade just isn’t the same," Anne said with a sad sigh.

"We’ll have it sorted out in a jiffy, old thing," said Julian, with a slight trace of irritation in his voice. Anne’s crying was grating with all of them.

After their evening meal, high tea and supper they all hurried out again. There had been no trace of the van all day. They found some very handy bushes near to the shop to crouch behind and waited with baited breath. Before long it started to get dark, and they saw Mrs Featherhead come out and shut up the shop. She disappeared inside again.

"I really must insist that Anne goes home to bed, and George takes her," said Julian snootily. "You shouldn’t be out in the dark Anne."

"We’ve been on lots of adventures in the dark, Ju," said Anne. "And I must say that I’ve coped most admirably with them in the end, even if I’m a trifle scared at first."

"Oh I say, well said Anne!" said George. "We’re staying, Ju."

"Hush!" hissed Dick, the only one still watching the shop. "I can hear a vehicle coming. It sounds to me like a van coming this way at 32 miles per hour with writing on its side and no tax disk. Truly shocking behaviour."

Sure enough, up drove the van they had seen the night before. Two men got out and went into the shop’s delivery entrance. Ginger Beer was written in large letters on the side. The Five watched with bated breath. Shortly, they came back out, and George spotted another man peering round the shop door after them. "There’s something jolly odd about him," she thought to herself. "I just can’t put my finger on it."

The men opened the rear of the van, and the Five could see that it was filled with boxes. The men started to unload them. Something fell out of one and onto the floor.

"Don’t move, you others!" said George, and quick as a flash she went over to the van and looked inside. She tried some of boxes but they were nailed down. Then just by chance she spotted a box at the back that had a notice over it that said ‘no nails in this one’. She peered inside the box, and oh horrors, it wasn’t ginger beer inside. It looked like chocolates, wrapped in purple squares of foil. "Most peculiar!" she thought.

Suddenly there came a sharp bark from Timmy. The men were returning! There was no time to race back to the bushes across the road – she would be seen. Instead George ran around the side of the van and crawled beneath it. She could see the feet of the men as they unloaded more boxes. When they next disappeared inside the shop, she ran back to the others and hid behind the bushes.

"It’s not ginger beer!" she said breathlessly. "It’s…"

"Shhh!" said Anne. "They are saying something."

The Five strained their ears to hear the conversation. The two men were speaking to someone who was out of sight in the darkness of the doorway. "…blah blah blah… secret location… blah blah blah… old forest… blah blah blah… well rewarded… blah blah blah … giraffe."

Then the men returned to the van and drove off.

"Oh I say!" said Dick. "What do you others make of that?"

"It didn’t make much sense to me," said Anne. "But it jolly well sounds as though they are going to meet in the old forest at a secret location and be well rewarded."

"And the giraffe?" said Dick.

Anne shrugged.

"My word it’s getting awfully late," Julian said. "This is all marvellously exciting but I say we should go home and get some sleep. Tomorrow morning at ten, after our mid morning snack, we will go to the old forest and see if we can find the secret location."

"Fabulous idea!" said Dick. "That sounds like just the right time."