Blyton, Enid – Famous Five 14 – Five Have Plenty of Fun

The only fresh news that day was a worried telephone-call from Aunt Fanny. She was shocked and amazed at the news she had heard. ‘Your uncle has collapsed!’ she said. ‘He has been working very hard, you know, and now this news of George has been quite the last straw. He’s very ill. I can’t leave him at the moment – but anyway we couldn’t do anything! Only the police can help now. To think those horrible men took George by mistake!’

‘Don’t worry too much, Aunt Fanny,’ said Julian. ‘We’ve hidden Berta away safely, and I expect the men will free George as soon as she tells them she’s the wrong girl.’

‘If she does tell them!’ said Dick, under his breath. ‘She might not, for Berta’s sake, for a few days at any rate!’

Everyone went miserable to bed that night. Anne took Timmy and Sally with her, for both were so forlorn that she couldn’t bear to do anything else. Timmy wouldn’t eat anything at all, and Anne was worried about him.

Julian could not go to sleep. He tossed and turned, thinking about George. Hot-tempered, courageous, impatient, independent George! He worried and worried about her, wishing he could do something!

A small stone suddenly rattled against his window! He sat up, alert at once. Then something fell right into the room, and rolled over the floor. Julian was at the window in a trice. Who was throwing pebbles at his window?

He leaned out. A voice came up to him at once. ‘Is it you, Dick?’

‘Jo! What are you doing here?’ said Julian, startled. ‘It’s Julian speaking. Dick’s asleep. I’ll wake him, and let you in.’

But he did not need to go down and let Jo in. She was up a tree outside the window and across some ivy and on his windowsill before he had even shaken Dick awake!

She slid into the room. Julian switched on his light. There was Jo, sitting at the end of Dick’s bed, the familiar cheeky grin on her face! She was very brown, but still showed her freckles, and her hair was as short and curly as ever.

‘I had to come,’ she said. ‘When I got home from shopping, there was this girl Jane! She told me all about how George had been captured in mistake for her – and when I said to her, “You go straightaway and say you’re safe and sound, and it’s all a mistake, and George has got to be set free!” she wouldn’t! She just wouldn’t! All she did was to sit and cry. Little coward!’

‘No, no, Jo,’ said Dick, and tried to explain everything to the indignant girl. But he could not convince her.

‘If I was that girl Jane I wouldn’t let someone stay kidnapped because of me,’ she said. ‘I don’t like her, she’s silly. And I’m supposed to keep an eye on her! Phoo! Not me! I’d like her to be kidnapped, the way she’s behaving about George.’

Julian looked at Jo. She was very, very loyal to the Five, and proud of being their friend. She had been in two adventures with them now, an artful little gypsy girl, but a very loyal friend. Her father was in prison, and she was living with a cousin of Joan’s, and, for the first time in her life, going to school to learn lessons!

‘Listen, Jo – we’ve found out a few more things since Berta – I mean Lesley – no, I don’t, I mean Jane…’

‘What do you mean?’ said Jo, puzzled.

‘I mean Jane,’ said Julian. ‘We’ve found out something else since Joan parked Jane with her cousin this morning.’

‘Go on, tell me,’ said Jo. ‘Have you found out where George is? I’ll go and break in and get her out, if you do!’

‘Oh Jo – it’s no use just being fierce,’ said Dick. ‘Things are not so easy as all that!’

‘George threw out a bit of paper with this written on it,’ said Julian, and he put it before Jo. ‘See? Just that one word – “Gringo”. Does it mean anything to you?’

‘Gringo?’ said Jo. ‘That rings a bell! Let’s see now – Gringo!’

She frowned as she thought hard. Then she nodded. ‘Oh yes, I remember now. A Fair came to the town a few weeks back – the big town not far from our village. It was called Gringo’s Great Fair.’

‘Where did it go?’ asked Dick, eagerly.

‘It was going to Fallenwick, then to Granton,’ said Jo. ‘I made friends with the boy whose father owned the roundabout, and gosh, I had about a hundred free rides.’

‘You would!’ said both boys together, and Jo grinned.

‘Do you suppose this Gringo, who runs the Fair, could be anything to do with the name Gringo that George wrote on this paper?’ said Julian.

‘I dunno!’ said Jo. ‘But if you like I can go and find the Fair and get hold of Spiky – that’s the roundabout boy – and see if I can find out anything. I know Spiky said Gringo was a real horror to work for, and thought himself as good as a lord!’

‘Had he a car – a big car?’ asked Dick, suddenly.

‘I dunno that either,’ said Jo. ‘I can find out. Here – I’ll go now! You lend me a bike and I’ll bike to Granton?’

‘Certainly not,’ said Julian, startled at the idea of Jo biking the twelve miles to Granton in the middle of the night.

‘All right,’ said Jo, rather sulkily. ‘I just thought you’d like me to help. It might be that this Gringo has got George somewhere. He was the kind of fellow who was a go-between, if you know what I mean.’

‘How?’ asked Dick.

‘Well, Spiky said that if anyone wanted something dirty done, this Gringo just held out his hand, and if a wad of notes was put into it, he’d do it, and nothing said!’ said Jo.

‘I see,’ said Julian. ‘Hm – it sounds as if kidnapping would be right up his street, then.’

Jo laughed scornfully. ‘That would be nothing to him – chicken-feed. Come on, Julian – let me have a lend of your bike.’

‘NO,’ said Julian. ‘Thanks very, very much, but I’m not letting anyone ride to a Fair in the middle of the night to find out if a fellow called Gringo has anything to do with George. I can’t believe he has, either – it’s too far-fetched.’

‘All right. But you asked me if the name meant anything to me,’ said Jo, sounding offended. ‘Anyway, it’s a common enough nickname in the Circus world and the Fair world too. There’s probably a thousand Gringos about!’

‘It’s time you went back home,’ said Julian, looking at his watch. ‘And be decent to Berta – I mean Jane – please, Jo. You can come over tomorrow to see if there’s any more news. How did you get here tonight, by the way?’

‘Walked,’ said Jo. ‘Well – ran, I mean. Not by the roads, though – they take too long. I go like the birds do – as straight as I can, and it’s much shorter!’

Dick had a sudden picture of the valiant little Jo speeding through woods and fields, over hills and through valleys, as straight as a crow flying homewards. How did she find her way like that? He knew he would never be able to!

Jo slipped out over the windowsill, and down the tree, as easily as a cat. ‘Bye!’ she said. ‘See you soon.’

‘Give our love to Jane,’ whispered Dick.

‘Shan’t!’ said Jo, much too loudly, and disappeared.

Julian switched out the light. ‘Whew!’ he said, ‘I always feel as if I’ve been blown about by a strong, fresh wind when I see Jo. What a girl! Fancy wanting to ride all the way to Granton tonight, after running all the way here from Berta’s!’

‘Yes. I’m jolly glad you wouldn’t let her take your bike,’ said Dick. ‘It’s a good thing she wouldn’t dare to disobey you!’

He got into bed – and just at that very moment the two boys heard a loud ringing noise. Dick sat up straightaway.

‘Well I’m blowed!’ he said. ‘The little wretch!’

‘What’s up?’ said Julian, and then he too realised what the ringing was – a Bicycle Bell. Yes, a bell rung loudly and defiantly by someone cycling swiftly along the sea-road towards Granton!

‘It’s Jo!’ said Dick. ‘And she’s taken my bike! I know its bell. Gosh, won’t I rub her face in the mud when I get hold of her!’

Julian gave a loud guffaw. ‘She’s a monkey, a gallant, plucky, loyal, aggravating monkey. What a cheek she’s got! She didn’t dare to take my bike when I’d said no – so she took yours. Well – we can’t do a thing about it now. What that roundabout boy is going to think when he’s awakened in the middle of the night by Jo, I cannot imagine.’