Clickety-clack went the train. Clickety-clack.
Emily gingerly opened the first of the cages. A tubby pink rabbit hopped out.
“I’m on the train, dear,” it said. “I can’t speak now.”
Emily picked up the lamp and pointed it at the rabbit. To her surprise, the lamp turned up its spout in disgust.
“That’s all we blooming need,” said Fidget. “I told you it was tricksy.”
“What do you think I am? I am my own lamp. I demand respect.”
“Oh, buddleia,” said Emily, putting down the lamp.
“It would be a good thing if you kept quiet and did your job,” said Fidget.
“It’s not my fault that all these people were turned into pink rabbits. Everyone always blames me.”
The lamp was now sitting very close to Emily, its legs sticking out. Fidget looked as though he wanted to throw the thing off the train.
“If you asked nicely,” it continued, “and rubbed me up the right way—”
“Please,” said Fidget, feeling the claws in his paws spring.
“I think,” said Emily, stroking the ears of the tubby bunny, “I’d better text Detective Cardwell. This is hopeless.”
“Oh, no it’s not!” said the lamp, and blew a puff of pink smoke.
Suddenly Emily heard snoring. The bunny had turned into a round-tummied gentleman. He was fast asleep and clutching his cage as if it were a briefcase.
“See?” said the spirit lamp to Fidget. “You only had to ask nicely. It’s that little magic word.”
By the time the train arrived at Liverpool Street Station, the two carriages were full of sleeping passengers.
“We can’t leave them like this,” said Emily. “If they don’t wake up, then all our hard work is for nothing.”
“Now,” said the lamp calmly, “is the time I do my special trick.”
It clicked its fingers together, it stamped its Moroccan slippers on the floor of the carriage, and—whiz-bang—everyone woke up, all confused, many still chewing carrots.
Chapter Twenty-five
Fidget had never realized how much his tail meant to him until it was replaced by a pink bunny tail. His balance had gone, he was all wobbly, and he didn’t feel like himself. When his tail was finally returned, he shook the spirit lamp by the hand.
“I thank you,” he said.
“No, no, no,” said the spirit lamp. “I thank you, for without my dear mistress, I would still be a slave—a slave, I tell you.”
Buster Ignatius Spicer was the last of the bunnies to be restored to his old self. He was rather grouchy to discover he again owed his freedom to Emily Vole. It seemed extraordinary to him that Emily, who possessed no magical powers whatsoever, had been courageous enough to steal the spirit lamp from Harpella and remove the dragon’s tooth inside. And he was grudgingly impressed that she was the new mistress of the lamp.
Buster was now the right size for an eleven-year-old. He looked around the old shop.
“It could do with a clean, Emily,” he said.
“Here,” said Fidget, putting on his apron and handing Buster a broom.
“Me?” said Buster. “You expect me to do the sweeping?”
“Yes,” said Emily. “What’s wrong with that?”
By the time the three of them had finished, the shop sparkled and gleamed. This, thought Emily, is a new beginning. I will become a detective and, with a bit of practice, I might be able to discover what has happened to my real parents.
The lamp, who loved nothing better than arranging flowers, had put bunches of them on the counter, while Fidget had polished all the cabinets.
“Right,” said Buster. “Now can I have my wings back?”
Emily took the keys from her pocket, put them on the counter, and waited for something to happen. One of the keys took flight and unlocked a cabinet drawer. It glided open.
“Yes!” shouted Buster. “These will be my wings, you’ll see.”
Nothing happened.
“If they were your wings, wouldn’t they have fixed themselves to you by now?” said Emily.
The question was no sooner asked than the answer was blown into the shop. Alfred Twizell’s wings had found their long-lost owner.
* * *
Detective Cardwell hardly recognized the shop when he arrived later that day. Fidget was on a ladder outside carefully repainting the sign above the door. It read WINGS & CO.
“Blow me down,” said Detective Cardwell when he stepped inside. The counter shone, the windows sparkled, but Buster was in a black mood.
“I haven’t got my wings back,” he said furiously.
“Perhaps you have to prove yourself, Buster,” said James Cardwell.
“Me? Buster Ignatius Spicer? Prove myself?”
“The day after tomorrow,” said Emily proudly, “we will be open for business.”
“Back in the detective business,” said Detective Cardwell, “after all these years.”
“There is just one thing I have to do first,” Emily said, smiling.
* * *
The Dashwoods’ house had a FOR SALE sign attached to the garden gatepost.
Daisy Dashwood was recovering from the three operations she had undergone, one to remove the rabbit ears, another to reshape her nose, and finally—the most embarrassing of all—the removal of her bunny tail. She was wrapped in bandages.
When the bell rang, the zombies went to open the door. There stood Emily Vole and Alfred Twizell.
In one voice, the triplets said, “Our mother is a mummy; our daddy is in Spain sorting out his dirty washing. Are you back to look after us, Emily Vole? We still have your ironing board.”
“No,” said Emily firmly.
Daisy Dashwood was lying on the sofa. She looked somewhat smaller than Emily remembered.
“What are you doing here?” she said to Emily. “This is all your fault … after everything we did for you. I have to sell the house, Ronald will probably go to prison, and my daughters are still zombies.”
Emily sat down next to her and held up the lamp.
Daisy struggled to sit up.
“I will release the spirits of your three ‘cutiekins’ if you sign some papers,” said Emily.
“You what?” said Daisy.
“It’s simple,” said Alfred Twizell. “It’s a document that says you have no legal rights over Emily Vole.”
Daisy Dashwood signed willingly. A few seconds later, in a whirlwind of noise, Peach, Petal, and Plum, her beloved girls, were back to their old selves.
“Nothing else matters,” said Daisy, hugging her three cutiekins, a tear rolling down her cheek.
She saw Alfred Twizell and Emily Vole to the front door and even managed a “thanks very much.”
As she watched them walk away, she could have sworn that she saw, sticking out of the back of Alfred Twizell’s coat, a pair of wings. But that was just plain silly. After all, Daisy Dashwood didn’t believe in fairies or daft stuff like that.
Do you?
Fin
Look for the Wings & Co. fairy detectives’ next case
Three Pickled Herrings
What do an orphan, a talking cat, and a grumpy fairy detective have in common? Together they’re Wings & Co., the famous fairy detective agency in Podgy Bottom.
When Sir Walter Cross turns into a human rocket, the detectives suspect something very fishy is going on. Soon there’s all sorts of hocus-pocus and fairy meddling when Emily, Fidget, and Buster find themselves with not just one but three pickled herrings to solve.
Sally Gardner is an award-winning novelist from London. Before finding her true passion as a writer, Sally attended art school and worked as a theater designer. She is now the successful author of more than thirty books for children.
sallygardner.net
David Roberts is a British artist who has illustrated many beautiful books for children. He holds a degree in fashion design from Manchester Metropolitan University and worked at various jobs befor
e becoming a children’s book illustrator.
davidrobertsillustration.com
Henry Holt and Company, LLC
Publishers since 1866
175 Fifth Avenue
New York, New York 10010
mackids.com
Henry Holt® is a registered trademark of Henry Holt and Company, LLC.
Text copyright © 2012 by Sally Gardner
Illustrations copyright © 2012 by David Roberts
All rights reserved.
First published in the United States in 2014 by Henry Holt and Company, LLC.
Originally published in Great Britain in 2012 by Orion Children’s Books.
Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data
Gardner, Sally.
Operation Bunny: book one / Sally Gardner; illustrated by David Roberts.
pages cm. — (Wings & Co.; 1)
Summary: At the age of nine, Emily Vole, a foundling raised to be housemaid and nanny for a wealthy couple, inherits a shop and discovers a magical world where, with the help of Fidget the talking cat, she must try to save fairies being targeted by a terrible witch.
ISBN 978-0-8050-9892-1 (hardback) — ISBN 978-1-250-05053-3 (paperback)
[1. Magic—Fiction. 2. Foundlings—Fiction. 3. Cats—Fiction. 4. Fairies—Fiction. 5. Witches—Fiction. 6. Adoption—Fiction. 7. Mystery and detective stories.] I. Title.
PZ7.G179335Ope 2014 [Fic]—dc23 2013037809
First American Edition—2014
eISBN 9781627792059
Operation Bunny Page 8
