So like The Rockingdown Mystery House!

[Katharine]

Fiona, that would be great, my little girl would love having you as a resident babysitter.

With 8 bedrooms, there would be room for Anita too if she wanted.

[Fiona1986]

Well the more of us who take a share the cheaper it is!

Not to burst anyone's bubble, mind, but it is already under offer so we are a bit late.

[Katharine]

I know, but if there are enough of us clubbing together, maybe we could make them an offer they couldn't refuse? Although even if we could raise the £375,000 we'd need to buy it, we'd probably need a fair bit more to make it habitable again.

[Fiona1986]

Yes. I mean, how much does one factor into the budget for a secret passage these days?

[Katharine]

Only one?

[Fiona1986]

Well naturally you price one and then multiply to the number required...

[Katharine]

Of course. Have you done this kind of thing before?

[Anita Bensoussane]

With 8 bedrooms, there would be room for Anita too if she wanted.

Cheers - that'd be great! When people want to raise a lot of money very quickly in Enid Blyton books, they start hunting for their long-lost family treasure and find it in the nick of time. So we'd all better start hunting for ours!

[Katharine]

Sadly I don't think my family ever had any treasure, lost or otherwise. I think I stand more chance of raising the money by selling fir cones to light fires with, or maybe I could weed gardens or clean bicycles?

[Courtenay]

There's the legend of a long-lost treasure - a box of gold coins, so we're told - buried somewhere around Townsend Bluff, just east of my childhood home town of Inverloch (on the south-eastern coast of Australia). If I were over there and had any idea of how to find it, I'd start looking! Unfortunately, treasure maps and secret passages and the like don't seem to turn up in real life with the frequency they do in Enid Blyton.

Maybe we should start by looking for a ship in a bottle...

[Fiona1986]

No, it just seemed sensible really. Maybe we should get metal detectors and hope to find treasure that way?

[Courtenay]

Nah, people don't use metal detectors in Enid Blyton stories. We need a map, I tells ya. (Just make sure it doesn't fall into the hands of either Mr Eppy or Mr Potts, too.)

[Daisy]

Well there are some wonderful ideas there , but how about someone volunteering to dress up as a guy and sit in a wheelbarrow for the next month?

[Fiona1986]

Well seeing as you came up with the idea Daisy...

How about weaving baskets from rushes and willow twigs and then filling them with autumn berries and nuts? We could sell those and raise lots of money!

[Katharine]

Well seeing as you came up with the idea Daisy...

Absolutely, wouldn't want to take credit away from you.

I'm afraid I'm not very creative, so think I'd struggle to make baskets out of rushes. I'll happily pick blackberries and nuts for them though. Might just have to sample a few while I'm picking though.

Definitely agree that metal detectors are OUT, that's almost like cheating.

As this particular house is on the coast, the ship in a bottle idea might be relevant. I shall keep an eye out next time I'm in the area.