It was, in fact, nine p.m., not midnight, according to the two watches that Zoe always wore. But it was dark enough that it felt like midnight, and they’d waited long enough to begin the hunt for the missing cat.

“Right,” Lottie ordered, looking at her notebook. “We need to search the school from top to bottom, inside and out.”

Mrs Peabody had insisted that the girls would need to be in bed (or in tent) before ten o’clock, so this did not leave Lottie and her team of detectives much time.

“We are going to split up,” Lottie told them, opening her notebook. “I have it all planned out. Isabel and Mrs Peabody will come with Pip and me to search the playground and downstairs. Rani, Ava, Zoe and Miss Moody will look for Lady Lovelypaws upstairs.”

“Why do we have to split up?” asked Zoe. “And why do I have to be with Ava? She’s just going to tell more scary stories.”

“People solving a mystery ALWAYS split up,” said Lottie crossly. “Haven’t you watched Scooby Doo? Ghosts are not real, anyway, and besides, you’ll have a grown-up with you. Miss Moody won’t let Ava scare you.”

Zoe reluctantly agreed.

“Hey!” said Rani. “How come you get to have all of the detective stuff? You have to share.” It didn’t seem fair: Lottie’s group had the dog detective and most of the supplies Lottie had brought.

“Oh, ALL RIGHT,” said Lottie. “Here, you take some rope and the camera.” Lottie handed Rani the ancient camera, which had been her dad’s when he was a little boy, and both parties set off on tiptoe.

“And remember,” called Lottie as they went. “No lights on! We don’t want to frighten Lady Lovelypaws away!”

“What about frightening me away?” asked Zoe. “Do we want to do that?”

“We definitely got the scarier bit of the school,” Rani whispered to Ava and Zoe as they made their way up to the first floor.

“It’s so quiet,” whispered Zoe. “It’s never this quiet during the day.” She shone her torch in every corner, in case Lady Lovelypaws was hiding there. Or in case something else was.

“QUACK! QUACK! QUACK!”

“Ahhhhh!” screamed Zoe, Ava and Rani together. Zoe jumped into Ava’s arms.

“Sorry,” said Miss Moody. “I’ve got a message.” She frowned at her phone in the darkness. “Oh dear. I need to call my flatmate. She’s lost her keys. Will you be OK for a bit, girls?” Miss Moody dashed back down the staircase.

“She probably doesn’t even have a flatmate,” said Zoe. “She’s scared!”

“Come on,” said Rani. “Let’s hurry up and get this over with so we can have our midnight feast.”

At the top of the stairs, they paused outside the door to the Year Three classroom. It was closed. They all stared at the doorknob.

They listened for scratching.

“Come on,” said Ava finally. “It was just a story.”

“So you don’t believe in ghosts, either?” asked Rani.

“Of course I believe in ghosts,” replied Ava. “But I made that story up. There are no ghosts in the Year Three classroom. Ghosts like scarier places, like attics and cupboards.”

Zoe and Rani gulped together. They pushed open the door to the Year Three classroom.

Ava was right: there were no ghosts in Year Three. All was quiet. Through the windows they could see Crabtree Park. In the dim glow of the street lamps, a few dogs were getting their last evening walks.

There was no trace of Lady Lovelypaws anywhere.

Together the three searched the Years Four, Five and Six classrooms. In Year Six they had a good snoop round, to see what the school’s eldest girls got up to. The empty desks seemed a bit ghostly without their occupants, but there were no actual ghosts present, nor were there any cats. Rani took a few photos with Lottie’s camera so that they would remember what Year Six looked like, and then they moved on.

“What’s behind there?” asked Rani, pointing to a narrow door at the end of the corridor.

“I don’t know,” said Ava. “Maybe it’s a cupboard?”

“Or an attic,” whispered Zoe.

The three of them stood there, frozen.

“You like ghosts,” Zoe finally told Ava. “You go first.”

“But there could be spiders in there,” said Ava. “Or bats or rats.”

“I’m not afraid of spiders,” said Rani, helpfully. “I’ll go first, but if there are ghosts I get to be the first one out.”

That seemed fair. Rani opened the door, which creaked like it hadn’t been used in ages. The girls found that it did lead to a small cupboard, which was empty except for a wooden ladder covered in cobwebs. It led up through a large hole in the ceiling.

“It’s a cupboard AND an attic,” Ava told Zoe, as Rani began climbing. “Definitely full of ghosts!”

“Wow,” gasped Rani, as first her torch and then her feet disappeared through the hole. “You have to see this!”

With sweaty palms and hearts racing, Ava and Zoe followed her.

When they were all in the attic, their torches lit up the treasures around them. The attic was packed full of hundreds of years of Crabtree School history. Big dusty blackboards, trunks of old-fashioned dresses, piles of old toys and stacks and stacks of musty old textbooks lined the floor and walls.

“Look,” said Rani, pointing to an old-fashioned machine with a big horn coming out of it. “That’s a gramophone. They used it to listen to music in the olden days! I saw one in a museum.”

Zoe got down on her knees to inspect some black-and-white photographs of girls in long skirts. None of them were smiling, which seemed sad. Then she flipped through an old lesson book. Eliza Smith, 1872, read the name written on the inside cover. Eliza Smith had good handwriting.

Rani looked through the dusty dresses. She put on a wide hat with a net that covered her face.

“Look at this,” said Ava, picking up a small bundle. Rani shone her torch on it. Cradled in Ava’s arms was a doll, wearing a grey lacy dress that must have once been white. The doll had golden curls that felt like real hair, and her head was made of china. Ava tipped the doll forward and her glassy eyes opened.

“She’s a bit scary,” Rani said. “Are those teeth?”

 

Zoe came in for a closer look. “They are teeth!” she said. “They look like fangs.”

Ava set the doll carefully back in its rusty metal buggy, but none of them could stop staring at its teeth. They were properly scary.

“We should take some photos,” Ava told Rani nervously. “Lottie and Isabel will be sad they missed this!”

But just as the camera made its first click, the legs gave out on the ancient doll’s buggy and it crashed to the ground.

“What was that?!” shrieked Rani.

“Heeeellllppppp!” screamed Zoe at the top of her lungs. “Help! Somebody help us!” Zoe was hysterical.

“Shhhhhhhh!” whispered Ava, as the three of them huddled together. “It’s OK! It was just the doll’s buggy.”

“We broke it,” said Rani sadly. “I hope the doll doesn’t get angry.” They spent ages trying to mend the doll’s buggy but it kept coming apart in their hands.

Then there was a small sound.

“What is that?” said Rani, as softly as she could.

“It sounds like scratching,” said Zoe.

Zoe was right; it was scratching. It was coming from the back of the attic, and it was getting louder.

“On the count of three,” whispered Ava, “we’ll all run to the ladder at once. Rani goes down first.”

“One… Two…”