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Whose Garden Grows at Midnight
mystery · Everyone
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Whose Garden Grows at Midnight

one path · 4 paragraphs

Nadia writes down everything that happens at the Marrow Lane allotments. So she's the first to spot it: Mr. Okafor's giant champion pumpkin moved overnight. Not gone, just sitting three plots away in Mrs. Pratt's strawberry bed, plump and shiny with dew. By morning both grown-ups are yelling at each other. Nadia opens her notebook and starts writing.

Nadia decides to keep watch that night. She tells her mum she's reading in bed, then climbs out the window and sneaks down to the allotments with a flashlight and a thermos of cocoa. She hides behind the compost bins and waits, eyes glued to the pumpkin.

Nadia waits an hour. Nothing. She starts to nod off behind the bins. Then a soft thump wakes her. The pumpkin is rolling, slow and steady, across the path. She rubs her eyes. She can't see anyone pushing it.

Nadia creeps closer and sees the truth: a fat hedgehog is wedged inside a hole in the pumpkin's bottom, waddling along with the whole thing on its back. The 'thief' is an animal that moved in. Nadia laughs until her sides hurt.

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