Eve's Homefun

Queen Victoria

“Quick, run into that alley-way!”

It was midday and me, Niamh and my brother Max were playing a game of hide and seek. My brother was 'in' and me and my friend Niamh, were desperate for a place to hide. Finally we spotted an alley-way. We dodged down it just as I heard my brother call “...28, 29, 30”. When we reached the end of the alley-way, there was this sort of triangular box. We decided this was the perfect place to hide.

The strange “box” had a stop/go button and a clock on the outside and the door was like the door of an elevator or lift. Inside it was even more strange - it was square, unlike the triangular outside. The room had a strange menu on the wall, like you might see on a tablet. There was also a t.v. screen that said “camera” and “to seats”. After a couple of minutes Niamh and I started taking risks by pressing buttons randomly. I accidentally (not!) pressed a button that said “1837”. Immediately there were strange noises “whir, whir, buzz”, and we started going into this sort of trance and felt delirious. All of a sudden we stopped so suddenly that we touched the roof. Then we heard a voice say “out please”. The door opened and we stepped outside.

When the door opened we were greeted by some strange looking men strolling in a park. Suddenly a man came up to us, looked at our clothes and said in a funny accent “My, what unusual garments you have on, you must change at once!” He handed us some frilly dresses. We both groaned. Niamh and I are both tomboys, but we saw that the man looked fierce, so we reluctantly put on the dress. I chose blue and Niamh chose pink. When we had finished, we started to walk down the road. As we walked onwards we couldn’t believe our eyes. We saw dirty canals filled up with thick dirty liquid, but also lovely looking ladies wore lace dresses puffed up at the back. Suddenly we heard someone crying. In the distance we saw a group of ladies crying. We ran up and asked what was wrong. They were so upset we couldn’t get much out of them, but then finally one said, “Why my child, Queen Victoria’s Crown Jewels have been stolen”. Me and Niamh looked at each other and at the same time said “Take us to the Queen”.

We were led to the palace by the Queen’s soldiers, in red velvet uniforms and black top hats. As we went through the palace gates we saw the gardens. They were absolutely beautiful. There were little patches of blue bells and tulips and rose vines that climbed up gates. There were fountains that either had a face that looked like a pig or a big crown. It was so clean and beautiful - completely different to the grey and dirty streets we had walked through outside the gates.

When we got inside we went up hundreds of stairs. At last we were presented to a woman, who looked all the world like a pig in a bonnet!! She was crying bitterly over a glass cabinet. This must be the cabinet where the crown jewels were kept.  

“Why are you crying?” asked Niamh. This was a daft question and I rolled my eyes.

“The crown jewels have been stolen and they have been in the Royal family for generations”, the Queen answered in a snivelly voice.

“Do you know who stole them?”I said gently.

“Yes, Colonel Blood stole them. He had his first attempt in 1836, but my guards seized him and they took him to the Gulag in Russia. But in the early days of this year he escaped and has never been seen since. Last night he struck again and got away with it….”. She didn’t finish her sentence because she burst into tears.

“Let’s go find this thief” I said to Niamh.

“Where might we find him?” I asked Queen Victoria.

“I’ll make a list,” she said. Then handed us a piece of paper with 4 places on it:

*St Paul's Cathedral

*Nelson’s Column

*London Bridge

*The Tower of London

“Okay Niamh, let’s go to St Paul's Cathedral”, I say. 
When we got there, we had  a good look around, but we didn’t see anything suspicious. We found some hiding places, but no-one was there, so we went to Nelson’s column. Niamh just about got run over by a crazy man in a cart pulled by horses! There were lots of people in Trafalgar square, including lots of filthy children asking for food. But still no sign of Colonel Blood.

Next we went to Tower Bridge and paid for a tour. We went up the stairs and had a good look around the tower, but there was not a person in sight (apart from our tour group).

Finally, we went to the Tower of London. As we went down to the dungeons, I saw dangerous eyes lurking in the shadows. I told Niamh to go fetch the guards. 
“I’ll stay on watch” I said. 
Five minutes later the guards were here. Relief filled my body. They came out struggling with a short man wearing a red waist coat and black pants. He was carrying the Crown Jewels. They were a beautiful sea of shininess. Diamonds claimed a tiara while emeralds and sapphires over took a bracelet. We ran back to the Queen, giving her the Jewels and then raced to the time machine - time to go home!! We pressed the button saying “2014” and suddenly we were back in the alleyway with my brother Max saying “FOUND YOU!!”

By Eve Bretherton!