Percy nodded. “All right,” he said. “Her secret is her baby hamster doll, Nutmeg. Olivia thinks she’s too old for Nutmeg now, so she plays with her in secret.”
Goldie and the girls were delighted.
“Thanks, Percy!” said Lily. She blew him a kiss.
They hurried next door to the bakery. Mrs. Nibblesqueak rushed to answer their knock.
“We just need one more thing to save Olivia,” Goldie explained. “It’s Nutmeg!”
But Mrs. Nibblesqueak wrung her paws with worry. “Oh dear,” she said, “I haven’t seen Olivia play with Nutmeg for months. I wonder where she is?”
Penny appeared in the doorway, too. “I’ll search Olivia’s room!” she said. But when she came back, she was shaking her head.
“I can’t find Nutmeg anywhere,” she said sadly. “Now what?” said Jess.
Mrs. Nibblesqueak’s eyes filled with tears. “Will Olivia turn into a messy bat?” she asked with a sob.
Lily hugged her. “We’re not going to let that happen,” she promised. “We won’t give up.”
Mr. Nibblesqueak passed around cups of raspberry soda, and Goldie and the girls sat down to think about what to do next.
As she sipped her drink, Jess flicked through Olivia’s sketchbook. “Here’s a picture of you, Mrs. Nibblesqueak,” she said. “And here’s the Toadstool Café.” She turned the page and found a drawing of a stream with bluebells growing along its banks. In tiny, hamster-size handwriting, Olivia had written Bluebell Brook.
Jess examined it closely, then gave a cry.
“That’s lovely,” Lily said.
“But look!” said Jess. “In the picture, something’s tucked among the bluebells.”
“It’s a tiny hamster!” said Lily.
“Exactly,” said Jess. “But maybe it’s not a real hamster. Maybe it’s Nutmeg the hamster doll! If Olivia doesn’t want anyone to see her playing with it, maybe she keeps it there—Bluebell Brook!” She kept flipping through the sketchbook, and they saw that Olivia had filled lots of other pages with drawings of Bluebell Brook.
Lily was thrilled. “It must be her favorite place!” She turned to Goldie and the Nibblesqueaks. “Where is Bluebell Brook?”
The Nibblesqueaks shook their heads.
“We don’t know,” said Olivia’s dad, his whiskers quivering with worry.
“There are lots of streams in the forest,” said Goldie. “I’ve never heard of Bluebell Brook, but it’s okay—I know someone who might have seen it. Captain Ace!”
A little later, Lily, Jess, and Goldie gazed down on the forest treetops. They were riding in a basket beneath a brightly colored patchwork hot air balloon!
Captain Ace flew alongside, towing the balloon with a rope in his beak. Whenever he squawked, “pull,” Goldie tugged another rope that hung down inside the balloon. Whoosh! A stream of bubbles shot up into the hot air balloon, keeping it floating high up in the sky.
“Watch out for bluebells growing beside a brook,” said Jess.
As they drifted along, Lily noticed a dark, forbidding building in the distance. “There’s Grizelda’s tower,” she said, shivering.
“And see that gray area next to it?” said Goldie. “That’s the Witchy Waste.”
Now Jess shivered. “I’m glad we’re not going there.”
A few minutes later, Lily spotted a ribbon of sparkling water flowing lazily through a field of buttercups. All along its banks were drifts of blue flowers.
“Bluebell Brook!” she cried, pointing. “It must be!”
“Take us down, please, Captain Ace,” Jess asked.
The balloon flew lower and lower, landing with a gentle bump among the pretty yellow buttercups.
“It looks just like Olivia’s pictures!” Lily exclaimed.
The girls and Goldie climbed out and called, “Thanks, Captain!”
“Good luck!” he replied, and took off again.
The three friends headed toward the brook, where the water bubbled and gurgled over moss-covered stones.
Goldie’s ears pricked up. “Listen!”
They heard shrill squeaking.
“It’s Peep and Olivia!” she said. “They’re coming this way.”
They all crouched down, peering between the bluebells.
They could hear Olivia giggling. “I can’t wait to make all these flowers messy, too,” she said. “Making a mess is so much fun! I want to keep being messy forever and ever!”
Peep flapped around her happily. “Not long to wait, Olivia,” he said. “Grizelda said that it takes a day for the magic to work, so you’ll turn into a bat really soon! Then we can be the messiest friends in the forest!”
Olivia gave a delighted squeak. “Hooray!” she cheered.
The girls and Goldie turned to each other in horror. “If our spell doesn’t work,” whispered Jess, “then Olivia really will turn into a bat—and there’ll be nothing we can do to save her!”
Chapter Eight
Cakes for All!
Jess, Lily, and Goldie watched in horror as Olivia and Peep tore up the bluebells by Bluebell Brook. “Lovely mess!” squeaked Olivia, tossing the flowers into the bubbling water. Peep giggled and splashed the water with his wings.
Lily spotted a tiny figure among the bluebells. “There’s Nutmeg, Olivia’s toy hamster!” she whispered. “The spell says that we need to gather all Olivia’s favorite things together. Come on!”
They wriggled on their stomachs through the bluebells until they reached Nutmeg.
Jess put the sketchbook beside the doll, and Lily added the pink cherries. Then Jess opened her notebook and read the end of the spelclass="underline"
“Look out,” Lily whispered. “They’re almost here!”
As Peep and Olivia came toward them, Goldie and the girls stood up.
“Olivia,” Goldie said gently. “Look! All your favorite things, here in your favorite place.”
The hamster came closer, flapping her paws, and sniffed the cherries and the sketchbook. Her whiskers quivered. When she saw Nutmeg, she gave a faint squeak.
“Now!” cried Lily.
“Olivia’s favorite hobby...” Jess chanted, “is drawing!”
“Olivia’s favorite food...” added Goldie, “... is pink cherries!”
“Olivia’s biggest secret...” Lily shouted, “... is Nutmeg!”
They joined hands and said together: “Olivia’s favorite place—Bluebell Brook!”
Instantly, purple sparks flew from Olivia out into the air. Her paws stopped flapping and she stopped squeaking.
Jess and Lily jumped for joy. “Hooray!”
“We did it!” said Goldie.
The little hamster looked confused. Lily scooped her up and cuddled her. “Everything’s all right,” she said softly, dropping a kiss on her golden-brown head.
Olivia clung to her. “I’m glad to see you,” she said. “Something really funny happened to me.”
“You’ve been under a spell,” Jess explained, “but we’ve broken the magic.”