Chapter 1
Holidays
As some of you might have read, we all (i.e. Jack, Bill, Martha and me, Joe) had discovered a long gone treasure in our house, even then we had managed to secure a small piece of gold. What with the prices of gold today, our father had managed to get a good business and a wonderful salary. So, our days of not going to school were over.
It was the summer holidays and we all were planning to go to Lakshadweep islands, a small group of islands in the Indian Ocean. We would swim there, dive, bask, oh, how heavenly things we could do there (excluding the fact that mother wanted all of us to wear about 6kg heavy suit for protection against sharks and such dangerous creatures). Bill was a little sad as he was the youngest and couldn’t swim. We all had later promised to teach him how to swim in the sea. Preparations were made slowly, clumsily and yet, enthusiastically. As it was the first vacation we had in our (very short) lives, we could take only little luggage owing to the untidiness of the packaged goods and also, we took all things in the wrong measure too. We set of to the airport which was in the next big town. Just as we set off, Bill began to complain that he was hungry. Mother had expected this to come from one of us, so she handed Bill a delicious looking chocolate. Soon enough the remaining three of us also complained that we were hungry in order to get some chocolates, but instead of chocolates, we got some boiled spinach wrapped in a newspaper…
