Welcome to Silver Street Farm Read Online Free

speaking!” said Meera, trying to sound grown-up.
    “Hi Meera. It’s Sashi from Cosmic TV.” She sounded very stressed. “I think you guys need to get back down here. Somebody’s just delivered ten bales of hay and”— Sashi took a deep breath —“some chickens and
two real live goats
!”
    The sidewalk outside Cosmic TV was blocked with a pet carrier full of clucking chickens and a huge pile of hay bales. Standing on top of the bales, contentedly munching hay, were two goats. One was pure white with sticking-up ears, and the other was chocolate brown with droopy ears.
    “Wow!” said Gemma, who had been reading up about goat breeds. “A Saanen and a Nubian!”
    But before the children had time to say hello to Silver Street’s first goats, Sashi rushed up looking very worried.
    “We’re in trouble,” she said, and pointed to a very large, very round police officer who was standing by the hay bales. “I think you’d better speak to him.”
    Nervously, the three children approached the officer. Close up, they could see that he was even bigger and angrier than he had at first appeared, but the moment he saw the children, the lambs, and the ducklings, his face broke into a big beaming smile.
    “Ah!” he said, as if seeing the children and their animals was the biggest treat of his day. “I wondered when you’d get here!”
    The police officer held out a huge hand for the children to shake. “I’m Sergeant Short,” he said. “And I presume you’re the youngsters who want to turn Silver Street Station into a city farm?”
    Caught in Sergeant Short’s blue-eyed stare, the children could only nod.
    “Well,” he said quietly, leaning down from his great height so that they could hear him whisper, “strictly off the record, I think that’s a great idea, but”— he straightened up to his official height again —“we can’t have goats and bales obstructing the public highway. So, my fellow officers and I will help you to get it all moved.” And the sergeant gave the children the biggest wink they’d ever seen.
    Sergeant Short asked Sashi not to film the hay bales, chickens, lambs, goats, and ducklings being loaded into the back of a big police van by four police officers.
    “Not sure how the police chief would see it, really,” he said. “Best keep it between us, eh?”
    “Hop in!” said a young woman police officer with a big smile. She helped the children into the van, and they were off.
    The children were too astonished to ask where they were being taken. Karl wondered anxiously if it was all just a trick and if they were about to go to prison. But when the doors opened, they found themselves at the far end of the park. The police had built a little compound for the animals using crash barriers and crowd-control netting.
    In just a few minutes, the goats were happily nibbling hay and the chickens were scratching in the shade of the trees.
    “You can’t stay here long,” said the sergeant, “but I’ve cleared it with the police chief until tomorrow. In the meantime, Julie — I mean Officer Worthing — will help keep an eye on things.”
    Julie leaned out of the driver’s seat of the van.
    “Sarge? Sarge! You need to see this!”
    On a tiny television in the front of the police van, the Wire TV lunchtime news was just ending.
    “We now bring you a live announcement from Lonchester City Council,” the newscaster was saying. The picture cut to a big man in a suit, standing outside of City Hall.
    He looked
very
angry.
    “I would like to read the following statement from Lonchester City Council,” the man began, already rather red in the face. “The council has for some time been planning to demolish Silver Street Station, in preparation for a new multistory parking garage.”
    Meera gasped. Auntie Priya hadn’t told her
that!
    “Lonchester City Council would like to reassure tax payers that there are no plans
whatsoever
to make this site into a city farm.”
    As he said the words