Grk Undercover (10 page)

Not yet, anyway.

But now his men had surrounded the boat. And the boy and the dog weren’t going anywhere.

Colonel Zinfandel’s men were positioned all along the Seine. Some were running along the shore. Others were driving down the road. A few were standing on the bridges. Between them, they could keep the boat in sight at all times.

And eventually, when the boat had shown the sights of Paris to a hundred tourists and their cameras, it would have to turn round and return to its dock. The boy would have nowhere to go and no way to escape. He would have to step off the boat and into the arms of the Stanislavian Secret Service.

Colonel Zinfandel smiled.

He was looking forward to that moment. He wanted to get his hands on that boy. And when he got his hands on him, he was going to hurt him.

Colonel Zinfandel stopped running, snapped his fingers and said, “Binoculars.”

One of his men handed him a pair of binoculars.

Colonel Zinfandel peered through them and focused on the boat.

There was the boy. He was turning his head from side to side, searching for somewhere to go. He looked scared. He knew he was trapped.

And there was the dog too. A little white dog with black patches all over its body.

Colonel Zinfandel grinned. This was fun. He loved hunting. His usual prey were deer and ducks. He didn’t often get the chance to hunt boys and dogs. He was going to enjoy catching them.

He handed the binoculars back and started jogging again.

“Dix euros.”

Tim stared at the sailor. “What?”

“Dix euros. Pour un billet. C’est gratuit pour les chiens.”

“I’m sorry,” said Tim. “I don’t speak French. Do you speak English?”

The sailor rolled his eyes. “You must buy one ticket. For the boat. It will cost ten euros. But the dog, he is free.”

“Oh, sure,” said Tim. “Here, I’ll get my money.” He dug into his pocket and pulled out the envelope of money. He handed over ten euros.

“Thank you,” said the sailor, giving him a pink ticket in exchange.

“Merci.”
Tim pocketed the ticket. “Where does this boat go?”

“Along the river.”

“Does it go anywhere near Notre Dame?”

“Of course,” said the sailor. “There is Notre Dame. You can see it now.” He pointed in the direction that the boat was going. “There! You see?”

Up ahead, the river divided in two and went around a long, thin island, crammed with trees and buildings. Several bridges connected the island to the mainland. In the middle of the island, there was a thin dark
tower, rising into the sky like a needle. Tim pointed at the tower and said, “Is that Notre Dame? That tower?”

“Exactly,” said the sailor. “That is the cathedral of our city.”

“Does the boat stop there?”

“No, no,” said the sailor. “We continue in a circle and return to the place where we started.” The sailor smiled. “Have a good day,
monsieur. Bon voyage
.” He walked down the boat.

Tim thought about what the sailor had said. He was trapped on the boat. And, even worse, he would be delivered back to the place where he had started. The Stanislavian Secret Service would be waiting for him there. They would grab him, handcuff him and put him in prison. And they wouldn’t let him out again until he was dead.

Around him, tourists were staring at the view, pointing out sights and taking photos. None of them spared a second glance for Tim. None of them knew how much danger he was in.

Tim looked down at Grk. “What are we going to do?”

Grk didn’t answer. He wasn’t interested. He had more important things to think about.

Further down the boat, a family of tourists were eating a picnic. They had boiled eggs, chopped tomatoes, celery sticks, sliced salami and chicken sandwiches.

Grk stared at the sandwiches, hoping a piece of chicken might fall out and land on the floor. When that happened, he would be ready. He would hurl himself forward, grab the chicken in his jaws and gulp it down before anyone managed to take it back again.

Tim shook his head. He couldn’t understand how anyone—even Grk—could be interested in food at a time like this. Didn’t he understand that they were in danger? Didn’t he know that they were soon going to fall into the hands of Colonel Zinfandel and the Stanislavian Secret Service?

Unless they escaped.

But where could they go? What could they do?

Hiding on the boat would be useless. Colonel Zinfandel’s men would search it from end to end and find him easily.

He stared at the river and the shore. His eyes roamed over trees, buildings, boats and bridges.

And then he had an idea.

Tim waited until the boat went under the arch of a bridge. For a brief moment, they couldn’t be seen from the shore.

That would be his chance.

He stared at the mossy bricks above him and the murky water surrounding the boat, then looked around at the other tourists.

None of them gave him more than a glance. They didn’t care about a boy and a dog. They were only interested in their picnics and their cameras and one another.

Tim ducked down and grabbed Grk in his arms, then took one last look at the nearest tourists. None of them looked back at him. He could have danced or stripped naked and they wouldn’t have noticed.

He didn’t want to dance. Or strip naked. He just wanted to get off the boat. Holding Grk with both hands, Tim clambered over the side and slid into the water. Tim took a great gulp of air, then sank under the surface.

The water was icy. It grabbed him and squeezed him and pulled him down. He could feel himself sinking. He struck out with both feet and swam away from the boat. He didn’t want to be chopped into pieces by the propellers.

The boat swept past, leaving large waves in its wake, washing back and forth between the river’s banks.

Tim and Grk were hurled backward. They tried to keep their heads above water, but they weren’t strong enough. The waves pulled them down. They sank under the surface and disappeared into the bridge’s black shadows.

Colonel Zinfandel couldn’t believe it.

He stared at the boat with horror and astonishment. The boy had disappeared. But how?

He turned to the soldiers who were standing beside him and yelled, “What’s happened? Where is he? Where did he go?”

No one answered.

No one could see the boy. No one knew where he had gone. And no one dared say so to Colonel Zinfandel. They didn’t want to feel the full force of his fury. So they pulled binoculars from their pockets and stared at the boat, searching for any sign of the dog or the boy.

He had been there a moment ago. Everyone had seen him.

He had been standing by the side of the boat, surrounded by tourists. Then the boat went under the bridge. And he disappeared.

When the boat emerged on the other side of the bridge, the tourists were still there, exactly where they had been standing only a few seconds earlier, but there was no sign of the boy.

The dog had gone too.

They had vanished into thin air.

“This is ridiculous,” screamed Colonel Zinfandel. His face was bright red with fury and his fists were clenched. He turned to the men who surrounded him and yelled at them at the top of his voice. “A boy can’t just disappear! Where is he? Where did he go? Someone! Anyone! Tell me! What has happened to that boy?”

Grk hated baths.

Five or six times a year, Natascha ran a bath and put him inside. He always tried to jump out, but he never managed to escape. She kept him in there and shampooed his fur and showered him, then took him out and toweled him dry.

It was horrible.

But this was even worse.

One moment, he had been standing with all four paws on the wooden deck of a big boat, staring at a chicken sandwich, dreaming
about dinner. And at the next moment he was in the middle of the biggest bath in the world.

Grk struggled desperately. But however much he struggled, he couldn’t escape. Tim was holding him too tightly.

Tim kicked out with all his strength, but he hardly seemed to be moving through the water.

He could feel the current sweeping them under the bridge. They were going to be crushed against the old bricks. His feet pummeled the waves, but they didn’t push him hard or fast enough.

Grk was weighing him down. With a small dog in his arms, he couldn’t swim properly.

Water went over his head.

Tim was going under.

The river filled his mouth and his nostrils. He coughed and spluttered. He couldn’t breathe. He was sinking.

There was only one thing he could do. He twisted round in the water and hurled Grk through the air. He heard a squeal. Then a splash. And then he dipped his head under the waves and swam with all his strength toward the shore.

Without a dog in his arms, he could swim much better. He reached the bank with a few quick, clean strokes. He pulled himself out of the water and collapsed in a sodden heap.

He lay there for a moment, getting his breath back, then stood up. His clothes were sopping wet. A pool of water formed at his feet. But he didn’t have time to worry about that now. Colonel Zinfandel would soon realize what had happened. The Stanislavian Secret Service would search both sides of the river. Tim had to get away before they arrived.

And what about Grk? Had he drowned? Or had he been swept down the Seine by the current? Was he now on the other side of Paris? Would they ever see one another again?

All these questions were answered by a sneeze.

Tim turned his head, searching for the source of the sound.

He heard another sneeze. And then another. And then he saw Grk, squatting on the riverbank, shaking his head from side to side.

“Hey!” shouted Tim. “Hey, Grk! Come here!”

Grk lifted his head, saw Tim, wagged his tail and sneezed again. Then he bounded along the shore, stopped at Tim’s feet and sneezed once more.

“Sorry about the swim,” said Tim. “Have I given you a cold?”

In response, Grk shook himself vigorously from side to side, spraying water in every direction. If Tim hadn’t been so wet already, he would have got soaked.

Tim wished he could shake himself like that. A change of clothes would have been nice too. But he was just going to have to get used to being wet. With any luck, his clothes wouldn’t take too long to dry in the sun.

“We’d better get going,” said Tim. “Max and Natascha will be waiting for us.”

Hearing their names, Grk barked excitedly. His tail wagged even faster, spraying dots of water in every direction.

“Yes, I know,” said Tim. “I want to see them too. Come on. Let’s go and find Notre Dame.”

The boy and the dog ran away from the river and headed into the city, leaving a long trail of wet footprints and paw prints on the pavement behind them.

Tim and Grk plunged through the streets, turning left, then right, then left again, putting as much distance as possible between themselves and the river. Nothing mattered more than escaping from Colonel Zinfandel and his men.

With every step, Tim’s wet trousers slapped against his legs and his wet socks slithered backward and forward inside his shoes. His wet T-shirt was rubbing against his skin and his wet sweater was starting to stink.

It was horrible.

But he didn’t have any choice. Even if he had been carrying a bundle of clean, dry clothes—which he wasn’t—he couldn’t have spared the time to get changed. If he stopped now, he would get caught. And he was sure that getting caught by Colonel Zinfandel would be a lot more unpleasant than running through the streets in wet clothes.

When they had been running for two or three minutes, Tim turned round and looked back at the way that they had come. He couldn’t see anyone. The street was deserted. He stood there for another minute or two, making sure that they were safe, then looked down at Grk.

Grk looked up at him.

Tim said, “How are you? Still wet?”

Grk wagged his tail. No more drops fell on the pavement. He had emerged from the river only a few minutes ago, but he hardly seemed to have shaken all the water out of his fur.

“Lucky you,” said Tim. “I’m soaking.”

He looked around. They were surrounded by tall gray buildings with blue slate roofs. He didn’t have any idea where they were or which direction to go.

A woman was walking along the street toward him.

Tim wondered if she was one of Colonel Zinfandel’s bodyguards.

She was wearing a blue shirt, white shorts and leather sandals. She had a backpack on her back and a straw hat on her head. If she was a highly trained, highly armed bodyguard, she was wearing a very good disguise.

Tim tried to remember what Natascha had told him to say.

When the woman came closer, Tim stepped forward and said,
“Excusez-moi, madame, où est Notre Dame?”

“I’m sorry, honey,” said the woman. “You’d better ask someone else. I don’t speak your language.”

“Yes, you do,” said Tim. “I’m English.”

“Oh, really? That’s so funny! I’m an American. Now tell me, honey, when you were speaking French just now, what did you ask me?”

“I’m lost,” said Tim. “I’m trying to find Notre Dame. But I’ll ask someone who actually lives here.”

“Oh, I can tell you how to get to Notre Dame. I’ve just come from there myself. You have to go down this little alleyway.” The woman pointed to a street on the left. “Take the first right. And you’ll see Notre Dame right there in front of you. Okay?”

“Thank you,” said Tim. “That’s really helpful.”

“It’s my pleasure,” said the American woman. She looked at the boy and the dog for a moment, and then said, “If you don’t mind me asking, how did you get so wet?”

“He fell in the river,” said Tim, pointing at Grk. “And I jumped in to save him.”

“Oh, that’s so sweet. You must really love your dog.”

“I suppose I do,” said Tim.

The woman leaned down and patted Grk on his head, then smiled at Tim. “Goodbye, honey,” she said. “Have a good day.”

“Thanks,” said Tim. “And you.”

He and Grk hurried along the street, taking the directions that they had been given by the American woman. They soon found themselves in a large square, bordered by tall buildings on two sides, trees on the third and a large church on the fourth. Tim recognized the spire of Notre Dame.