Mission In Malta (11 page)

‘Are you sure this is a good idea?' Linden panted behind Max as she hurried with determined steps through the backstreets of Valletta.

‘Absolutely.' Max picked off a stray piece of fish pie that was stuck to her skirt. She flicked it into the air where it was pounced on by a skinny cat. ‘I know Straussmann acted all innocent back there, and maybe the cupcake was just a cupcake, but he was up to something. While he's still at the luncheon, I'm going to find out what.'

They ran past tall stone buildings that stood cobbled together, with square window-boxed verandas jutting out every few metres. Pigeons cooed on rooftops and telephone wires, adding designer poo stripes at regular intervals to the centuries-old houses and shops. Washing lines crisscrossed narrow streets and alleys that were tucked away with rose-coloured domes of churches and steeples of cathedrals filled with gold and precious art.

Max consulted the Time and Space Machine with its virtual search engine and turned down a steep, stepped street. ‘This way.'

‘How do you know where he's staying?'

‘You know when we were dragged out of the luncheon just now?' Max leapt over a kid's bicycle.

‘Yes, but I'm not counting it as one of my finer moments.'

‘Do you remember how I stopped at the door of the restaurant and asked for my bag?'

‘Yes.' Linden stepped faster to keep up.

‘That's where the registration table was, with a book listing all the guests at the luncheon …'

Linden stopped. ‘And their contact details.' He smiled widely. ‘Including where they are staying. Very clever, Max Remy.'

‘Thank you, but you can compliment me more later.' Max stopped and looked up. ‘We're here.'

The building was tall and skinny and made of stone like all its neighbours.

‘Most of the conference delegates are staying at our hotel. Why would Straussmann stay somewhere else?'

‘Because he has something to hide,' Max explained. ‘And we're going to find out what.'

‘How are we going to get in?'

Above was a pale blue curtain blowing through an upper window.

‘Easy. Watch.' Max put the Time and Space Machine in her belt and tightened the straps on her backpack so it fit snugly to her body. She looked up again, her face suddenly smeared with
apprehension. ‘You sure these shoes work okay?'

Linden's eyes flung upwards, then back at Max. ‘You can do it in a cinch. Just stand firm and jump as if you're going to hop across a puddle.'

Max looked up to the window, which was plastered against a blue, cloudless sky. She felt her temples pound and a wave of heat trickle over her body.

‘It's a long way up,' Linden said as if he'd read her mind. ‘Do you want me to go first?'

‘No.' Max flicked her hair from her eyes. ‘I can do it.'

She wriggled her toes in her shoes. Her palms began to sweat. Her chest caught a quick snatch of air.

You've already mucked one thing up today, she silently warned herself. Don't let this be the second.

Max took a final deep breath, bent her knees and jumped.

‘Aaaah!' The air tunnelled past Max as her shoes catapulted her higher and higher, arms and legs thrashing and flapping like a baby bird learning to fly.

‘Aaaah!' She saw the window ledge pass her by as her body sailed up to the top of the building, giving her a view across the entire harbour.

‘Oh boy.' Her body weakened, a tingling sensation caterpillared all over, before she slowed and began to fall.

‘Aaaah!'

‘Max!' Linden called from below. ‘The window.'

Linden's voice slapped Max out of her fear of heights just in time to fling her hands out and catch hold of a window ledge with a jarring stop.

‘Oooph!' Her fingers clung desperately while beneath her, carved in relief in the stone, was a date. 1589. She rested one foot on the protruding numbers, gaining a foothold.

Linden's body relaxed through a husky chuckle. ‘Well done,' he muttered as he watched his spy partner hoist her legs through the window and scramble into the apartment. After a few seconds she poked her head back out and spoke quietly into her watch. ‘Well, come on. What are you waiting for? An invitation?'

Linden smiled and checked that the street was clear. He bent his knees and vaulted himself upwards. The Flea-Powered Shoes lifted him into the air, through the warm afternoon. When he passed the window, he squared his feet, so that when he came down, he landed firmly on
Straussmann's window ledge before sliding quickly into the room.

There were suitcases opened and half unpacked on the floor, burger wrappers and empty drink bottles on bedside tables and a desk, and clothes and damp towels thrown everywhere.

‘He's neat.' Linden stepped over a soggy, leftover plate of chips and gravy.

‘And a little guilty.' Max was staring at a wall plastered with articles and photos of Alfonzo.

Linden moved over to Max and skimmed the jumbled display before them. ‘Either that or he has a huge crush on him.'

‘Trouble is, it still doesn't prove anything. We've got to find something that nails him as our man.' Max used an umbrella to pick up a wet towel thrown across a chair. ‘If we can sift through all this mess.'

She shuffled though a crooked pile of papers and conference notes on Straussmann's desk while Linden checked the bedside table. He searched inside and underneath the drawers and tabletop to see if anything was stuck to the bottom. He ran his fingers along the top of the wardrobe and looked beneath the bulky mattress and floor rugs, but it wasn't until he picked up a jacket hanging on the end of a chair that he found more.

‘There's this.' Linden picked up a business card that had fallen from the jacket pocket. “Greenfield Incorporated. Tomorrow's Scientific Solutions, Today.” There are offices in Belgium, London, New York and Paris.'

‘Take down the details.' Max dumped a pile of papers back on the cluttered desk. ‘It may just lead to the brains behind this operation,' she stepped over a dirty pair of socks and a tomato sauce-smudged comic, ‘because it certainly isn't this guy.'

Linden used his watch to take a picture of the card when Max found something else. Hidden in a small leather sports bag beside the desk, tucked into a side pocket, was a gun. Max pulled her sleeve over her hand and picked up the weapon.

‘Linden?'

Linden put the card back in the jacket pocket and turned to face Max. ‘What do you think he plans to do with that?'

‘What do people usually do with guns?'

‘It isn't to kill Alfonzo. He could have done that by now.'

From downstairs, they heard a noise. Max carefully slipped the gun back into the bag. She crept over to the bedroom door, which was slightly ajar, and listened. She heard a key turn in a lock
and a creaking door open. It slammed shut and the sound of keys thrown on a table echoed up the stairs. Someone was singing, badly, to the rhythmic sound of approaching footsteps.

‘Straussmann,' Max realised. ‘Quick, in here.'

She and Linden hastily climbed into the wardrobe and Max pulled the slatted door shut behind them.

The steps got closer. So did the singing.

‘He's not about to win any talent contests,' Linden whispered.

A mound of papers sild from the overflowing desk and spilled onto the floor. Max made a move to get them, but Linden held her back. Straussmann entered the room.

Max peaked through the slats of the wardrobe door and saw the pool of papers. She watched as Straussmann lifted a conference badge from around his neck and threw it on the bed. He loosened his tie and moved around the room, pacing. Something was different about him. He sank heavily onto the end of his bed and massaged his eyes and face with both hands. Linden threw a confused frown at Max. She shrugged.

Straussmann sighed, dropped his hands to his lap and closed his eyes, but when he opened them,
they landed squarely on the floor beside the desk.

Max's breathing grew shallow.

Straussmann sat dead still. Staring at the disturbed papers. His eyes scuttled around in their sockets, climbing the walls and scooting across the floor. His head flicked about in small, irritated turns. Max flinched when Straussmann dropped to the floor with a reverberating thud and checked beneath the bed. He stood, a murderous sneer wiped across his face. He leapt at the bathroom door and threw it open, slamming it against the tiled wall in an echoing clang. He backed into the room and his eyes landed on the wardrobe.

Max and Linden moved back, forced into the rear of their hiding place by Straussmann's eyes reaching in through the wood. He sunk slowly to the floor, lowered his hand into the sports bag and took out the gun. Max's face burned in a panicked rush of nerves as he stepped silently towards them, his face a chiselled portrait of anger – ready to lash out. Ready to kill, Max thought.

Straussmann stopped and flung his head towards the sound of a door being pounded on downstairs. He slipped the gun into his bag as a loud crack echoed from below, followed by two sets of footsteps thudding their way upstairs.

The bedroom door was obscured from Max and Linden's view, but the words they heard were clear: ‘You're coming with us.'

‘I told you. It's all going to be taken care of,' Straussmann spat in anger. ‘If you don't trust me then …'

‘I said, now.' The command was quietly spoken but carried a threat as loud as a thundercrack.

Straussmann stood still for a few seconds before one of the men grabbed his arms and forced him out of the room. His voice receded down the stairs, ‘Get your hands off me, you overgrown baboon. I can walk by myself. Who do you think you –' Straussmann's protests were swallowed into silence as they left the house.

Max slumped. ‘That was a little close.'

‘I thought I was going to lose my Lampuki pie at one point.' Linden patted his stomach.

‘Lucky for both of us you didn't.' Max pushed open the wardrobe door. ‘Let's go; we need to get back to the hotel and ask Steinberger to do a check on Greenfield Incorporated. My guess is it will lead us a lot closer to the real reason Alfonzo is being targeted.'

‘We've done a preliminary check on Greenfield Incorporated.' Steinberger spoke from the screen of Max's palm computer when he contacted them later that evening. ‘They provide technology and software for companies hoping to operate more efficiently, from banks and security firms to steel works and irrigation plants, but as for anything suspicious, we've found nothing so far.'

‘Do you know who heads the company?' Max spoke from beneath the Shush Zone in her hotel room.

‘Yes, a person called Louie Syphon. Very clever, it seems. Used to be a kind of child genius. He had a brush with fame when he was younger, but he has been very quiet ever since.'

‘A brush with fame?' Linden asked.

‘He created a machine that could unleash vast amounts of energy from a single handful of sand. He'd been working on it for years, predicting it would revolutionise the production of energy for the entire world. As you can imagine, governments and large companies from every continent were very excited. But when it came to demonstrating his invention in front of computer linkups, via podcasts, TV screens and a live audience of some of the world's most important and respected leaders
and scientists, it failed. The machine blew up in a spectacular and very expensive manner. Several people were hurt and Syphon's humiliation sent him underground.'

‘My volcano project blew up in front of my School of the Air classmates once. I felt bad, but humiliation in front of the entire world? That's got to hurt,' Linden sympathised.

‘It seems it did,' Steinberger agreed. ‘We'll continue to dig for more information but for now I must go. Harrison needs me to drop round a screwdriver and a blowtorch.'

‘A blowtorch?' Max asked. ‘Isn't that a little dangerous?'

‘Yes, but you know how the chief gets when he has an idea. If you need anything else, contact me immediately. May the Force be with you.' Steinberger signed off and disappeared from Max's screen.

‘What would a leech expert like Straussmann be doing with Syphon?' Max asked.

‘He needs a little help with his pet leech?' Linden suggested. ‘Or he's wants to breed performing leeches for a leech circus and needs some advice on how best to train them. Or maybe –'

‘Okay, I think I've had enough of the
suggestions.' Max deactivated the Shush Zone and the invisible security cone disappeared.

‘But I've only just begun,' Linden pleaded. ‘There's also –'

‘Look at this.' Max stared out of her hotel window. ‘There's a flashing light coming from the top of Fort St Angelo. What is it?'

‘Someone got a new torch for their birthday?'

‘And why would they want to show it off to us?'

Linden watched the flashing light that shone in short bursts and then long flares. ‘It's no birthday present,' he realised. ‘It's Morse code.'

‘Morse code? How are we going to work out what it says?'

Linden grabbed a piece of paper and pencil from the desk. ‘I can work it out if I write it down.'

‘You know Morse code?'

‘I was helping teach Larry.'

‘Of course you were.'

The light continued to switch on and off in long and short bursts.

‘Dot, dot, dot, dot.' Linden copied the letters down. ‘Pause, dot, pause, dot, dash, dash, dot. Pause again. Dot, dash, dash, dot.'

‘It says,
help
,' Linden deciphered.

‘Help? Who is it from?'

‘It doesn't say. But there's more.' Linden again took down the mysterious code. This time it was longer.

‘Help … me …' Linden translated before looking up. ‘Max.'

‘Help me, Max?
Me
, Max?'

‘I'm not sure Max is such a common name in Malta,' Linden suggested. ‘And it is pointing directly at your window, so I'd say so. Is it the same person who left the note in your pie?'

‘Maybe they've decided to meet earlier. Maybe they're in trouble.'

‘Or maybe it's a trap.' Linden frowned.

‘A trap? Why would it be a trap?'

‘They don't like that we're getting close to finding out who is after Alfonzo.'

‘And maybe they have information that will take us even closer to solving our mission.' Max watched as the light repeated the same plea. ‘We have to go.'

‘I don't know,' Linden shook his head.

‘Come on,' she added with a smile. ‘If anything happens, I'll buy you breakfast for the rest of the mission.'

‘Okay, but the moment we sense trouble we're out of there.'

Max and Linden put on their packs and headed downstairs into the quiet, night streets of Valletta. They ran down steep alleyways, past creeping cats scrounging for food, a few strolling couples, and the blue light and muffled voices of TV sets. Soon they reached the edge of the harbour. A breeze stirred the light-sparkled surface, creating the whisper of a gently lapping sea. The foreshore in front of them was empty of boats and across the bay was the fort.

In a brief exchange of looks, Max and Linden pulled out the levers on their backpacks. ‘Looks like we fly,' Max grinned.

The fortress city of Valletta rose behind them as the two spies activated their packs and were slowly lifted into the air under the protective cover of darkness. Max looked ahead as her Personal Flying Device glided effortlessly towards the fort. The light of the Morse code message was still flashing. Still pleading for help. Linden was slightly in front of her, and in only minutes they would both be there.

Or that's what they thought.

Max's pack began to falter. It spluttered through the air like a car running out of petrol. She moved jerkily forward, rising and falling. She grappled with
the lever, trying to gain control, trying to stop her descent.

Then the PFD stalled.

‘Linden!' Max looked below into the inked blackness of the sea, dropping in a terminal freefall.

Linden turned to see his spy partner plunging silently into the night. ‘Max! Your parachute!'

Max worked her fingers to the strings at the side of her pack and tugged hard. Her parachute opened above her in a billowing slap, jerking her forward on the edge of the breeze. Linden landed with his pack on the shore, beneath the fort. ‘Just a little bit further,' he whispered.

Max's parachute sailed towards him. Sinking and sailing closer to safety until a sudden burst of air pushed her sideways. Max tumbled like a broken string puppet at the whim of the wind, twirling beneath the chute.

Linden reached out helplessly when she fell with a muffled splash into the harbour. ‘Max!'

But there was nothing. Just the warm night wind and the rippling of Max's parachute, floating on the harbour surface like the remains of a shipwreck.

And something else. Something he couldn't see.

Linden took off his pack and dived into the harbour. All around him, like slow moving horses on a merry-go-round, were colourful Luzzi – red, yellow and blue-painted fishing boats, all with two eyes painted on the front to ward away evil spirits. Eyes of Osiris. They bobbed beneath the lights of the shore, buoyed up and down by the gentle swell of the sea. Most of them were equipped with the usual fishing supplies: nets, tackles, boxes of bait and lures, but in one of them, not far from where Linden was frantically searching for his friend, a man lay hidden from view. Watching from beneath a canvas cover. A sly grin on his face. A small, compact gun firmly grasped in his hand.