by Andrew Cope
Spud and Star had nothing to lose. They moved as a team, jumping up on to the table and grabbing the museum bag between them. They skidded across the steel surface, falling to the floor below. The breath knocked out of them from the impact, Star and Spud raced as hard as they could out of the kitchen dragging the bag, with Brad and Chad only a few steps behind.
Spud and Star panted with the effort of carrying the mask’s weight, knowing the brothers would catch them long before they reached the main gate. They heard a shot. Missed! A bullet embedded itself into the wall beside them and they sprinted faster than ever. Desperately, they swerved on to the viewing platform above the polar bear pool, and scrambled up on to the top of the wall. The puppies looked at each other.
‘You ready?’ woofed Spud.
‘Let’s go!’ barked his sister and the brave puppies launched themselves into the pool with a terrified yowl.
Spud spluttered to the surface, closely followed by his sister. ‘Boy, this is cold,’ she whined, paddling furiously to the side. The twins appeared on the viewing platform.
‘Come back here with our mask,’ yelled a purple-faced Chad.
Spud heaved himself out of the icy water and shook himself, water spraying everywhere. He jabbed a paw to the centre of the pool. Chad went a darker shade of purple as he saw the priceless Janus mask slowly sink to the very bottom of the murky pool.
Greed glinting in their eyes, the baddies leapt into the air and plunged into the polar bears’ pool.
17. The Bear Necessities
Coughing and wheezing, Brad and Chad surfaced and floundered across the deep pool. The priceless Janus mask was glinting below. Chad doggy-paddled ahead of Brad and hauled himself out. He took his gun and pointed it at Star.
Noooo! Spud woofed.
Star froze.
Chad pulled the trigger and there was a watery phut, but no bullet. He screamed in frustration and emptied the water from his gun. He shot again, with the same result.
‘Forget the blasted dogs!’ yelled Brad from the pool. ‘It’s the mask we’re after,’ he said, taking a huge breath and plunging underwater.
Everyone watched as the man in the suit dived down to the bottom of the pool before surfacing, empty-handed and empty-lunged. ‘You get it, idiot,’ he bellowed to his brother. Chad dived back into the water. A minute later, he surfaced, Janus mask in hand. He struggled to the water’s edge, a victorious grin on his face, as his brother hauled him out.
‘Yes! We got it!’ Brad punched the air. But the brothers’ joy was short-lived as they watched the puppies twist the dial on their harnesses and hover up to the viewing platform, leaving the twins trapped.
‘Bye bye, boys!’ yapped Spud. ‘Don’t worry about missing us – you’ll have company soon enough!’
Seconds later, the puppies were back in the zoo kitchen. Spud crouched as Star climbed on to his shoulders. She used her mouth and paws to turn the key and the Cook family burst in through the door.
‘Thank goodness,’ yelled Mrs Cook as the door was bolted behind her. ‘Just in time. Those bears were getting hungry!’
A bell rang as the ninety minutes were up. The family looked through the window and watched as the cage bars disappeared. The polar bears sniffed the air and padded down towards the pool to see what food the keeper had left for them. Whatever it was smelt tastier than their usual bucket of fish. Ben winced.
‘Forget the baddies for a minute,’ barked Star. ‘Quick! Get Mum!’ But Sophie was already on her way. She grabbed the freezer door handle and yanked it open. Cold air billowed out.
‘Is she still alive?’ yapped Spud as Mr Cook reached in, scooped Lara out and carried her over to the table. Spud and Star jumped up beside her and nuzzled her fur. Lara was as cold as ice.
‘Ma!’ whimpered Spud. ‘We’re sorry! This is all our fault. We should have listened to your warning.’
‘We thought it was exciting, going off with Brad instead of staying in the field office,’ sobbed Star. ‘We thought we were being proper Spy Dogs, but we were just being silly pups.’
‘What’ll we do, without you to keep us on the right track?’ whispered Spud, licking Lara’s cold face.
Star cried into Lara’s sticky-up ear.
The Cooks were all crying too. Ben rested his hand on his beloved pet’s chest.
‘I can’t believe she’s gone,’ sobbed Sophie.
‘She isn’t,’ said Ben, looking down at his hand. It was rising and falling in time with Lara’s shallow breaths. ‘She’s still alive!’
‘We need to warm her up!’ cried Mrs Cook, pulling off her jacket.
Mr Cook yanked his jumper over his head and the Cook children added their coats to the pile on the table.
‘Lift her on to the coats,’ instructed Mrs Cook. ‘Good. Now cuddle her, everybody. Give her our warmth.’
Spud and Star both squeezed in between Lara’s front legs, Ben clambered on to the table and cuddled her back, Sophie and Ollie took a back paw each and held it between their hands, while Mr and Mrs Cook bent over the table and wrapped their arms round her in a massive team hug.
When Lara opened her eyes, she saw her pups and then the faces of the Cook family. She felt their arms encircling her. Her head ached fiercely and her paws burned with pain as the feeling returned, but she had never felt so safe and happy.
A few minutes later, she felt strong enough to stagger to her feet. ‘Where are they?’ she croaked.
‘The terrible twins? Follow me, Ma,’ yapped Spud.
He and Star led the way out to the polar bear viewing platform. Mr Cook followed, carrying Lara in his arms.
‘That looks uncomfortable,’ chuckled Sophie, gazing down at Brad and Chad. They were clinging together on the point of a narrow needle of rock, clutching the Janus mask between them. The polar bears paced below.
‘I’m not sure I like polar bears any more,’ said Ollie.
‘Oh, they’re only being bears, Ollie,’ said Mr Cook. ‘The real baddies are the ones holding the mask.’
‘Their balance is very good,’ yapped Star, watching the brothers wobble on their perch.
‘Yes, they seem to be “bearing up” well,’ joked Lara feebly.
Mrs Cook dialled 911. ‘Hello? We need a doctor, right away. Or maybe a vet? Also, if you’d like to send the police to Central Park Zoo, they can nab two baddies for the price of one!’
‘I’d like to leave them there all night after what they did to Lara,’ growled Ben as the sirens wailed towards them across Central Park. ‘But I suppose I’ll just have to grin and “bear” it.’
18. New York, New York!
Mrs Cook wasn’t looking too pleased. Professor Cortex was showing them Agent Onkers’ secret video footage on his laptop. The Cooks had held their breath as Star and Spud risked their lives to steal an ice hockey puck. Mrs Cook glared as the food fight started.
‘We thought it was a mission,’ wagged Star, her guilty eyes looking up at the family. ‘We were being tricked.’
‘Yeah,’ agreed her brother. ‘Why else would I be throwing food instead of eating it?’
Professor Cortex tried to smooth things over. ‘It seems that the puppies put an end to a very dangerous escapade,’ he began. ‘Not only were you lot all to be fed to the bears, but the pups were then going to be framed for it.’ The scientist mopped his brow. ‘Very dangerous indeed. The Onkers twins had accounted for nearly everything.’
Except super special secret agents Star and Spud, thought Star, puffing out her chest with pride.
‘The FBI is very grateful,’ said Professor Cortex, beaming round the table. They were gathered in the big dining room at the hotel, and the table was groaning under the weight of every kind of New York delicacy, from pizzas to donuts. ‘This is their way of saying thank you.’
Spud tried to say, ‘They’re very welcome,’ but all he could manage through a mouthful of pastrami was ‘Mpphh!’
‘When they broke into the Onkerses’ house, they found it st
uffed full of stolen artworks,’ continued the professor.
‘Bonkers and Conkers have certainly been busy!’ yapped Star.
‘I knew that Brad was a bad un from the start,’ said Agent T smugly. Agent K nodded in agreement and they clinked their cups together.
‘Now that they’re behind bars, all I want to do is enjoy the rest of our holiday,’ said Mr Cook.
‘That reminds me,’ said the professor, pulling a wad of tickets from his jacket. ‘The FBI would also like you to have these. Family tickets to all the major attractions in New York, including Broadway shows, access to the Empire State Building and the Yankee Stadium, tea at the Waldorf Hotel, tickets for the Coney Island funfair and vouchers for all the big Fifth Avenue stores.’
Ben and Sophie cheered, and Ollie leapt out of his seat and ran three times round the room.
‘Humph. That’s the least they can do, after we nearly got eaten and poor Lara nearly froze,’ said Mrs Cook.
Lara pulled her shawl tighter round her shoulders, remembering the bone-numbing cold inside the freezer. Star and Spud cuddled up protectively to their mum.
‘Finally, before we get stuck into all this lovely food, I’d just like to say that I’m very proud of my three Spy Dogs,’ said the professor, smiling at Lara, Spud and Star. ‘Once again, they put their lives on the line against a very nasty pair of baddies. And I think we’d all agree that Spud and Star have passed their Big City spy training with top marks. Give me a spy pup over the FBI any time!’
‘Hear, hear!’ said Mr and Mrs Cook as Ben, Sophie and Ollie all clapped in agreement.
‘And,’ added the professor mischievously, ‘raise your glasses to the spy pups’ next mission … at the North Pole!’
Spud nearly choked on his donut. Star slammed his back as he coughed it back up. No more polar bears!
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First published 2012
Text copyright © Andrew Cope and Ann Coburn, 2012
Illustrations copyright © James de la Rue, 2012
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The moral right of the authors and illustrator has been asserted
Typeset by Palimpsest Book Production Limited, Falkirk, Stirlingshire
ISBN: 978-0-141-97024-0