‘Oh yes. I caught it in India, while watching an old Indian rope trick known as “Biriani Poppadum Masala”, which translates as “Rope trick that is both Indian and old”. I’ve never been able to so much as touch a rope since. It ruined my dream of becoming a sailor. I’m all right with string funnily enough.’
While Arthur was saying this, Reg had managed to bend his legs, arch his back, lean backwards, and successfully free himself of his dilemma, remaining completely dry. Looking pleased with himself, he brushed himself down, unwound the rope and carefully kicked the raft so that the crate bobbed out on to the river.
‘Well done, Reg,’ said Arthur, slapping him on the back with such force that the fat man flew head first into the river with a loud SPLASH.
Holly suppressed a giggle, but Arthur didn’t find it at all funny. ‘Stop messing about,’ he said. ‘It’s time to go.’
‘Sorry, Arthur,’ said Reg, treading water, then climbing up the muddy bank. ‘I must have slipped.’ He was soaking wet, with streaks of mud down his face and clothes.
Caught by the river’s current, the raft and large crate bobbed out into the middle of the river, pulling the rope taut.
The two men returned to the van.
‘Can we go to my place so I can change my clothes?’ asked Reg.
‘What’s wrong with those ones?’ demanded Arthur.
‘They’re all wet.’
‘Well, you should have thought about that before you decided to go for a swim, shouldn’t you?’
They climbed into the van, closed the doors and, after some protest from the engine, drove away.
Holly jumped out from her hiding place and ran to the river’s edge. She looked at the raft bobbing on the river. She listened. To her horror, she could hear the unmistakable sound of a cat’s miaowing. She gasped.
The crate was full of cats.
She grabbed the rope and tugged at it, but it wouldn’t budge. Far out on the water she could hear desperate feline pleas coming from the crate. Those poor cats, she thought, they must be terrified. What was going to happen to them? She needed to rescue them, but how? She needed Dirk.
Chapter Nine
Dirk was getting worried about Holly. Not that he cared what happened to the girl. Oh no. He was too tough and too old to get sentimental. And even if he did care a little, it was only because of the possible repercussions for him. It was one thing a cat going missing but a human girl was an entirely different matter. Besides, she had called him from home. The police only had to do a few checks and his number would come up, then they would start asking difficult questions, wanting to know his involvement. The police wouldn’t leave it at a phone call either. They would want to actually come round and check out his office. Yes, it would only make life complicated if anything happened to her. That was the only reason he found himself hoping that Holly was OK.
His thoughts were disturbed by the sound of the reluctant once-white van chug-chug-chugging its way down the path, turning right on to the road and disappearing noisily into the distance.
A few seconds passed while Dirk stared intently ahead and then Holly appeared, her arms outstretched, running towards him, shouting at the top of her voice, ‘Dirk! Help. Come now. You’ve got to help them.’
Amateur, thought Dirk. If there was one thing he knew about being a detective it was that no matter how bad things got, you always kept your nerve. You didn’t go screaming blue murder at the first sign of problem.
‘Dirk Dilly. You’ve got to save them!’ she cried.
Cursing the girl, Dirk quickly checked that the coast was clear, spread his wings, jumped and glided across the road, down the tree-lined path, landing in front of her. He raised himself up on to his hind legs and said, ‘Shut up, will you. Do you want everyone to know we’re here?’
But Holly just grabbed Dirk’s paw and dragged him towards the river. He looked across the water. The area was fairly rundown this far from the city. On the north bank was an old rusty boat that looked like it hadn’t been used in twenty years. Behind it was a shabby collection of ugly grey apartment blocks overlooking some overgrown allotments.
‘What?’ asked Dirk.
‘It’s full of cats,’ said Holly, pointing to the crate floating in the middle of the river. ‘Listen.’
Dirk listened and, sure enough, he could hear the desperate miaows drifting across the water.
‘You’ve got to rescue them,’ said Holly.
‘Hey, kiddo. It’s one thing me letting you tag along for a bit. But nobody orders the dragon around.’
‘All right,’ said Holly. ‘Please can you rescue them?’
‘That’s better. Now let me see.’ Dirk grabbed the rope and pulled. It didn’t budge. He tried again, straining as he did. Nothing. ‘It must have caught on something.’
‘Can’t you fly out and get it?’ said Holly’.
‘I think we’re taking enough risks as it is without flying into open water in daylight.’
‘Can’t you swim out, then?’
‘I think you may have confused me with a Sea Dragon. Easy mistake. Sea dragons have grey backs, shorter wings and they tend to be a little slimmer, although I like to think I keep myself in pretty good shape. But no, I’m more of your red-backed, green-bellied, urban-based Mountain Dragon. Not a big swimmer.’
‘But what’s going to happen to them? Willow might be in there and you promised you’d get her back.’
‘Oh, all right.’ Dirk gave in. ‘I’ll swim out and get the stupid moggies.’
‘Thank you, Dirk.’
Dirk dropped on to all fours and cautiously approached the water’s edge. It looked cold. It looked dirty. In fact, it looked about as inviting as a barrel of blue-skinned salamander sick, which, if you’ve never experienced such a thing, is not very inviting at all.
‘Hurry up,’ urged Holly before hastily adding, ‘please.’
Dirk dipped his paw into the water. ‘It’s cold,’ he said.
‘Oh, come on,’ said Holly, and she pushed against his large rear, catching him off guard and knocking him into the water with an enormous splash.
‘Oh th . . . th . . . thanks,’ shivered Dirk. ‘I was just hoping someone would push me into a freezing-cold, filthy river.’
‘No problem,’ replied Holly, trying not to find it too amusing.
Dirk paddled through the cold and murky water towards the crate, thinking that he had been foolish to let the human tag along. She was already too involved. When he got back to shore he would take her home. No more Mr Nice Dragon. Dirk worked alone.
He reached the crate and circled it but was unable to see what it was caught on. The whole thing was very strange, dragons stealing cats, putting them in crates to be picked up by a pair of human crooks, who pushed them out on to the river. He had never heard of anything like it.
He closed his nostrils, ears and mouth and ducked his head under. Despite what he had said to Holly, Dirk, like all dragons, was capable of surviving for long periods of time underwater. Sea Dragons, like the one he had seen on the warehouse, often went centuries without surfacing, their backs softening with time to aid swimming.
The water was muddied and dark and the shadow cast by the raft made it even darker beneath it. Dirk couldn’t see a thing. He groped around until he found something solid. It was long and smooth and appeared to be wrapped round the base of the raft. He tugged at it, but it wouldn’t budge. He tried moving his hands down, but it seemed to go on for ever. If only he could see what he was doing. After several more unsuccessful attempts to free the raft, he lost patience. He opened his jaws and bit down. But instead of it snapping, as he had expected, he felt his teeth sink into it. It was soft like flesh, and something dark and rancid leaked from it, blackening the water. Instinctively Dirk let go. He reached to grab it again, but it had gone. Whatever it was it had let go.
Quickly he resurfaced, and paddled as fast as he could towards the shore, pushing the raft in front of him.
But he was fee
ling tired. His legs grew weak. Energy was draining away from him with each passing second. The raft grew heavier and heavier. He felt like he was swimming in treacle. Every stroke felt like his last.
I must be near now, he thought. He could hear Holly shouting, but he couldn’t respond and his vision had gone as though night had fallen. Too tired. Even breathing was too much effort. Holly’s face loomed in front of him.
‘What’s wrong?’ he heard her say. But the exhaustion had overrun every muscle in his body. He pulled himself on to the riverbank and tried to stand, but stumbled and then the darkness took him and he collapsed.
Chapter Ten
Dirk,’ screamed Holly. She shook the dragon’s limp body, but he didn’t respond. She lowered her head to listen to his heartbeat, but quickly realised that she had absolutely no idea where a dragon’s heart might be kept. Providing they even had hearts. ‘What’s happened to you, Dirk? Can you hear me?’
He said nothing.
A miaow from the box reminded her about the cats. The crate bobbed by the side of the bank, but it was too heavy for her to lift. Instead she climbed on to the raft, edged her way carefully on to the other side and with all the energy she could muster, pushed.
The crate toppled over, causing an almighty screeching from within. Holly scrambled back on to the bank, rounded the crate and yanked open the top. Cats clambered out. More cats than she had ever seen in one place. Gingers, tabbies, black, white, grey, all scrambling over each other, desperate to get out of the crate on to dry land. Holly had never heard cats make such a noise. The poor things. They must have been terrified. And then at last she saw what she was looking for: a black cat with white paws and a white face with a black smudge on her nose. It was Willow. Holly reached down to grab her and received a scratch from another cat. Ignoring the pain, she held Willow to her stomach and lifted her up.
‘Willow,’ she whispered, looking into the cat’s eyes. ‘You’re alive.’
Willow replied with a sweet miaow.
Holly wrapped her arms round her cat and hugged her tightly. Willow purred. ‘I’m so glad you’re OK,’ she said. Willow was more than a pet. She was more than a friend. She was Holly’s family. Not like Dad, who gave her pocket money, or Dad’s big-haired wife, who told her to turn her music down and go to bed. When Holly had had a bad day at school or if she was feeling lonely or sad, Willow was always there, comforting, loving and pleased to see her. Holly felt tears of relief fill her eyes. She blinked several times and swallowed hard to stop them from falling.
She remained like that, cuddling Willow, grateful that she was alive, until a low moan reminded her that they weren’t alone. She looked up. The other cats had disappeared into the undergrowth or gone off in search of bowls of milk or kindly old people who would take pity on them.
The moan had come from Dirk.
‘Dirk?’ she said, seeing that one of his eyes was half open.
He let out another groan.
‘Wink if you can hear me,’ she said.
Slowly but surely the large eyelid closed.
Then opened again.
Holly knew she had to get him back to his office, out of danger. This, however, was not as easily done as it was thought. She had the unique problem of having to get herself, her cat and this rather large dragon back to central London without drawing any unwanted attention. This called for some serious thinking.
‘I could call a cab,’ Holly said to herself, finding it easier to think aloud, ‘But they would definitely notice that one of the customers was a dragon.’ She paced up and down, Willow held in her arms. ‘Same goes for an ambulance or police.’ A plastic bag floated past in the river. ‘I could push him on to the raft and we could drift down the river.’ But watching the bag, she quickly realised that the current ran east towards the sea, not west towards the city. ‘Besides,’ she said to herself. ‘I would probably capsize it trying to get him on and drown him.’
She held Willow up and asked her, ‘How can I get Dirk back to his office without him being seen?’
The cat replied with a helpful miaow, which she completely ignored.
Then she said, ‘Without being seen. That’s it. Of course.’
She put Willow down carefully and told her to, ‘Stay there.’ Then she grabbed as much foliage as she could gather and threw it over Dirk’s body, which took some time, with him having so much body to cover. Eventually he was covered enough that if someone was to come strolling down the path they wouldn’t instantly recognise what he was. However, it wasn’t a great disguise and she knew she had to act fast, so she scooped up Willow again and ran up the path.
At the road, she turned right and kept running until eventually she came across a phone box. After making a phone call she returned to the entrance of the path by the road.
There she waited, ducking back behind a hedge to avoid being seen by passing cars, not wanting to attract any unwanted attention. After about half an hour she climbed out and stared down the road. Eventually she saw what she was looking for.
Coming down the road towards her, lurching dangerously from side to side and driving at around five miles an hour, was a pale blue, round-topped car. Behind it five cars, two vans and a supermarket lorry were all furiously beeping their horns.
Holly jumped up and down, waved her arms and shouted, ‘Hey, I’m over here.’
The car turned on to the track, allowing its train of followers finally to pick up a decent speed. As they passed, each one yelled an obscenity at the driver of the blue car, but she remained unfazed, instead, rolling down her window and saying, ‘Is that you, Holly? Where’s your uncle?’
‘Oh, Mrs Klingerflim, thank you so much for coming,’ replied Holly.
‘Don’t you worry yourself, dear. I do like a nice drive every once in a while. Everyone in London, though, is very impatient, don’t you find?’
The last of the cars passed and the driver shouted something so obscene that Holly wasn’t even sure what it meant.
‘He’s down this path,’ said Holly, getting into the car. She lowered her voice to a whisper and added, ‘He’s in an awful state though. I think he’s been drinking.’
‘Oh dear,’ replied the old lady, lifting off the handbrake and driving the car down the path, ‘Mr Klingerflim liked a drink, you know. He used to get very silly, though, did Ivor. I remember, he once got so drunk that he thought he was a sheep. A sheep, yes. He kept bleating and following me around and as I recall he refused to eat his lamb stew, saying that it would be cannibalism. Silly man.’
‘Watch out!’ shouted Holly as the car veered towards a tree, which Mrs Klingerflim narrowly avoided by swerving at the last minute.
‘Don’t you worry. I’m an excellent driver,’ she said unconvincingly.
They stopped by the side of the mound of leaves and branches under which Dirk lay.
‘Where’s that uncle of yours? I don’t know, getting himself all drunk and disorderly at his age,’ said Mrs Klingerflim.
‘It’s all right, I’ll get him. You stay here,’ said Holly, getting out of the car, leaving Willow in the passenger seat. She opened the back door, walked over to where Dirk lay and knocked the foliage off his body.
This was the tricky bit.
She knelt down beside him. ‘Now, Dirk,’ she said in his ear.
Another gentle groan indicated that he was still conscious.
‘We need to get you back, and Mrs Klingerflim is here but I can’t lift you into the back seat. I need you to get in. OK?’
Nothing.
‘OK?’
Another groan.
‘Is everything all right?’ called Mrs Klingerflim.
‘Oh yes,’ replied Holly. ‘I’m just helping him in.’
‘This is a lovely little dog, you’ve got,’ said the old lady, stroking Willow in such a way that caused the cat to scowl and purr angrily.
Holly lifted Dirk’s large heavy head and said, ‘Come on, let’s get you home.’
For a second,
Holly thought the plan wasn’t going to work. Dirk’s body was heavy and limp. Then she felt the weight of his head ease and, slowly but surely, he stood on all fours. Together they crawled forward. They reached the car and Dirk dragged himself on to the back seat, like it was the last thing he would ever do.
‘Oh, what a state,’ pronounced Mrs Klingerflim. ‘Drunk as a skunk. Just like poor Ivor used to get.’
Dirk managed to squeeze his large body into the back. Holly grabbed his tail and crammed it into the car after him.
‘Did you bring a blanket, as I asked?’ she said.
‘In the boot, dear,’ replied Mrs Klingerflim. Holly retrieved an old blanket from the boot and threw it over Dirk’s body. She slammed the back door shut and climbed in the front, lifting a very relieved-looking Willow away from Mrs Klingerflim’s hand.
‘Home, dear?’ she asked benignly.
‘Yes, Mrs Klingerflim. Thank you, Mrs Klingerflim.’
‘Such good manners,’ said the old lady, starting up the engine and driving the car back up the path, narrowly avoiding hitting every possible tree on the way and then turning right on to the wrong side of the road. Holly screamed and Mrs Klingerflim casually swerved, just missing an oncoming truck. Peeking through her fingers, Holly wondered whether this had been such a good plan after all.
Chapter Eleven
Dirk awoke from a terrible dream. He couldn’t remember the details but he was left with a feeling of cold dread. He forced his heavy eyelids open and found himself staring up at his own ceiling.
He looked around. He was slumped in the corner of his office on the mattress where he normally slept. How had he got there? Waking up with no memory of the previous night was not entirely unheard of but it usually coincided with having drunk three bottles of pure, undiluted orange squash. He didn’t recall having hit the concentrate last night, though.
Last night, he thought, what happened last night?
His office door swung open and Holly strode in, her arms piled high with newspapers. Seeing Dirk she squealed, ‘Dirk, you’re all right,’ dropped the newspapers and threw her arms round the dragon’s neck. Never having been hugged before Dirk wasn’t sure how to react. He reached out his forepaw and awkwardly patted Holly’s back. Sensing his embarrassment, Holly withdrew and knelt down to pick up the newspapers.
The Case of the Missing Cats Page 4