The Whizz Pop Chocolate Shop (7 page)

Alan was holding another flashlight, and he pointed it down into the deepest depths of the river. The beam caught at strange growths and spars and twists of barnacled rubbish in the gloom, and Lily tried not to think of the weird things Alan had come across in his job with the River Police Unit of the SMU—she didn’t fancy meeting a sea dragon, dead or alive. She was certain, however, that the magic chocolate was working; it didn’t stop her from being scared, but it did make
her amazingly confident and graceful in the water. She even dared to let go of Alan’s hand.

In front of her, Demerara suddenly got agitated. She darted and swooped like a demented four-legged acrobat, and her mouth moved in a storm of bubbles.

They had found the tram.

“There won’t be any dead bodies, will there?” Lily had asked Alan that afternoon.

“Of course not.”

“And—no ghosts?”

“It was thoroughly checked by the ghost patrol,” Alan had assured her. “You don’t need to worry about anything except finding that golden mold.”

It was comforting to know that this terrible place—where twenty-four people, including Oz and Lily’s great-great-grandfather and great-great uncle, had perished in 1938—was not haunted. All the same, in the beams of the flashlight, the wrecked tram did make Lily catch her breath. It had sunk down into the mud, until only the tops of the windows (and half a ghostly advertisement for Bovril) were visible.

Demerara seemed to know exactly what she was doing, and slipped inside one of the windows, where the glass had shattered. It was a narrow opening. Alan had a kind of pickax attached to his belt, and he used this to make it bigger.

The three children had their instructions. Caydon
swam after the cat, Oz followed Caydon, Lily went next, and Alan swam in last.

Lily paused to concentrate on her breathing; so far, everything was going well. They were inside the wrecked tram. She felt herself sinking slowly into the soft, oozy mud until it came up to her waist. The beams of light shone through the murky Thames water, showing the very tops of wooden seats and shadowy advertisements for Sunlight Soap and Stephens’s Ink. The twins and Caydon joined hands.

“You’ll know the sign when you get it,” Demerara had told them.

They had practiced the joining of hands in the testing tank, and there had been no hint of a magical sign—but something was different now. For the first time in ages, the other voice the twins had sensed when they were small was among them. Lily’s heart was beating hard, yet she wasn’t afraid. It was like being part of a machine; she could almost feel the electricity fizzing through them. She felt like they were being tugged toward something—the three of them, clutching one another’s hands, squelched and sucked along the narrow passage between the sunken seats.

A bolt of searing heat shot through their arms, flinging them all apart—for a few seconds Lily lost her footing and had to scramble frantically not to disappear into the mud.

This was the sign Demerara had been waiting for; she plopped into the mud, sending out a great fountain of dirt. The water cleared and there was the triumphant cat, wearing something gold on her head; years at the bottom of the Thames had not dimmed the magic metal of the lost mold.

They had found it—or it had found them. Oz, Caydon and Lily did underwater high fives. Demerara turned somersaults of triumph. Alan tucked the precious object carefully into a special pocket on his wetsuit and made the thumbs-up sign—mission accomplished.

What happened next caught them all completely off guard. Alan saw them safely out of the tram. At the very moment he came out himself, something—someone—rushed at him through the dirty water like a torpedo.

It took Lily a second to make sense of what she was seeing.

A thin man in a white suit, wearing no diving equipment whatsoever, was wrestling violently with Alan. He bashed the head of the river policeman against the side of the tram, snatched the golden mold out of his pocket, and paused to laugh a horrible, silent, underwater laugh, his face veiled by a blizzard of bubbles.

Isadore.

The evil immortal chocolatier didn’t have enough
magic to find the mold by himself; he had been waiting until they found it for him.

Alan was slumped in the water—had Isadore killed him? Caydon swooped forward and bravely kicked the mold from Isadore’s hand. It dropped down into the ooze on the riverbed. To Lily’s horror, Isadore—silently screaming with fury—gave Caydon a tremendous swipe that sent him rocketing away toward the surface.

The golden chocolate mold gleamed in the mud, but Oz and Lily had to help Alan, and quickly swam to his side.

And then everything was a maelstrom of underwater madness.

Through her goggles Lily saw Isadore—bizarre in his white suit, with brown-and-white lace-ups on his feet instead of flippers—dive for the mold with outstretched hands.

The very second before his hand closed round it, the golden mold was whisked away by a stout cat in a wetsuit, who was immediately surrounded by a flock of small dark shapes—hundreds of swimming rats, carrying her away to the surface.

The look of fury on Isadore’s face was horrible to see. His mouth opened in a silent scream, and he lunged at Oz, grabbing his arm and tugging him away into the murky depths of the river.

“I know this is easy to say,” Alan murmured, “but try not to worry too much. We’ll have agents searching round the clock—and he won’t be harmed while we have two of the molds.”

Lily had finally stopped sobbing. She was calm and exhausted, sick with misery. “And are you sure our parents won’t notice Oz has been kidnapped?”

“Quite sure,” Alan said. “The department’s very good at cover stories.”

“But Isadore murdered his own brothers—what’ll he do to Oz?”

“I still think we should get back in the river and look for him,” Caydon said.

“He’ll have gone by now,” said Alan.

“Gone where?”

“Nobody knows where Isadore’s hideout is, I’m afraid—but I know they’ll put their best people on it.”

“Let me tell you what I’d like to do to that Isadore Spoffard,” Spike said furiously. “I’d like to watch a whole army of rats tearing him limb from limb.”

“Never mind,” Alan said. “You and your army got the mold—it’s been taken straight to the SMU vault.”

“Do you really have your own army?” Caydon asked.

“Just a few mates who owe me favors,” said Spike.

Big Ben loudly struck three above their heads. They
were sitting in a cozy riverside police hut, and had changed out of their diving gear into ordinary clothes that now felt deliciously comfortable. Alan was fine—he had only been stunned—and he had kindly bought them all cups of tea and egg sandwiches from a twenty-four-hour stall on the Embankment.

They had been joined by Alan’s boss, a plump, bald sergeant who looked far too ordinary to be dealing with the unexplained. They were all—even the angry animals—talking quietly, because the sergeant was on the phone to the prime minister.

“Thank you, sir.” He switched off his phone. “He’s deeply concerned, and he’s making young Oz his number one priority. He wants hourly reports.”

Lily felt a little more hopeful; the prime minister was the most important person in the country, and that had to mean they would find her brother quickly.

“I hope he didn’t mind being disturbed in the middle of the night,” Demerara said.

“No, he said it was fine—he’s taking this business very seriously. And he was up anyway with the baby.”

Alan had not forgotten the animals when he was buying their early breakfast: Demerara lapped at a bowl of milk, and Spike chomped disgustingly through a bacon roll.

“Boy, this is lovely! Fancy a bite, old girl?”

“No, thank you,” Demerara said primly. “I’m watching my waistline.”

“Well, you are quite pudgy,” Caydon said.

“PUDGY?” The cat was highly offended. “Lily, tell me honestly—am I pudgy?”

“I like to see the old girl with a bit of meat on her,” Spike said. “That’s what a fine figure looked like in my day.”

“Crudely put,” Demerara said, “but he means it kindly. And I must admit he’s been useful. Wait till we get hold of Isadore! He might be immortal, but we can still make him SUFFER!”

“You’re a hard cat, Demerara,” Alan said. “I wouldn’t like to get on your wrong side.”

“We’re paying Isadore back for what he did to us,” Spike said, sucking on a piece of bacon. “When he was experimenting with his immortality recipe, he left me burning in a fire all night to see if I’d die. I came out like a charred sausage—my hair didn’t grow back for weeks.”

“And he left me trapped in a bucket of water for a whole weekend,” said Demerara.

Lily’s swollen eyes smarted; if she’d had any tears left, she would have cried again. This great-great-uncle of hers was incredibly wicked and it was agony to think of Oz in his clutches.

Caydon yawned loudly. “I am SO tired! And when
I got up this morning—yesterday morning—I didn’t even know I was going scuba diving. Can we go home yet?”

“As soon as it’s a decent time to wake your parents,” the sergeant said. “You’ve both done a terrific job tonight.”

“No, we haven’t,” said Lily. “We’ve lost Oz—it’s been a disaster.”

“My dear Lily.” Demerara put a paw on Lily’s arm. “Alan’s quite right—Isadore won’t lay a finger on Oz.”

“He won’t give him back unless he gets something in exchange—I don’t care what it is, you have to give it to him! Let him have the stupid molds!”

“Sorry,” the sergeant said gently. “That’s the one thing we can’t do. You have to be very brave and trust us to do this our way. Isadore is dangerous enough with only one mold.”

Lily was too tired to argue anymore. Despite the dreadfulness of everything, she fell asleep the moment she got into the car, and didn’t wake up until they were on Skittle Street and Caydon was shaking her shoulder. She stumbled out onto the pavement. “Alan, wait—what shall I say to Mum and Dad?”

“It’s been dealt with,” Alan said. “All you have to do is try not to look worried.”

“That’s going to be impossible.”

“Hope Oz comes back soon,” Caydon said. “It’ll be so boring without him.”

“Thanks a lot,” Lily snapped.

“Well, sorry, but you know what I mean—you don’t like the stuff we like doing.”

“You two are supposed to be working together,” Demerara said, stretching. “It’s no good squabbling—if you want to help Oz, you must put your differences aside. Alan, don’t forget Spike.”

Alan opened the trunk and a cloud of smoke puffed out.

“SPIKE!” shrieked Demerara. “How DARE you smoke in a government vehicle?”

“Ugh! Ugh! I’ve been under stress!”

“I’ll give you STRESS, you unspeakable rodent!”

The young river policeman picked up the grimy rat and dropped him on the pavement.

“I’m getting out of here—see you, kids!” said Spike, dashing into the gutter and jumping down the nearest drain before Demerara could pounce on him.

“It’s been great to meet you all,” said Alan. “Good luck, Lily—I feel pretty bad that Oz was kidnapped on my watch.”

“You couldn’t help it,” Lily said.

“Oz is a very bright guy, and I’ve got a feeling he’s going to be fine.” He shook hands with Lily and Caydon, pressed Demerara’s paw and drove away.

Lily and Caydon looked at each other.

“I didn’t mean you were boring,” said Caydon. “I just meant—I’m going to miss Oz.”

“You can’t miss him more than I do—I’ve never had to live without him in my entire life.”

The front door of Number 18 opened, and there was Dad in his dressing gown. “Well, they warned us you’d be back at the crack of dawn! Hi, darling.”

Lily hugged him, trying not to burst into tears again. “Hi.”

“Hi, Caydon—would you like to come in? My wife’s making toast.”

“No thanks,” Caydon said. “I’d better get home. See you, Lily.”

“See you.”

It was strange and horrible to be back at home without Oz—and extremely strange that her parents were so cheerful.

“I’m glad you had a nice time,” Mum said happily. “And wasn’t it great that Caydon was taking the same diving course? I was afraid you’d be lonely without Oz—but he’s having a wonderful time at that music camp.”

“Oh—good.”

Music camp. That was where Mum and Dad thought he was.

“Have some toast.”

“No thanks, they gave us breakfast.”

Lily drank a cup of tea, listening to her parents chatting, slightly comforted by the warmth of Demerara’s body across her feet.

“Drat, my nail polish has chipped!” The yowling voice floated up from under the table. “Be brave, Lily dear. We’ll find Oz, and Isadore had better watch out—it’s PAWBACK TIME!”

Oz felt a terror so intense that it blocked out everything else. He had been dragged through the murky river water by a maniac in a white suit, sure he was about to be killed. But the maniac had suddenly pulled him out of the water and dropped him on hard pavement, and as soon as he realized he wasn’t dead yet, Oz began to pay attention to his surroundings.

His diving equipment was torn away from him. While he lay panting and exhausted, he was gagged and blindfolded, and his arms and legs bound.