Grk Undercover (2 page)

Natascha and Max Raffifi were both born in Stanislavia, but they spent their childhood traveling all around the world. They lived in Vienna, Montevideo, Riga, Toronto, Madrid and London.

Their father, Gabriel Raffifi, had worked for the Stanislavian Foreign Office. He had been the Stanislavian ambassador to Austria, Uruguay, Latvia, Canada, Spain and the United Kingdom.

When the Raffifis were living in London, terrible things happened in Stanislavia. The president was thrown in prison and the country was taken over by a despicable despot named Colonel Zinfandel.

There are many brutal, unpleasant and cruel politicians in the world, but Colonel Zinfandel was one of the worst. He killed some of his enemies and imprisoned the others. The Stanislavian people didn’t want him as their president, but they were too scared to protest. Using a mixture of terror, bribery and brute force, Colonel Zinfandel grabbed control of the country.

One of Colonel Zinfandel’s oldest enemies was Gabriel Raffifi.

On the same day that he took control of Stanislavia, Colonel Zinfandel sent his secret service to London. They kidnapped the Raffifis and took them back to Stanislavia, where they were put in prison. There, Mr. and Mrs. Raffifi were murdered.

If you want to know the whole horrible story, you should read
A Dog Called Grk
.

You will discover how Max and Natascha eventually escaped from prison and why they came to live in London with Tim and his parents.

You will also learn how Max made a solemn promise to his dead parents.

“I shall take revenge for your deaths,” he said. “And I promise, Mother and Father, my revenge will be swift and cruel.”

An eye for an eye, a tooth for a tooth
.

Tim wrapped his duvet around himself and thought about revenge.

If you knew that a friend of yours was going to kill someone, what would you do?

Would you try to stop him?

What if he was intending to kill the man who had killed his parents? Wouldn’t you let him do the one thing that he wanted more than anything else in the world? Even if that meant he might die?

Tim didn’t know the answer to any of these questions. He didn’t even know how to think about answering them. He wasn’t a philosopher or a priest. He was just an ordinary boy who wanted to spend the whole morning in bed.

Given the choice, he wouldn’t have done any thinking at all. He would have stretched out, pulled the duvet over his head, closed his eyes and gone back to sleep.

But he couldn’t do that. Natascha was sitting on the end of his bed, waiting to hear his response. She was looking nervous, but determined. Tim knew what she was going to do: with or without him, she was going to go and search for Max.

“It’s none of my business,” he could have said to her. “If you want to help Max, then you’re welcome to help him, but I’m not going to. He’s your brother, not mine.”

Or he could have tried to argue with her. “If Max wants to kill Colonel Zinfandel,” he could have said, “why don’t you let him? He’s old enough to look after himself. Why don’t you leave him alone and let him do what he wants?”

Or he could have said what an adult would have said: “Max can’t just go around killing people. Someone has to stop him. We’d better call the police. Pass me my phone, I’m going to call them right now!”

But he didn’t say any of these things. If Max and Natascha needed his help, then he had to help them. That’s what friends are for.

“Of course I’ll come with you,” he said. “Where are we going?”

Natascha smiled for a moment; then sadness and worry settled over her face again. She slowly shrugged her shoulders. “That’s the problem,” she said in a quiet voice. “I don’t know where he is. I thought you might.”

“Me?” said Tim. “Why me?”

“You share a room with him. Didn’t he tell you where he was going?”

“He didn’t tell me anything,” said Tim, shaking his head. “This whole thing is complete surprise to me.”

“You must know something,” insisted Natascha. “Didn’t he talk to you about traveling? Didn’t he mention planes? Or trains? What about guidebooks? Or maps? Or tickets?”

“He didn’t say anything about anything,” said Tim. “You know what Max is like. He’s good at keeping secrets.”

“He certainly is,” said Natascha. She sighed despondently. Then another thought occurred to her. “I don’t suppose you heard him leaving in the middle of the night?”

“No, I didn’t.” Tim glanced across the bedroom at Max’s bed. “He was there when I went to sleep, but that’s all I can remember. Sorry.”

“Oh, it’s hopeless,” said Natascha. “What am I going to do? How am I ever going to find him?”

Tim bit his fingernail. He always did that when he was thinking. And then he said, “Maybe he left a clue.”

“What kind of clue?”

“I don’t know,” said Tim. “But it’s still worth looking.” All thoughts of sleep suddenly forgotten, he threw aside his duvet, rolled out of bed and grabbed his bathrobe. He drew the curtains, letting light flood into the bedroom. “Come on,” he said. “Help me look.”

“What are we looking for?” said Natascha.

“We won’t know till we find it,” said Tim. “A ticket, a receipt, a guidebook, a weather forecast—who knows? But as soon as we find it, we’ll know it’s exactly what we’re looking for.”

Tim and Natascha searched the room for clues. They rummaged through Max’s clothes and peered behind the chest of drawers and poked their fingers down the edges of the carpet. Tim crawled under Max’s bed and emerged with a rolled-up sock. Natascha hunted through Max’s cupboards and discovered a novel that she wanted to read. But neither of them found anything like a ticket, a receipt, a guidebook or a weather forecast.

In fact, after they had searched the entire room, they only discovered one thing that looked as if it might possibly be a clue, and even that didn’t appear to be much help.

When Tim tipped out the contents of the wastepaper basket, he found two Band-Aids, a battery, an empty Coke can, a snapped pencil, an apple core, some orange peel, several tissues and a screwed-up piece of paper. He unrolled the paper and flattened it on the floor.

It was an ordinary sheet of paper. One side was blank. In the middle of the other side, someone had written a single number and three words:

Tim showed the paper to Natascha. He said, “Do you know what this means?”

Natascha peered at the paper. “I’ve got no idea,” she said. “But it’s Max’s handwriting.”

“Are you sure?”

“Of course I’m sure. I know my own brother’s writing.”

Tim stared at the paper again. “Zinfandel. Jules Verne. One.” He looked at Natascha. “What do you think ‘Jules Verne’ means?”

“It doesn’t mean anything,” said Natascha. “It’s a name. Jules Verne was a real person.”

“Who was he?”

“A writer.”

“What did he write?”

“Around the World in Eighty Days,”
said Natascha. “And
Twenty Thousand Leagues Under the Sea
. And lots of other books, but I can’t remember any of the titles.”

“I’ve heard of
Around the World in Eighty Days
,” said Tim. “I think I might have seen the film. Do you know anything else about him?”

“He was French,” said Natascha. “He lived about a hundred years ago. He pretty much invented science fiction. That’s all I know, really. We could look him up if you’re interested.”

“I’m not,” said Tim. “I’m just wondering why Max would be interested in him.”

“He wouldn’t,” said Natascha. “Max only reads books about tennis and football. He definitely doesn’t like science fiction.”

“If he’s not interested in Jules Verne, why would he write his name on a piece of paper? And why would he write Colonel Zinfandel’s name there too? And what does the ‘one’ mean?”

“I don’t know the answer to any of those questions,” said Natascha. “But I can tell you one thing for sure. It’s not a clue.” She sighed deeply. “Oh, this is hopeless. I’m never going to see my brother again.”

“You will,” said Tim. “I’m sure you will.”

“You know that’s not true,” said Natascha with a sniff. Tears were collecting in the corners of her eyes. “He’s going to try to kill Colonel Zinfandel—and he’s going to die trying.”

Tim looked at the trails of dried tears on Natascha’s face and wished he didn’t feel so useless. He hated seeing his friend suffering, but he had no idea how to help her.

He thought hard. There must be something he could do. But what? How could he find Max?

He stared at the piece of paper that he had found, wondering what the words could possibly mean.

What was the connection between Colonel Zinfandel and the writer of
Around the World in Eighty Days
? And why had Max written the number “1” with their names?

It didn’t make any sense.

Tim folded the piece of paper and put it in his pocket. Natascha was right. It wasn’t a clue.

There had to be another way to find Max.

Tim tried to recall anything unusual or unexpected that Max had said over the past few days, but he couldn’t remember anything that
gave any clue to where Max might have gone. He thought about what they knew and what they had discovered so far. And then he had an idea.

“Let’s read the letter again,” suggested Tim. “Maybe you missed something when you translated it from Stanislavian into English.”

“My translation was perfect,” snapped Natascha.

“I’m sure it was,” said Tim. He tried to sound calm and reassuring. He could see that Natascha was starting to panic. He didn’t blame her; if his brother went missing, he would probably panic too. He said, “Even if your translation was perfect, and I’m sure it was, you might have missed something. Maybe there’s a clue in what he wrote.”

“I don’t think so,” said Natascha. “Max was very careful not to give away any useful information. He just said he was going to assassinate Colonel Zinfandel, that’s all. He didn’t say anything about where or when or how he was going to do it.”

Tim clapped his hands together. “That’s a clue!”

“What is?”

“If he’s planning to kill Colonel Zinfandel, he has to be in the same place as Colonel Zinfandel.”

“Obviously.”

“So we just have to find out where Colonel Zinfandel is. And then we’ll find Max.”

“You make it sound so easy.”

“It is easy,” said Tim. “There’s a magic box downstairs which has the answer to every question in the universe. All we have to do is ask.”

Grk wasn’t allowed upstairs.

He could go into the kitchen, the sitting room and the garden, but he was strictly forbidden from venturing upstairs and going into the bedrooms. That was the law in the Malt household.

Grk was the type of dog who didn’t really care about laws. But he had learnt that breaking the law often had unpleasant consequences. He had been shouted at and sometimes even slapped. Once he had been locked in the garden for an entire afternoon. After that, he never went upstairs again. Unless he was alone in the house, of course. When everyone else went out, leaving him in charge, he roamed from the attic to the basement, treating the whole place as his own personal playroom.

Every night, Grk slept in a basket.

Every morning, he sat at the bottom of the stairs, his tail thumping on the carpet, waiting to greet people as they emerged from their bedrooms and came downstairs to have breakfast.

Mr. Malt was usually the first person that Grk saw. Mr. Malt liked to leave home as early as possible so he could get to work before his colleagues and prove how hard he worked.

Mrs. Malt usually followed a few minutes behind her husband. She would rush downstairs to the kitchen, gathering her things for work, and drink the tea that Mr. Malt had made for her.

During term time, the children would follow them soon afterward. But in the holidays, the house stayed quiet for a long time after the Malts had drunk their tea, eaten their toast and gone to work.

Today was different.

Grk was a good guard dog. If he had ever heard burglars breaking into the house, he would have barked loudly enough to alert everyone in the street. But when he heard those feet on the stairs, he didn’t bother barking, because he knew who owned them. He just sat at the bottom of the stairs, his tail wagging, wondering why Max was getting up so early.

Max came downstairs, knelt on the carpet, whispered goodbye to Grk and tickled his ears. Then he grabbed his coat and tiptoed out of the house, closing the front door silently behind him.

When Max had gone, the house was quiet again.

Not long after dawn, Mr. Malt came downstairs, patted Grk on the head and went into the kitchen to make breakfast. He was soon followed by Mrs. Malt. They drank their tea and ate their toast together, then went to work.

The house was quiet once more.

Right now, Grk was sitting at the bottom of the stairs. His head was cocked to one side and his tail was thumping on the carpet.

He could hear the sound of voices from the top of the stairs. He knew the voices belonged to Tim and Natascha. Although he had no idea what they might be talking about, he did know two things for sure.

One: if they were talking, then they must be awake.

Two: if they were awake, then they would take him for a walk.

He sat at the bottom of the stairs, impatiently waiting and watching, hoping they would hurry up and come downstairs.

As the voices came closer and closer, his tail thumped faster and faster on the carpet. When Tim and Natascha finally reached the bottom of the stairs, Grk threw himself forward, unable to contain his excitement, and hurled himself at their legs. Then he turned round and ran the entire length of the hallway, barking with excitement, ready to go out and smell the fresh air and throw himself into the new day.

When Grk got to the front door, he turned round once more and looked for Tim and Natascha, expecting them to be right behind him, eager to get outside as fast as possible.