Brush with Danger

by Adam Frost

  “I am Dimitri Gottabottomitch,” Wily declared.

  One of the soldiers whispered, “He’s friends with the president.”

  “Take me to my gallery,” said Wily.

  “Where did he come from?” growled one of the older soldiers, looking up at the sky.

  “I came from the Kremlin. On a top-secret mission from the president. Take me to my gallery or I’ll get you all posted to Siberia,” he said.

  The soldiers looked at each other. A younger soldier seemed to take charge.

  “Put him in a taxi. I don’t fancy winter in Siberia.”

  Two soldiers escorted him to a taxi rank on the edge of Red Square and helped him into the first cab.

  “Morning, Mr Gottabottomitch,” said the driver. “Your gallery, I assume?”

  Wily made the bear suit nod.

  “Right you are, sir,” said the driver.

  They reached the gallery in about twenty minutes.

  A wolf scuttled over, paid the driver and helped Wily out.

  “Back already, boss,” he said.

  Wily made the bear suit nod once more. Then he walked quickly through the front doors.

  “Oscar’s nearly finished if you want to check on the painting,” the wolf said, hovering at the detective’s side.

  Wily nodded for a third time and followed the wolf down a corridor. They walked past a showroom full of pictures by famous painters. Then they reached a thick security door with a fingerprint reader next to it.

  Wily lifted up the paw of the costume, and placed it on the sensor.

  The sensor flashed red. Of course it did. A costume could not imitate Dimitri’s fingerprints.

  Wily froze for a second and then put his paw back down angrily.

  The reader flashed red again.

  “Stupid thing,” growled the wolf, and put his own paw on it.

  The door hissed open.

  “There you go, boss,” he said and headed back down the corridor, leaving Wily alone.

  Wily found himself in a large white room full of paintbrushes, plaster moulds, blank canvases and empty paint pots.

  In the middle of the room, an otter was standing in front of a strange painting, chained to the floor by his ankles. The painting looked like this:

  The otter turned round. “Almost finished,” he said. “Just this final loop here to do.”

  Wily looked again at the otter’s chains and made a quick decision.

  He climbed out of the costume.

  “Have you come to d-do me in?” the otter stammered, backing away.

  Wily started to gnaw and chew on the otter’s chains with his sharp teeth.

  “Here to help,” he said. “Now, tell me what’s going on…”

  The otter looked relieved. “I don’t really know,” he said. “I’m just an artist. Oscar Otter. I sold a few paintings to Dimitri last year. All abstract – a bit like this one. Then about three months ago, I got woken by a loud knock on the door, someone put a bag over my head and the next thing I know, I’m chained up here.”

  Wily couldn’t get through the manacles with his teeth so he tried pulling them.

  “Carry on,” he grunted.

  “I have to copy these strange pictures,” the otter said. “I only get one at a time, so I never see them together. When they’re given to me, they’re just sketches – scraps of paper, torn round the edges. I have to turn them into paintings like this one. The thing is, a lot of them are the same. I’ve done this one at least twice before.”

  Wily stopped yanking for a second. “Say that again?”

  “I’ve done this one before,” the otter repeated.

  Wily stopped to think. He took a picture of the painting, then he reached into his pocket and pulled out his college photo.

  “Have you seen any of these foxes before?”

  The otter stared for a few seconds and then shook his head.

  “There was a vixen that brought me a fish once. I do like fish…”

  “But it wasn’t this vixen here?” Wily pointed out Vicky Vixen.

  “No, she had light-brown fur. Hang on, I think I sketched her just after she left. I hide all my sketches under that concrete slab there. Lift it up and I’ll show you.”

  Wily stepped forward and started to lift up the slab. A split second later, there was a loud…

  Dimitri was standing in the doorway. Behind him stood the two wolves that Wily had met in Paris.

  “We’re doomed,” the otter wailed, curling up behind his painting.

  “Fast work, Wily Fox. I’d hoped you were still at the bottom of the Eiffel Tower, where we left you,” growled Dimitri.

  “Paint fight!” Wily shouted, letting the slab fall.

  He picked up a tin of red paint and flung it at Dimitri, covering him from head to foot.

  One of the wolves stepped forward and Wily threw a tin of blue paint at him. The wolf stopped in his tracks, wiping the paint out of his eyes and ears.

  The other wolf picked up a tin of yellow paint and threw it at Wily.

  Wily held his arms out wide, allowing himself to be covered. Then he grabbed two more paint pots from behind the canvas, and handed one to the otter.

  “Throw the paint as hard as you can,” he said.

  For the next two minutes, paint flew everywhere until everyone was sticky, spluttering and multicoloured.

  “Get him!” shouted Dimitri.

  But now it wasn’t clear who was a wolf and who was a fox.

  “OK, boss,” Wily said in his best Russian accent, and jumped on one of the wolves. The other wolf joined in. Then Wily stepped away and let the two wolves roll around in the paint, kicking and thrashing about, until they had knocked each other out.

  “Idiots!” roared Dimitri, and started throwing empty paint tins at Wily.

  The detective jumped left and right, dodging Dimitri’s missiles.

  “Missed!” exclaimed Wily.

  Then he grabbed the painting that the otter had been working on, and held it in front of him. The paint tin hit the canvas. The canvas stretched backwards, like a huge trampoline. Then the tin came rocketing back, towards Dimitri.

  It hit the bear on the nose, sending him flying. Dimitri reeled and staggered, pulling things over and knocking things sideways. Eventually he ended up underneath a huge pile of easels, paintbrushes, cloths and buckets.

  Wily grabbed some rope from a side table and tied up Dimitri. Then he tied up the two wolves.

  After that, he turned round to check on the otter. But one of the paint tins had broken his chains, and the artist was nowhere to be seen.

  Looks like he’s an escape artist, too, thought Wily.

  Now what had the otter said? He had drawn a picture of the fox that was behind all this and hidden it under a slab. Wily lifted up the slab. Underneath, he found a folded piece of paper. He opened it and saw this:

  Oh no! It was in the same style as the otter’s other paintings – a mass of weird shapes. It would have been Wily’s best clue yet, but it was no use at all. And the otter was gone so he couldn’t ask him any more questions.

  He raced around the room, searching for other clues. And then he spotted it. The otter had written something on the back of the canvas he had been working on:

  Wily would look for the otter later. Once he had found the vixen, the otter could help to identify her.

  As the detective folded up the piece of paper, something started to buzz under the pile of easels and cloths and buckets.

  Dimitri’s phone was under there.

  Wily pulled Dimitri’s phone out from under the pile. He had a new message:

  This was a bit of luck. The message could only be from one person – the fox who was behind everything. The detective’s nose twitched, his ears pricked up and his cheeks tingled.

  “Wily Fox,” he murmured, “solving crime in record time.”

  He pulled out his phone and called Albert. But it went through to voicemail:

  There was a sound effect of
an explosion…

  That was strange. Albert always answered.

  Wily decided to call Suzie La Pooch instead. He needed to give her an update and tell her she’d soon be free. He phoned Sybil Squirrel’s number at PSSST. Julius wouldn’t let him talk to Suzie, but Sybil might.

  But there was another recorded message:

  NEE-NAW-NEE-NAW, went the sound effect.

  That was even stranger. There was always someone in the PSSST offices.

  “You’re out of your depth, Fox,” said a voice behind him.

  Wily turned round and saw that a groggy-looking Dimitri, still bound hand and foot, had propped himself up against the wall.

  “Oh yeah,” said Wily. “Why’s that?”

  “You will never beat her,” said Dimitri. “She sees everything, and knows everything.”

  “Who? Who are you talking about?”

  Dimitri shook his head.

  Wily pulled out the old college photo. “It’s her, isn’t it? Vicky Vixen?”

  “She’s not in the photo,” said Dimitri, “but she’s there just the same.”

  “What do you mean?”

  “You’re the detective. You work it out.” Dimitri closed his eyes.

  Wily shook him, but the bear had passed out again.

  The detective tried to think. Six paintings. Painted over and over again. Sent to garages not galleries. And a fox that wasn’t there. He looked at the paintings on his phone again.

  Hmm. Maybe he was out of his depth. But it was time to go. Whoever he was about to meet on the River Moskva – she would have the answers. He put on the bear costume and left the studio.

  The River Moskva was frozen and covered with snow. Everywhere there were ice skaters in fur coats and hats, young animals pulling each other along on sledges and old donkeys in kiosks selling hot coffee and soup.

  Wily scanned the river for any sign of a vixen. Nothing. She was late.

  A couple of seconds later, a group of ice skaters parted to reveal a tall, elegant fox in dark glasses and a scarf tied, bandit-style, around her muzzle. She had a large briefcase in one paw. Ice skates glinted on her feet.

  The fox was about twenty metres away. She was staring at Wily the bear. There was no expression on her face. This wasn’t Vicky Vixen.

  Wily breathed in, trying to catch the fox’s scent. Across the ice, the other fox was also breathing in, and she had caught Wily’s. Her blank expression turned to one of surprise, then anger. She spun round and sped off.

  Wily was out of the bear costume in seconds. He ran on to the ice, skidding in all directions. He was never going to catch up with the fox at this rate. He needed to f ind ice skates or skis or a sledge – or anything but his paws.

  Then he heard a growling sound behind him and a voice declared, “It can turn into a snowmobile, too.”

  “Albert?” Wily gasped.

  The mole was riding the Vespa, which now had two giant skis under its chassis.

  “When the Vespa went down over Moscow, it sent out a distress call,” Albert explained. “I came out here to repair it.”

  “But how did you get here so fast?”

  “Rocket socks,” he said, glancing at his feet. “Still need some work. Should be ready for your next case. Anyway, after I fixed your bike, I locked on to your mobile signal.”

  Wily grinned. “Clever. Now budge over – I’m driving.”

  Albert shuffled back and Wily leaped on. They gave chase and within moments they were closing in on the fox.

  She was swerving between groups of skaters, leaping over sledges and looping around holes in the ice.

  Albert was taking photos of her and trying to analyze them.

  “She’s not showing up in any databases,” he said.

  “Don’t worry,” said Wily. “We’ll soon catch her and then we’ll know everything.”

  But the fox sped up, heading downstream where the ice was thinner.

  Wily also picked up speed, making skaters leap out of the way.

  “Take over,” he told Albert, “and get as close as you can.”

  The mole grabbed the handlebars and steered the Vespa towards the vixen. Wily stood up behind him, getting ready to jump.

  The vixen glanced over her shoulder and growled.

  Wily jumped towards her, but as he did so, she whacked him with her briefcase. And Wily – in a reflex action – grabbed it.

  The vixen tugged.

  Wily tugged.

  The vixen tugged harder.

  The briefcase sprang open, spilling its contents over the ice. Wily saw six paintings, all in the style of Kandogski. The vixen looked down at the pictures and then up at Wily. She growled before speeding off, leaving them on the ice.

  “Albert!” Wily called.

  But the mole was fifty metres away, turning the Vespa in a wide arc.

  Wily tried to stand up, but the ice was too slippery. He saw the empty briefcase and had an idea. Two seconds later, he was pushing himself along the ice with his arms, using the briefcase as a sledge.

  “Get the paintings! I’ll chase the fox!” he yelled to Albert.

  Within moments, Wily had nearly caught up with the vixen again. She snarled and went faster, but the detective pushed even harder and sped up, too. As they headed downstream, Wily could see that the ice was getting thinner. It groaned and crackled beneath him.

  Wily was within a metre of the vixen now. He tried to grab her feet, her arms, her tail. She swerved out of the way, narrowly avoiding a large crack in the ice.

  “Who are you?” Wily muttered.

  The vixen turned round, as if she’d heard his question.

  “The one that got away,” she said in a low voice.

  She pulled up a scuba mask from around her neck then she dived through a crack in the ice and vanished.

  Wily slammed down with his fists and brought the briefcase to a stop by the hole. He peered into the icy water. A split second later, an arm emerged from the hole and pulled him under.

  The water was freezing cold. Wily felt himself go stiff. At the same time, he felt two paws close around his neck. Wily opened his eyes but everything was blurry. He could only see the outline of a fox’s head and, above him, thick ice. He started to struggle but the vixen wasn’t letting go.

  Quickly, he thought about what was in his pocket. No weapons, just his magnifying glass, his notepad (now soggy) and his phone.

  His phone. His phone was waterproof, bombproof, everything proof. It would still work.

  As the vixen gripped tightly to his throat, Wily managed to move his paw into his pocket and grab his phone. He was holding his breath but he knew he couldn’t last too much longer. With his thumb, he switched his phone to camera mode. He moved it slowly up, in between the arms that were choking him, and started taking pictures.

  Even underwater, the light was blinding. Realizing what was happening, the vixen let go and tried to grab the phone.

  Which was exactly what Wily wanted. The detective pressed a small blue button on the back of the phone. All of Albert’s gadgets had this button. It was meant as a last resort, but this was a last resort.

  These words appeared on the phone’s screen:

  Even underwater, the numbers were perfectly clear.

  The vixen seemed to hesitate. She looked at Wily and looked at the phone. Then she was gone.

  The phone was starting to rumble. Wily swam upwards. There was nothing but thick ice above his head. There was no point trying to find the hole he fell through – it could be anywhere.

  This was the second part of his plan, but he had no idea if it would work. He dug his phone into the thick ice, wedging it in place. Then he swam back down.

  Wily was about ten metres below the surface when the phone exploded, blasting a huge hole in the ice. The explosion spun him round and round, but he was still conscious. Just.

  The detective swam to the surface as fast as he could. He could feel the air in his lungs running out. Black blobs appeared in front of
his eyes. He was about to pass out, when his head emerged above the water. He took a gigantic breath and his strength flooded back.

  “Albert!” he gasped.

  Wily looked around but all he could see was smoke from the explosion. Then a second later, the Vespa’s headlamp appeared through the cloud and Albert was beside him.

  “Did you catch her?” he asked.

  “No, but I know who she is,” Wily smiled, climbing out. “It’s like Dimitri said – she’s not in the picture, but she’s there all the same.”

  Wily pulled the photograph out of his pocket. It was wet but otherwise undamaged.

  “You mean she’s hiding behind one of those trees?” said Albert.

  Wily shook his head. “Who does the photo belong to?”

  Albert thought for a second and smiled. “The person who took it,” he said.

  “That’s why she’s not in the photo,” said Wily. “Her name is Klara, and she’s the cleverest fox I’ve ever met. When I was in the river, I saw the outline of her face.”

  “But what is she doing – and why?” asked Albert.

  “Let’s get out of here,” said Wily, “and I’ll explain.”

  Albert drove the Vespa towards the shore.

  “Klara was brilliant,” said Wily, as they drove along. “Came top in every exam we took. But she was also superstitious. She had this lucky mascot called Captain Snuggles. He was a small fluffy puffin with a missing eye – she’d had it since childhood. Wherever she went, Captain Snuggles went, too. Every exam, Captain Snuggles was there, sitting on the desk in front of her.”

  “So she thought the puffin brought her good luck?”