by Pat Hutchins
‘What on earth is going on?’ Mr Jones demanded as Jessica, her finger pointing dramatically at the Eiffel Tower, collapsed to the ground.
‘The kidnapper!’ Jessica gasped, as the children clustered round her. ‘He’s after us. Bent on revenge.
‘I knew he was following us,’ she went on breathlessly, ‘when Miss Parker didn’t have fish. I bet he’s in league with the fiendish doctor.’ Her eyes narrowed as she looked at Mr Jones’s bewildered face. ‘And the waiter,’ she hissed. ‘I bet they’re all in league!’
‘Jessica,’ said Mr Jones, ‘you’re imagining things. There’s nobody after us …’
‘Oh yes there is,’ cried Sacha, overhearing Mr Jones as he, Morgan and Matthew ran towards the group of children. He pointed at the Eiffel Tower.
‘That’s only a balloon seller,’ said Mr Jones.
‘In front of him,’ said Sacha, pointing again.
‘Good heavens!’ said Mr Jones. ‘It’s the bearded man from the boat. The one you attacked,’ he added nervously, glancing at the children. ‘I wonder what he wants? He sounds terribly agitated.’
‘Do you think we ought to hang around to find out?’ murmured Mr Coatsworth.
‘Perhaps not,’ Mr Jones replied, remembering the state the man had been in after the attack.
‘Anyway,’ he added quickly, noticing the children slipping off in the direction of the Métro, ‘we don’t have time to chat.’
‘He’s still coming,’ Mr Coatsworth observed, glancing over his shoulder as he tried to keep up with Mr Jones, who was striding after the children. ‘And a balloon seller seems to be coming too. He’s catching up,’ he gasped, as Mr Jones broke into a trot.
‘Stop! Stop!’ the man shouted, as he struggled after them. ‘I want to ask you something!’
‘He’s carrying a bunch of flowers,’ Mr Coatsworth said in surprise, slowing down.
‘So he is,’ Mr Jones replied, slowing down too as the man caught up with them.
The children saw the flowers and cautiously crept back towards Mr Jones and Mr Coatsworth.
‘Goodness!’ said Mr Jones, turning to face the breathless man. ‘What a coincidence! Fancy meeting you here. Can’t stay,’ he added, looking at his watch.
‘Wait!’ the man gasped, clutching Mr Jones’s arm as he turned to go. ‘I’ve been trying to catch up with you for the last ten minutes.’
‘Have you?’ asked Mr Jones in a surprised voice. ‘We didn’t notice.’ The man waved the bunch of flowers. ‘I saw you leaving the restaurant so I bought these to give to that nice teacher.’ His eyes darted round the group of children, looking for Miss Parker. ‘The one that was so kind to me on the boat.’
‘Oh,’ said Mr Jones in relief. ‘She decided to stay at the hotel this morning. Her leg was bothering her.’
‘Which hotel?’ the man asked quickly. ‘I’ll deliver them personally. Just a little token, that’s all.’
‘The Hôtel Groblin Madeleine,’ Mr Jones replied.
‘Thanks,’ said the man, dashing to the kerb.
‘Oh dear,’ said Mr Jones, as the man stepped into a taxi. ‘I should have told him she’s probably left the hotel by now.’
‘Oh look!’ cried Avril as a great cloud of multi-coloured balloons came bobbing towards them.
‘How much?’ she demanded, stepping in front of the legs that protruded from them. A pair of eyes peered between the balloons then, thrusting the whole bunch into Avril’s hand, the man who had been holding them darted towards the road and hailed a taxi too.
‘If that man had a moustache,’ said Morgan, catching a glimpse of the man’s face as he ran from them, ‘he’d be the double of the waiter from the hotel.’
‘Yes,’ agreed Matthew. ‘But it can’t be him. He went to Calais.’
‘Come on, children,’ Mr Jones interrupted. ‘Let’s get to the Louvre.’
13. The Mona Lisa
They arrived at the Louvre at ten past three, but Miss Parker wasn’t there.
‘Perhaps she’s gone in already,’ said Mr Coatsworth as they stood on the steps of the main entrance.
‘I don’t know why we’re bothering to wait,’ Jessica whispered to Avril, whose face was hidden by the balloons. ‘She won’t be coming. I bet the kidnapper was too late. I bet the doctor has got rid of her body already.’ The balloons parted.
‘Don’t be daft,’ said Avril, gazing through the gap. ‘Here she comes now.’
Jessica’s eyes widened in disbelief when she saw Miss Parker hurrying towards them.
‘I’m sorry I’m late a little,’ Miss Parker cried, running up the steps. ‘But that very kind doctor insisted on putting on my leg a fresh bandage.’
‘Oh, it’s quite all right,’ said Mr Jones. ‘We were rather late ourselves. We bumped into …’
‘I’m sure you’re very anxious to see all those wonderful paintings,’ Miss Parker interrupted, striding towards the entrance. ‘I am. I have never before clapped eyes on the Mona Lisa,’ she added. Mr Jones and Mr Coatsworth hurried after her, trying to ask her if the bearded man had called to see her at the hotel, but not getting a chance to as she strode ahead of them, chattering all the time.
‘All my life for this moment I have waited,’ she continued, turning to count the children when she reached the ticket office. ‘Three adults and twenty children,’ she said, rapping the desk to attract the attention of the girl behind it; who was engrossed in a newspaper.
‘Pardon!’ said the girl, putting the newspaper down and hurriedly getting the tickets.
Morgan, who was at the end of the line of children, glanced idly at the newspaper on the desk. Noticing the date on it, he wondered why the girl was bothering to read a newspaper that was a day old. His eyes travelled down the columns of type on the page, trying to work out what the girl found so interesting. He gasped when he saw the small photograph at the bottom of the page.
‘Sacha!’ he cried, pulling his friend back. ‘Look!’
‘Crikey!’ exclaimed Sacha, gazing at the photograph. ‘It’s the bearded man. The one we’ve just seen!’
‘What does it say?’ Morgan asked urgently, as Mr Jones shouted at them to hurry up.
‘Something about paintings,’ murmured Sacha, frowning with concentration as he bent over the newspaper.
‘Pardon!’ The girl behind the desk smiled at them, nodded towards Mr Jones, who was beckoning to them, and picked up the newspaper.
Morgan and Sacha groaned as they ran to catch up with the rest of Class 3. Miss Parker, already halfway up a flight of stairs, stopped to wait for Mr Jones and Mr Coatsworth, struggling behind her.
‘Did you see the old gentleman from the boat?’ Mr Jones asked as she pointed to a sign.
‘The Mona Lisa this way is,’ she said, not hearing Mr Jones. ‘Come on!’ she added, frowning at the group of children who had stopped to admire a huge painting of a battle scene.
Morgan and Sacha, having quickly told Matthew about the photograph in the newspaper, left him to tell the rest of Class 3, while they struggled through the crowds following the signs to the Mona Lisa to tell Mr Jones and Mr Coatsworth.
‘Mr Jones!’ Morgan shouted, catching up with him and Mr Coatsworth as they stood behind Miss Parker, who had stopped abruptly in a doorway.
‘Sssh!’ said Mr Jones, nodding towards Miss Parker, who was gazing reverently across the room.
‘There it is!’ Miss Parker breathed, staring at a glass box on the wall. ‘The Mona Lisa!’
‘Mr Jones?’ Morgan repeated, tugging at his sleeve.
‘Priceless,’ Miss Parker continued. ‘Leonardo’s masterpiece!’
She winced and staggered, as the rest of Class 3 charged into the room, shouting for Mr Jones.
‘Oh!’ she cried. ‘My leg!’
The children, who were about to tell Mr Jones and Mr Coatsworth what Matthew had told them, fell silent and stared at Miss Parker as she collapsed on the floor, clutching her bandaged leg.
‘Oh!’ she
shrieked again. Mr Coatsworth, bending over her in concern, attempted to help her up. The crowd of people who had been clustered round the Mona Lisa came rushing towards them to see what was going on. The guards, wondering what all the commotion was about, came rushing over too.
‘Oh!’ screamed Jessica, as Miss Parker’s shrieks were drowned by the crash of breaking glass. ‘Look!’
Everyone gazed in horror at the shattered glass case as a loud wailing noise filled the room. Standing next to the case was a man; in one hand he clutched a gun, and in the other, the Mona Lisa.
14. Held Hostage
The guards looked at each other in alarm as the man tucked the painting under his arm, grabbed Jessica and, holding her like a shield, backed out of the door.
Mr Jones, Mr Coatsworth and the rest of Class 3 stood rooted to the spot, gazing in shocked silence as the man ran with the struggling Jessica through the next room towards the stairs.
‘Quick! After them!’ Avril screamed and, still grasping her bunch of balloons, ran after them.
‘Wait!’ said Mr Jones as the rest of the children charged after Avril. ‘He’s got a gun!’
‘Oh dear,’ he murmured. The children, not hearing him, had vanished down the stairs.
‘Mr Coatsworth,’ he shouted, as Mr Coatsworth prepared to give chase too. ‘Get Miss Parker into a taxi and back to the hotel. I’ve got to try and stop those children.’ Then, ignoring Mr Coatsworth’s protests, he ran after them, followed by the guards and the rest of the people in the room.
There were police cars all over the forecourt and gendarmes everywhere as Mr Jones raced down the steps of the Louvre. He could see the gunman in the distance, still holding Jessica, as he ran across the forecourt towards the main road. The gendarmes, who had been warned that the man was armed and had taken a hostage, were shouting through megaphones as they tried unsuccessfully to stop the rest of Class 3 from following the two figures.
The gunman had reached the wall surrounding the Louvre. He struggled over it, then, dodging in and out of the traffic, ran across the road to the Métro.
The children vaulted the wall, then stopped, waiting for the road to clear. Mr Jones caught up with them as they dashed across the road.
‘There he is!’ screamed Avril, pointing to the Métro entrance. ‘After him!’ The gunman, hearing her, turned and, throwing Jessica down, levelled his gun at the children as he backed down the tunnel steps. Class 3, ignoring Mr Jones’s shouts, had started down the steps too. They froze at the explosion that followed.
‘Oh!’ shrieked Avril, clutching her chest as she slid to the ground. ‘He got me!’
Mr Jones, who was bending over the motionless body of Jessica, jumped up in alarm as Avril, who had been gingerly feeling her body for the bullet hole, stood up and gazed at her wet, crimson fingers in horror. ‘Blimey!’ she whispered. ‘Blood!’
Jessica sat up. She looked at the sticky mess oozing from Avril’s pocket. ‘Huh!’ she sniffed disdainfully. ‘That’s not blood. It’s tomato ketchup!’
Everyone gazed at the balloons, and the shrivelled piece of blue rubber dangling from the bunch. ‘He didn’t shoot you, either,’ Jessica added. ‘It was just one of your balloons popping.’
Then, eyeing Mr Jones, she gave a little moan, and fell back again. ‘He nearly got me though,’ she gasped.
‘Come on,’ shouted Morgan, hearing the distant rumble of a train, ‘he’s getting away!’
‘Oh no you don’t!’ thundered Mr Jones, stopping the children in their tracks, as Avril removed the broken ketchup bottle from her pocket and ran to join them. He nodded to the gendarmes who were swarming towards them. ‘They can handle it now.’
‘Oh!’ shrieked Jessica. ‘It was awful! Simply awful …’ she repeated, her voice trailing off as she gazed after them dashing past her. ‘Don’t they want to question me?’ she added indignantly as they charged down to the Métro. The rest of the children, clustered round the entrance, gazed longingly after them. An agitated figure came running towards them.
‘Thank goodness you’re all right,’ said Mr Coatsworth breathlessly. ‘I got Miss Parker into a taxi and came as quickly as I could, but those French policemen kept trying to stop me.’ He looked at Jessica. ‘How are you feeling?’ he asked in concern.
‘Dreadful,’ Jessica whispered. ‘It was simply dreadful!’ She took a deep breath, her eyes shining. ‘It was like this …’
‘Excuse me!’ Someone tapped Mr Jones on the shoulder. ‘Is that nice teacher with you?’
It was the bearded man, whom they’d met at the Eiffel Tower. He was still clutching the wilting flowers in his hand. ‘She’d left the hotel when I arrived,’ he continued, panting. ‘And the manager said he thought she was joining you at the Louvre. What’s going on?’ he added in alarm, seeing the grim-faced gendarmes emerging empty-handed from the tunnel.
‘Someone has stolen the Mona Lisa,’ said Mr Jones.
The man gasped, and the flowers fell from his hand.
‘Miss Parker collapsed in the Louvre,’ Mr Jones added. ‘She’s gone back to the hotel.’
‘Oh!’ cried Jessica, who had been so busy describing her lucky escape to Mr Coatsworth that she’d only just noticed the bearded man. ‘The kidnapper! Morgan! Matthew! Sacha!’ she shouted. ‘It’s the kidnapper! The one whose photograph was in the newspaper!’
‘What newspaper?’ asked Mr Jones in surprise as the man, who had turned very pale, hastily turned his collar up, darted to the road and jumped into a taxi.
‘Where?’ cried Morgan, as he and the rest of the children ran out of the tunnel entrance.
‘There!’ said Jessica, pointing at the taxi vanishing into the distance.
‘Crikey!’ whispered Sacha, as a big black Citroën pulled away from the kerb.
‘Crumbs!’ exclaimed Matthew.
‘16 90 75!’ Morgan yelled.
15. Under Arrest!
Crowds of curious bystanders joined the hordes of gendarmes and reporters who were milling around Class 3 asking questions and taking photographs. Morgan, Matthew and Sacha tried to explain to Mr Jones and Mr Coatsworth that it was the same car that they’d seen in New End, on the boat and following the doctor’s car to Paris.
‘Are you absolutely sure?’ Mr Jones asked. ‘It seems an incredible coincidence.’
Morgan pulled from his pocket the piece of paper with the car’s number on it and handed it to him. ‘I wrote it down in Dover,’ he said.
‘Good heavens!’ Mr Jones exclaimed, looking at the paper. ‘The number is identical. How amazing!’
‘It looked to me,’ said Mr Coatsworth, puzzled, ‘as though he was following the other bearded chap.’
‘Who had his photo in the newspaper,’ Avril added.
‘Where did you see this photograph?’ Mr Jones asked.
‘In the newspaper the girl at the ticket office was reading,’ Morgan replied. ‘Sacha tried to read what it said about him, but he didn’t have much time.’
‘I could understand only a few words,’ said Sacha. ‘Something about paintings.’
‘Perhaps we could go back and ask to see it again,’ Akbar suggested.
Mr Coatsworth shook his head. ‘We can’t,’ he said. ‘They’ve closed the Louvre to look for clues.’
‘Well!’ said Mr Jones. ‘We can see if there’s a copy at the hotel when we get back.’
‘I doubt it,’ said Morgan. ‘It was yesterday’s paper. That’s why I noticed it. I thought it was strange that she should be reading an old newspaper.’
Mr Jones sighed. ‘There’s a lot of strange things going on,’ he agreed.
Morgan looked at Sacha and Matthew. ‘I think we’d better tell you about the waiter,’ he added, as Matthew and Sacha nodded. ‘We didn’t tell you before in case you didn’t believe us.’
Mr Jones sighed again. ‘Morgan,’ he said, ‘if someone had told me that Hampstead Primary School’s Class 3 would witness the theft of the Mona Lisa, I’d never have believed them. R
ight now I’ll believe anything, but you’d better tell me on the way back to the hotel,’ he added, waving to Jessica, who reluctantly left the reporters and came over to join them. ‘We’d better get away from here while we can,’ he finished, as the excited crowd, realizing that the Mona Lisa had been stolen, shouted the news to passers-by. The chief detective in charge of the robbery asked them a few more questions. Then, telling them not to leave Paris for the next six hours in case he needed to question them again, he said they could go.
They fought their way through the crowds to the bus stop – the gendarmes had sealed off the Métro entrance. Pursued by an excited mob who had discovered that they were witnesses to the crime, they escaped on a bus that was going to the Madeleine.
Mr Jones sighed with relief as the bus pulled away from the disappointed crowd. Sitting next to Mr Coatsworth, he listened carefully as Morgan told them about the button, the doctor’s room number and the waiter’s telephone conversations.
‘So,’ said Mr Jones, holding up a finger when Morgan had finished, ‘one, a black Citroën follows us to the ferry.’
‘No,’ Matthew interrupted. ‘It followed the taxi to the ferry. The taxi was following us.’
‘All right,’ said Mr Jones. ‘One,’ he repeated, ‘a taxi follows us to the ferry.’ He held up another finger. ‘Two,’ he said, ‘a black Citroën follows the taxi to the ferry. Three, the black Citroën follows the doctor’s car to Paris.’
‘So the doctor,’ said Sacha, ‘must have been in the taxi.’
‘And picked up his own car at Calais,’ Morgan added.
‘Four,’ said Mr Jones, ‘the man in the black Citroën disappears. And the waiter tries to break into the doctor’s room.’
‘But comes into mine instead,’ said Jessica proudly.
‘Five,’ continued Mr Jones, ‘the waiter goes to Calais and the other bearded chap from the ferry turns up.’
