Mission In Malta by Deborah Abela Page A

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    Dressed in her black, full-length, anti-detection suit, Max slipped on her infrared glasses and searched the darkened corners of the cathedral. Her eyes drifted across the carved stone walls and along the domed ceiling and side altars with their intricately painted scenes from the life of St John. Every centimetre of the church was covered with art, down to the marble floor with its inlaid designs that took centuries to complete.
    Max activated her Hover Shoes and floatedsilently above the cool surface, waiting for Fossdrake’s entrance.
    And there he was. From a glass window high above the altar of the cathedral, lowering to the floor on a silken rope like a giant huntsman spider, was Fossdrake.
    â€˜About time you showed up,’ Max whispered.
    The young spy waited for the thief to reach the floor, fold up his rope and make his way to the Oratory, the room that held the Caravaggio painting.
    Moving across the floor on silent jets of air, Max followed. She poked her head into the Oratory. Her eyes flicked around the room. Her breathing quickened.
    Fossdrake wasn’t there.
    She quickly ran her eyes over the tall golden ceilings carved with angels and banners and columns inlaid with the reddened marble of the Maltese Cross. She looked beyond the stone floor to the altar and above it, to the painting.
    Max inched further into the room. Where could he have gone?
    â€˜Oooph!’ Max felt the threads of steel close around her like a giant octopus. Fossdrake was famous for his web launcher, and even thoughshe’d promised herself it wouldn’t happen, Max had become its next victim.
    The web launcher not only wrapped you snuggly in an inescapable trap, the steel threads were treated with a fine coating of knock-out serum that, after only minutes, left the victim in a deep coma.
    â€˜Oh, that was too easy.’ Archibald sniffled. ‘I thought the clever Max Remy would have been much more difficult to catch.’ He smiled and stretched out his arms. ‘And here she is!’
    The serum itched Max’s nose. She swivelled and thrashed to loosen the threads, but with each movement she felt her muscles lose their strength and her body slip into a deep desire to sleep.
    Fossdrake walked closer. ‘I’m going to rid the world of you for good, Max Remy. Do you understand? And I’m going to enjoy every minute of it.’
    The huge figure loomed over Max’s tightly bound body. Closer and closer. All to the rhythm of a drawled, scraping sound.
    Max turned her head to see a large, marble floor tile behind her sliding open, like the mouth of a gaping tomb.
    â€˜Bye bye.’ Fossdrake raised his hand.
    He was going to push her into an open tomb. If Max didn’t think of an escape in the next few seconds, she’d be locked beneath the church’s marble floors for decades. Maybe even centuries. She had to escape. She had to get away before the brutal push that would

    â€˜Ouch!’
    â€˜Who are you?’
    â€˜I’m the kid whose toe you just stepped on.’ Max cradled her sore foot and jumped on her good one.
    â€˜Well, you should watch where you put your toe in the future. Or you might just lose it.’
    The short, stout man tugged at his rumpled suit and grunted through sneered lips before turning away.
    â€˜I’m sure what you meant to say was “sorry”,’ Max cried after him, but he’d already begun yelling at the waiter over the breakfast table about his coffee being cold.
    â€˜Cheery fella,’ Linden said, nodding. ‘I bet he’s a ball to hang out with.’
    Max and Linden were at the St James Cavalier Centre in Valletta. The first session of the Annual Leech Conference was about to begin, and to ignore the fact that the foyer was full of glass tanks resting on stone pillars filled with leeches, she’d been writing in her spy notebook.
    â€˜If science makes you that popular, I think I’ve decided on a change