"Oh, Rowena. I'm sorry. I didn't mean to." (I'd been holding Rowena's hand in a grip so tight it would have put Arnold Schwarzeneg-ger to shame. I was petrified that she'd be kidnapped, now that I knew who the spy wanted.) I looked at my watch. It was time to meet up with my friends.

"Rowena," I said, "we have to go back."

"But we didn't find a toy store."

"I know. We'll go to FAO Schwarz soon. I promise. And I know you'll like it. It has more stuffed animals than I've ever seen. Some of them are bigger than you are!"

Rowena walked happily to our meeting place. (The thought of FAO Schwarz had satisfied her.) Stacey and Alistaire were waiting for us, but no one else had arrived yet.

"Stacey!" I cried, just as she cried, "Mary Anne!", "What?" we both said. Then I added, "You go first."

"The guy is after Alistaire," she whispered to me. "I saw him three times."

"No way. He's after Rowena. 7 saw him twice."

Stacey and I stared at each other. "What does this mean?" asked Stacey.

"I'm not sure. . . . He's twins? He's after you or me?"

"Well, I don't know about twins, but it's the kids he's after."

"Both of them, I guess." I wrung my hands. "We have to tell Mr. and Mrs. Harrington," I said firmly.

Stacey looked pained. "Here come Jessi and Laine," she whispered. I knew she meant, "We'll talk about this later."

We didn't have many chances to talk that day, though. Either Rowena and Alistaire were around, or our friends were. But at one point, when the others had walked ahead of us, and Kristy was pointing out something to the kids, Stacey nudged me and said quietly, "We'll tell the Harringtons this afternoon."

"Okay." I nodded, swallowing hard.

Near four o'clock, Stacey and I were standing in the Harringtons' foyer, having returned safely with Alistaire and Rowena.

The housekeeper came to meet us. "Mr. and Mrs. Harrington aren't home yet," she said, "but they told me to give you a message. They'll be having some time off. They won't need you again until Friday morning."

I glanced at Stacey. All we could do was wait.

Claudia.

Chapter 18.

It was our seventh day of cla.s.ses at Falny. I had learned to dread them. All Mr. Clarke ever said to me was, "Work slower," or, "Do it over." Once he might have smiled, but I wasn't sure. It could have been a grimace.

When Mal and I arrived in Mr. Clarke's cla.s.s on Wednesday morning, he said, "All right. Today is our day at the Cloisters."

The Cloisters? Oh, right. The Cloisters. Mr. Clarke had mentioned the trip the day before, but somehow I had forgotten. Now I remembered. He had told us that the Cloisters, a branch of the Metropolitan Museum of Art, located in some place called Fort Tryon Park, features medieval art. Only it's not just a building where you go to stare at paintings and statues. I mean, it z's a building, but Mr. Clarke said it's unusual. And it looks out on the Hudson River. (Plus, since it's in a park, you feel like you're in the counitry.) Here's what's in the museum: a collection of art, plus parts of medieval chapels and monasteries - real ones from Europe. The structures had been taken apart, the stones were shipped to the United States, and then the structures were rebuilt.

(In case you're wondering, medieval does not mean "halfway evil," like I used to think. It means "having to do with the Middle Ages," which were the years 1000 to 1400 in Europe. And a cloister is part of a monastery or convent, or the monastery or convent itself. Okay. Enough of this stuff. It's too much like school. If it didn't have to do with art, I would be bored, too.) When our cla.s.s had a.s.sembled, we gathered our sketch pads, our charcoals, and our lunches. Then we boarded a bus. It was a special bus to the Cloisters, and some other people were on it, but most of the pa.s.sengers were us Falny students. And Mr. Clarke, of course.

Mr. Clarke sat with Mallory on the bus. They sat in the front. I sat in the back. Alone.

As soon as we reached the Cloisters, Mr. Clarke turned us loose. "Just go sketch," he said.

Goody, I thought. I'll stay out of his way. This looks like a big place. I ought to be able to avoid him.

My first hour was blissful. There seemed to be lots of places in New York that felt so un-New Yorkish you could imagine yourself in a different place, or even a different time. Mal felt that way about Chinatown. Kristy felt that way about Central Park.

And I felt that way about the Cloisters. It was, I think, the most peaceful place I have ever been in. So I settled down and began drawing. I found a part of a chapel that fascinated me. I began a series of quick sketches, one after the other. First I concentrated on angle, then perspective, then the texture of the stones. I was very excited.

I barely noticed when Mal sat down next to me. (I had settled myself on the floor.) In fact, I jumped when she said, "I will go crazy if we have to do this all day. How can you keep drawing and drawing, Claud?"

"It's in my blood," I said dryly.

"Oh." Mal looked hurt.

I went back to my drawings.

The next thing I knew, Mr. Clarke was saying, "Very nice."

He couldn't be talking to me.

I turned around. Nope. He was talking to Mallory. Of course. Then I remembered: You have to escape him!

I stood up quickly. But not quickly enough.

"Let me see, Claudia," said Mr. Clarke.

I closed my eyes briefly. Then I handed over my sketch pad.

Mr. Clarke looked at what I'd been working on. Then he flipped back a page - and another and another and another. . . .

"Claudia, what are you doing? Trying to set an Olympic sketching record? We're going to be here for hours. Would you please settle down and concentrate on one drawing? Just humor me for once."

I didn't bother to answer Mr. Clarke. I took back my sketch pad, turned to a fresh page, moved to a different spot, and started drawing again. I was so angry that I worked on one drawing for three and a half hours. I almost forgot to eat my lunch.

Mr. Clarke didn't say another word to me the entire time we were at the Cloisters. He walked by me twice and checked out my work, but then he just moved on. Good. I was sending silent signals to him. The signals warned, "Keep away. Don't talk to me. Keep away. Don't talk to me."

They must have been pretty strong.

When the time came for us Falny students to leave the Cloisters, I was exhausted. I don't think I had ever worked or concentrated so hard. I staggered onto the bus. I wasn't sure where Mal was, and I didn't care.

Halfway down the aisle, I saw her. She was about to slide into the empty seat next to Mr. Clarke, but when he looked up and spotted me, he said, "Oh, excuse me, Mallory." He jumped up. "Claudia, I'd like to talk to you."

Oh, fabulous. This was just fabulous. What a way to end the day. I was only thirteen years old, and someone was going to tell me that my career as an artist was over - before it had even started.

I was an eighth-grade failure.

I wondered if there was a future in knowing the contents of every single Nancy Drew book ever written. That was my only other talent.

I plopped myself down in a seat next to the window. Mr. Clarke sat beside me. I waited for him to deliver the bad news and wondered if I could make it back to Stacey's before I began to cry.

"You worked very hard today," Mr. Clarke began.

Was this some kind of trick?

"Yes," I said cautiously.

"May I see what you worked on?"

As the doors to the bus closed and we eased out of the parking lot, I opened my pad and showed Mr. Clarke the three-and-a-half-hour drawing.

He looked at it for a long time. (During that time, I thought, Nurse? Cab driver? Professional baby-sitter?) At last he said, "Now this is what I've been waiting for, Claudia."

"What?"

"I knew you could do it. I knew you could settle down, concentrate, and show some discipline. This is one of the finest pieces of work I've ever seen. And from such a young student, no less."

I must have looked completely confused, because Mr. Clarke went on, "I'm sorry I've been so hard on you, Claudia. I know you've been upset. But you are one of the most gifted artists I've had the pleasure of working with."

"Really?" Mr. Clarke sure had an odd way of letting people know he was pleased.

"Yes." He nodded. "You are also distracti-ble and undisciplined."

"Oh." I paused. Then I asked, "Is Mallory Pike disciplined and - and - "

"Focused?" Mr. Clarke finished for me. He lowered his voice. "I suppose so. She certainly concentrates. And she tries very hard. But you are talented. However, to be a success, you have to be disciplined, too. Put you and Mallory together and we'd have one great artist. If you continue to work as you work now, your talent will go to waste. But you can de- velop discipline. Talent cannot be developed."

I thought about Mal. She wanted to learn to ill.u.s.trate. She wanted to draw cute bunnies and mice. Maybe she could do that. But if I didn't concentrate and learn to become disciplined, I would not become an artist. Was that why Mac pushed me so hard? Because I had potential?

I checked it out. "You pushed me because I have potential?" I asked.

Mac nodded. "Great potential."

"Thank goodness. I didn't really want to be a cab driver."

"Excuse me?"

"Nothing."

The bus rolled on. We were in midtown Manhattan again.

"How much longer will you be attending my cla.s.ses?" asked Mac.

"Just tomorrow. Then I go back to Connecticut."

"Do you have a good teacher there?"

"Not as good as you."

Mac smiled. "Thank you. Will you promise to study hard?"

"Yes." What else could I say? The one and only McKenzie "Mac" Clarke had just told me I had enormous talent. I felt like throwing my arms around him, but of course I didn't.

A few minutes later, we filed off the bus.

"See you tomorrow!" I called to Mac. "Hey, Mal! Wait for me!"

I had to wait longer than I'd expected. Mal said she needed something from the cla.s.sroom. She returned looking subdued. But as we rode back to Stacey's, I couldn't stop grinning. I knew that lots of hard work lay ahead of me, but so what? I could do anything.

"Claudia?" said Mal tentatively, as we flew along a side street. "I don't think this serious art stuff is really for me. I'm glad I tried it, but I'm going back to my animals and mushrooms and raindrops. My kind of art."

"Mal, I'm sorry," was my reply. (I meant for being so mean.) She must have understood because she said simply, "That's okay."

Kristy.

Chapter 19.

You'd think that with all the Sonny signs we'd put up, and that with the millions of people who must have walked by them everyday, I'd have received more than one call from someone wanting a dog.

That one call came on Monday evening. Laine's father answered the phone. Then he said, "Kristy, this man saw one of your signs. He wants to talk to you about Sonny. He sounds pretty interested."

"Oh!" I said. I wasn't sure whether to feel relieved or sad. I needed to find a good home for Sonny, but in the back of my mind I was hoping it would be at our house in Connecticut.

I took the phone from Mr. c.u.mmings. "h.e.l.lo?" I said.

"h.e.l.lo?" answered a voice. "I'm calling about the collie. I saw a sign ..." The voice trailed off.

"Is he your collie? Did you lose him?"

"No. I'm looking for a pet for my children."

"Well, Sonny is very good-natured," I a.s.sured the man. "He's gentle and he loves to play. And even though he's a stray, he's healthy. I took him to the vet. No mange or anything."

"How old is he?" asked the man.

"Three."

"Three months?"