The Venetian Job by Sally Gould

Author:Sally Gould
Language: eng
Format: epub
Tags: childrens series aged 9 to 12, series for kids aged 9 to 12, action and adventure for kids aged 9 to 12, adventure and humor for 9 to 12, mystery and detective for kids aged 9 to 12, short stories for kids aged 9 to 12
Publisher: Sally Gould

3. THE PERFECT CRIME

Caterina put on a special dinner for us. There were no other hotel guests at dinner, just relatives. It was weird suddenly meeting about ten more relatives. Some of them didn't speak English, so Charlie and me sat next to Santo. He interpreted for us when the oldies got excited and broke into streams of Italian. Everyone talked and ate and drank at the same time. The long table overflowed with loads of different dishes; I wished we'd eat like this at home.

Santo was glad we played real football. I didn't tell him I barracked for Manchester United; he might want me to barrack for an Italian team. He was very polite for someone who'd played such a devious trick. I was warming to him, even though he'd made me worry about catching a contagious disease.

Charlie and me had to answer lots and lots of questions. Even before we'd finished the main meal, I'd repeated sixty times how old I was, my favorite sport and my favorite place in Italy. I reckoned you didn't really know someone just because you knew a bunch of facts about them. Important stuff was that you didn't hog the ball in a game, because you wanted to win the game more than you wanted to score a goal. Or whether you could crack a joke in some boring class with some boring teacher and make the class and the teacher laugh. Or whether, at school, you took the punishment alone when only you got caught pulling out the leads for the DVD player, because no one wanted to watch a dumb documentary about rare frogs.

Everyone sitting at the table told us what we must see in Venice. I kept my mouth shut. They wouldn't want to hear that I wasn't interested in checking out art, churches, towers or islands, because I liked doing, not looking. Mom and Dad were going to some boring modern art museum first, because a wonderful exhibition was about to finish.

We were lucky to be able to help Santo with his job, because we might find bad guys, crime and action.

***

The next morning, after breakfast, Charlie and me met Santo in the hotel foyer. He wore a police uniform; it wasn't as good as the Carabinieri uniform, but I didn't mind because he'd arranged for us to go on his police boat.

Caterina came out of her office to say goodbye. "Santo will show you the real Venice. When you're out and about, look past the historical buildings and the tourists. Look for the ordinary and you'll see Venice is a city of people without the cars."

Frowning, I whispered, "I don't want ordinary. I want action!"

She patted me on the head as if I were four years old. After we said goodbye to Caterina and she was too far away to hear, I asked Santo, "What sort of criminals do you catch?"

"We have very little crime." He stood taller and smiled down at me. "Venice is a pleasant place with pleasant people.

Download

Copyright Disclaimer:
This site does not store any files on its server. We only index and link to content provided by other sites. Please contact the content providers to delete copyright contents if any and email us, we'll remove relevant links or contents immediately.