1997 - The Chocolate Money Mystery Read Online Free PDF

cable car reached the top, and without wasting any time they bundled the dogs inside and then dragged their toboggan crate in behind them.
    The cable car began its journey down just as the professor and his assistant reached the top of the hill above the cable station. The professor shouted out and shook his fist, but the children just laughed. There was nothing he could do to them now. Once they reached the bottom, they would immediately telephone Mr Huffendorf and tell him to come and collect his money. He would telephone the police, and before too long Professor Sardine and his evil assistant would be safely locked up in jail.
    Or so the children thought. They had not reckoned on the fact that they were dealing with one of the most cunning and determined villains in the world, and he still had one or two tricks up his sleeve. In fact, although the children did not realise it, they were just about to find themselves faced with the greatest danger they had ever encountered in their lives.
     
    Halfway down the mountainside, while Max was sitting with his eyes firmly closed so that he could not see the drop, and while Maddy was talking soothingly to the rather frightened St Bernard dogs, the cable car suddenly stopped.
    “Have we arrived at the bottom?” asked Max, not daring to open his eyes. “That seemed quite quick.”
    Maddy looked down. They were nowhere near the bottom, and in fact they were quite a way above the top of a tall pine tree.
    “I’m afraid we haven’t,” she said. “The cable car has just stopped. There’s something wrong.”
    Max gave a groan as he realised what had happened. Professor Sardine must have done something to stop the cable, and now he had them at his mercy. All he would have to do was to get a high ladder and climb up to catch them. There would be nothing they could do.
    Max was right. Up at the cable station, Professor Sardine and his desperate assistant had overpowered and tied up the man in charge of the controls. Then they had pulled the lever which stopped the great engine that wound up the cable. Now all they had to do was to fetch the ladders which the cable-car crew used to fix the cable, drag them down the hill, and climb up to where the children were trapped. It was all perfectly simple, although they hadn’t decided exactly what they would do with the children when they caught them. Still, there would be plenty of time to think of that…
    Maddy saw them coming and grabbed her brother’s arm.
    “Look,” she said. “I know you feel dizzy up here, but look over there.”
    Max looked up at the mountainside above them. There were two figures carrying a very long ladder, struggling down through the snow towards them. Max gave another groan.
    “It’s all over,” he said. “We’re trapped.”
    Maddy shook her head. “No,” she said. “Don’t give up yet. Here, give me your scarf.”
    Max unwound the long scarf which Mr Huffendorf had lent him, while Maddy did the same with hers. Then, knotting them together at one end, Maddy began to dangle the scarf out of the open window of the cable car. When it was hanging out as far as it would go, she tied the end of the newly-made scarf-rope to the handle of the door.
    Next, sticking her head out of the window, Maddy looked down. The scarf was blowing a bit in the wind, but she could see that it just reached the top of the tree below them. That was just what she had hoped for, and she gave a great sigh of relief.
    “We’re going to be all right, Max,” she said calmly. “All you have to do now is climb down the scarf, and grab hold of the top branches of the pine tree. Then let go of the scarf.”
    Max gulped. “And then?” he said.
    “Pine trees are very thin and bendy,” said Maddy calmly. “The tree will bend down like a spring and lower you gently to the ground. That’s how it should work.” She paused. “Should I go first?”
    Max nodded. “Please,” he said. “I promise I’ll come after you. I