Holly’s thumbs hovered over the thrusters. “Yes,” she said. “Let’s.”
The Atlantean shuttle disappeared into the supply tunnel faster than a carrot down Foaly’s gullet. And for those who don’t know, that’s pretty fast.
The Crowley Hotel, Beverly Hills, Los Angeles
Mulch made it back to his hotel undetected. Of course, this time he didn’t have to scale the walls. It would have been more of a challenge than Maggie V’s building. The walls here were brick, very porous. His fingers would have leeched the moisture from the stone and lost their suction.
No, this time Mulch used the main foyer. And why wouldn’t he? As far as the doorman was concerned, he was Lance Digger, reclusive millionaire. Short, maybe. But short and rich.
“Evening, Art,” said Mulch, saluting the doorman on his way to the elevator.
Art peered over the marble-topped desk.
“Ah, Mister Digger, it’s you,” he said slightly puzzled. “I thought I heard you passing below my sight line only moments ago.”
“Nope,” grinned Mulch. “First time tonight.”
“Hmm. The night wind, perhaps.”
“Maybe. You’d think they’d block up the holes in this building. All the rent I’m paying.”
“You would, indeed,” agreed Art. Always agree with the tenants: company policy.
Inside the mirrored elevator, Mulch used a telescopic pointer to push P for the penthouse. For the first few months he had jumped to reach the button, but that was undignified behavior for a millionaire. And besides, he was certain that Art could hear the thumping from the security desk.
The mirrored box rose silently, flickering past the floors toward the penthouse. Mulch resisted the urge to take the Academy Award out of his bag. Someone could board the elevator. He contented himself with a long drink from a bottle of Irish springwater, the closest to fairy pure it was possible to get. As soon as he had stowed the Oscar he would run a cold bath, and give his pores a drink. Otherwise he could wake up in the morning glued to the bed.
Mulch’s door was key coded. A fourteen-number sequence. Nothing like a bit of paranoia to keep you out of prison. Even though the LEP believed that he was dead, Mulch could never quite shake the feeling that one day Julius Root would figure it all out and come looking for him.
The apartment decor was quite unusual for a human dwelling. A lot of clay, crumbling rock, and water features. More like the inside of a cave than an exclusive Beverly Hills residence.
The northern wall appeared to be a single slab of black marble. Appeared to be. Closer inspection revealed a forty-inch flat-screen television, a DVD slot, and a tinted glass pane. Mulch hefted a remote control bigger than his leg, popping the hidden cabinet with another complicated key code. Inside were three rows of Oscars. Mulch placed Maggie V’s on a waiting velvet pad.
He wiped an imaginary tear from the corner of his eye.
“I’d like to thank the Academy,” giggled the dwarf.
“Very touching,” said a voice behind him.
Mulch slammed the cabinet door shut, cracking the glass pane.
There was a human youth beside the rockery. In his apartment! The boy’s appearance was strange even by Mud Man standards. He was abnormally pale, raven-haired, slender, and dressed in a school suit that looked as though it had been dragged across two continents. The hairs on Mulch’s chin stiffened. This boy was trouble. Dwarf hair is never wrong.
“Your alarm was amusing,” continued the boy. “It took me several seconds to bypass it.”
Mulch knew he was in trouble then. Human police don’t break into people’s apartments.
“Who are you, hu—boy?”
“I think the question here is, who are you? Are you reclusive millionaire Lance Digger? Are you the notorious Grouch? Or perhaps, as Foaly suspects, you are escaped convict Mulch Diggums?”
Mulch ran, the last vestiges of gas providing him with an extra burst of speed. He had no idea who this Mud Boy was, but if Foaly had sent him, then he was a bounty hunter of one kind or another.
The dwarf raced across the sunken lounge, making for his escape route. It was the reason he’d chosen this building. In the early nineteen-hundreds, a wide-bore chimney had run the length of the multistory building. When a central heating system had been installed in the fifties, the building contractor had simply packed the chute with dirt, topping it off with a seal of concrete. Mulch had smelled the vein of soil the second his real estate agent had opened the front door. It had been a simple matter to uncover the old fireplace and chip away the concrete. Voilà. Instant tunnel.
Mulch unbuttoned his back flap on the run. The strange youth made no attempt to follow him. Why would he? There was nowhere to go.
The dwarf spared a second for a parting shot.
“You’ll never take me alive, human. Tell Foaly not to send a Mud Man to do a fairy’s job.”
Oh dear, thought Artemis, rubbing his brow. Hollywood had a lot to answer for.
Mulch tore a basket of dried flowers from the fireplace and dived right in. He unhinged his jaw and was quickly submerged in the century-old clay. It was not really to his taste. The minerals and nutrients had long since dried up. Instead the soil was infused with a hundred years of burnt refuse and tobacco ash. But it was clay nevertheless, and this was what dwarfs were born to do. Mulch felt his anxiety melt away. There wasn’t a creature alive that could catch him now. This was his domain.
The dwarf descended rapidly, chewing his way down floor by floor. More than one wall collapsed on his way past. Mulch had a feeling that he wouldn’t be getting his deposit back, even if he had been around to collect it.
In a little over a minute, Mulch had reached the basement parking garage. He rehinged, gave his rear end a shake to dislodge any bubbles of gas, then tumbled through the grate. His specially adapted four-wheel drive was waiting for him. Fueled up, blacked out, and ready to go.
“Suckers,” gloated the dwarf, fishing the keys from a chain around his neck.
Then Captain Holly Short materialized not two feet away.
“Suckers?” she said, powering up her buzz baton.
Mulch considered his options. The basement floor was asphalt. Asphalt was death to dwarfs, sealed up their insides like glue. There appeared to be a man mountain blocking the basement ramp. Mulch had seen that one before in Fowl Manor. That meant the human upstairs must be the infamous Artemis Fowl. Captain Short was dead ahead, looking none too merciful. Only one way to go. Back into the flue. Up a couple of stories, and hide out in another apartment.
Holly grinned. “Go on, Mulch. I dare you.”
And Mulch did. He turned, launching himself back into the chimney, expecting a sharp shock in the rear end. He was not disappointed. How could Holly miss a target like that?
Chute E116, Below Los Angeles
The Los Angeles shuttleport was ten miles south of the city, hidden beneath the holographic projection of a sand dune. Root was waiting for them in the shuttle. He had recovered just enough to crack a grin.
“Well, well,” he grunted, hauling himself off the gurney, a fresh medi-pac strapped across his ribs. “If it isn’t my favorite reprobate, back from the dead.”
Mulch helped himself to a jar of squid paté from the Atlantean Ambassador’s personal cooler.
“Why is it, Julius, that you never pay me a social visit? After all, I did save your career back in Ireland. If it hadn’t been for me, you never would have known about Fowl’s copy of the Book.”
When Root was fuming, as he was now, you could have toasted marshmallows on his cheeks.
“We had a deal, convict. You broke it. And now I’m bringing you in.”
Mulch scooped dollops of paté from the jar with his stubby fingers.
“Could use a little beetle juice,” he commented.
“Enjoy it while you can, Diggums. Because your next meal is going to be pushed through a slot in a door.”
The dwarf settled back in a padded chair. “Comfor
table.”
“I thought so,” agreed Artemis. “Some form of liquid suspension. Expensive, I imagine.”
“Sure beats prison shuttles,” agreed Mulch. “I remember this one time they caught me selling a van Gogh to a Texan. I was transported in a shuttle the size of a mouse hole. They had a troll in the next cubicle. Stank something awful.”
Holly grinned. “That’s what the troll said.”
Root knew he was being goaded, but he blew his top anyway.
“Listen to me, convict. I have not traveled all this way to listen to your war stories. So shut your trap before I shut it for you.”
Mulch was unimpressed by the outburst.
“Just out of interest, Julius, why have you traveled all this way? The great Commander Root, commandeering an ambassador’s shuttle, just to apprehend little old me? I don’t think so. So, what’s going on? And what’s with the Mud Men?” He nodded at Butler. “Especially that one.”
The manservant grinned. “Remember me, little man? Seems to me I owe you something.”
Mulch swallowed. He had crossed swords with Butler before. It hadn’t ended well for the human. Mulch had vented a bowelful of dwarf gas directly at the manservant.
Very embarrassing for a bodyguard of his status, not to mention painful.
For the first time Root smiled, even though it stretched his ribs. “Okay, Mulch. You’re right. Something is going on. Something important.”
“I thought so. And as usual, you need me to do your dirty work.”
Mulch rubbed his rump. “Well, assaulting me isn’t going to help. You didn’t have to buzz me so hard, Captain. That’s going to leave a mark.”
Holly cupped a hand around one pointed ear. “Hey, Mulch, if you listen really hard you can just about make out the sound of nobody giving a hoot. From what I saw, you were living pretty well on LEP gold.”
“That apartment cost me a fortune, you know. The deposit alone was four years of your salary. Did you see the view? Used to belong to some movie director.”
Holly raised an eyebrow. “Glad to see the money was put to good use. Heaven forbid you should squander it.”