Ричард Мак Эндрю (Richard MacAndrew)CHAPTER ONE
The empty house
'Come on, Mary said Andy. 'Look at the time. We've got to get back to the hotel. Mum said eight o'clock at the latest. It's almost that now.'
'Just a minute,' said Mary. 'I want to see what's in here. Quick!' She took her brother by the hand and pulled him through the half-open front door of a house.
'Hey...' began Andy. 'Mary, what are you doing? We can't go in here. This is someone's house
Sometimes he couldn't believe the things his sister did. She was always getting them into trouble - and he usually had to get them out.
Andrew, always called Andy, and Mary Lawson were spending the evening walking round the streets of Amsterdam near their hotel. They were on the Lijnbaansgracht when Mary saw the half-open door and pulled her brother inside.
They looked round the room in the half light of the even-ing.
'Well, no one's living here,' said Mary. 'But look - there are builders working here. Maybe they just forgot to shut the door.' There was no furniture in the room, just a lot of builders' things. 'Let's have a look round,' she said. 'It'll be interesting to see inside a Dutch house'
'Mary!' said Andy. 'What if someone comes?'
'No one's going to come,' said Mary.
'But Mum's going to be really angry if we're not back,' said Andy. 'She'll just say that we can't go out anymore without her. Then we'll have to stay in the hotel all the time and that'll be really boring.'
'OK, OK,' said Mary. 'You're right, as usual.'
Andy turned and started to go out of the door, but sud-denly he stopped and pushed Mary back into the room.
'Someone's outside,' he said very quietly.
Together they looked through the half-open door, careful that no one could see them. It wasn't their house: they didn't want anyone to ask them what they were doing there.
Amsterdam is an unusual city. It has streets, houses, shops, restaurants and cinemas, like other cities; but, because it is very flat, it has lots and lots of bicycles and not so many cars; and it also has a lot of canals and a lot of boats on the canals.