“This is a map to where I live,” said the leprechaun, struggling furiously to escape, as he drew spidery lines on a crumpled piece of paper using a stick and some strange liquid he had taken out of his coat pocket.

“And you’re expecting me to let you go in exchange for this?” Daniel held on tightly to the little man’s legs. “You must think I was born yesterday.”

“Well that’s all yer getting so ye can make the most of it,” huffed the leprechaun, going suddenly limp, then trying to bolt for freedom, but finding his legs still clamped in an iron grip by Daniel.

“So what will you give us if we do find our way to your house?” asked Patrick, “a wish or a bag of gold?”

The leprechaun waggled his head; it was impossible to tell if he was agreeing or disagreeing.

“You’re supposed to give us the gold now,” growled Daniel, “we caught you fair and square.”

He shook the leprechaun in the air just to prove it, provoking squeals of terror from the captive; whether real or imagined the boys could not tell.

“Well I can’t give it to ye if I don’t have it, now can I?” wheedled the little man. “Be reasonable. What sort of creature goes out to breakfast lugging a great big sack of gold around? Gold’s heavy, you know; can’t be just taking it all over the place for walks. Anybody might get a-hold of it.”

“Yes, but we’ve got a-hold of you instead, and you’re going to tell us where the gold is,” said Daniel, bringing the leprechaun’s face right up to his own so that they could see the whites of each other’s eyes.

“Like I said, there’s the map. Ye’ll be alright if ye follow the road I marked.”

The little man threw the map to the ground and crossed his arms around his chest. Patrick and Daniel reached out for the map at the same time, causing Daniel to loosen his grip on the spindly leg. It was enough. The captive wriggled free, and was gone in an instant.

“Hey! Come back!” shouted Daniel, but all he heard in reply was the wind swishing through the grass. “I should never have looked away,” he muttered and turned angrily to the map.

“What’s this? I can’t see anything!”

The liquid was evaporating, removing all trace of the drawing. The map was swiftly becoming just another crumpled piece of paper.

Patrick reached down, scooped up a handful of sand and threw it onto the paper. The grains of sand stuck to the liquid, and remained in place even after the inky substance had completely faded away.

“Hey, that’s cool – where did you learn that?” asked Daniel, staring at the still incomprehensible drawing, which now looked like a worn piece of sandpaper.

“We’re dealing with the little folk here,” said Patrick, “no telling what they’ll get up to so as to trick you out of their gold.”

“So let’s get going.”

The two boys looked at the map. A series of lines, criss-crossing each other, filled the paper, with no other markings, and no start or end point.

“That little rascal has tricked us!” said Daniel.

“Wait,” said Patrick, “we know leprechauns live in hollow trees, and we know that they are shoe-makers. Maybe that will give us some clues.”

“This map doesn’t look like a tree or a shoe,” said Daniel, gazing around the field, “and we’ll never find him again in this long grass. I shouldn’t have taken my eyes off him when I had him. Leprechauns vanish if you stop looking at them.”

Patrick didn’t say anything. He turned the paper over and over, then folded it and unfolded it, and then rolled it up, all the time looking around the field.

“Just my luck,” muttered Daniel to himself. “Nobody will ever believe I really caught a leprechaun and I don’t even get a wish.”

“Hey,” said Patrick, “I think I’ve solved it!” He had rolled the paper into a tube and now held it out in front of Daniel. “Look, the little fellow did give us a map. I think these markings are the bark on his tree.”

Daniel looked closer. With the paper rolled up, the trails of sand really did look like cracks in bark, with bumps for the knots and branches.

“Great,” he said, shrugging, “and how do you propose we find the right tree? There must be over forty around here!”

“Easy,” said Patrick, digging around in his pockets, “leprechauns love shiny objects, so we just lay a few around, like this watch with an alarm, which I will now set. When the leprechaun takes the watch we just listen for the alarm and then we’ll know which tree is his. While we’re waiting we can check out the bark patterns on the trees.”

Daniel shook his head, but as he did not have a better idea he went along with his friend’s plan. Patrick set the alarm for one hour, then left the watch on a stone, together with a couple of bottle tops and a shiny coin. The two boys retreated to the edge of the field and began to study the bark on the trees. It was boring work. The bark all looked the same to Daniel, and as the morning wore on the map looked less and less like bark, and more and more like a messy piece of paper, but as Patrick was diligently working his way through the line of trees he felt he ought to do the same. Every ten minutes one of them would go and check the rock for the bait.

On his third trip Daniel found the rock bare.

“It’s gone!” he shouted to Patrick.

“Shh, we don’t want to give the game away,” said Patrick.

Daniel thought the leprechaun was probably watching their every move but he was too excited to care.

“How long before the alarm goes off?”

“Um, I’m not sure,” said Patrick slowly, “that was my only watch.”

The two boys looked at each other then burst out laughing.

“Come on,” said Patrick, “let’s stand in the middle of the trees so we’ll be sure to hear it.”

The boys moved farther into the trees and Patrick continued examining the bark patterns while Daniel looked anxiously around. It seemed an age before they heard a faint ringing sound from somewhere to their right. Both boys dashed through the trees until they stood under the one the noise was coming from. There was no hollow at the base, but the noise seemed to be coming from high up the tree.

“I didn’t know leprechauns could climb trees,” said Daniel.

“Me neither,” said Patrick, “but I’m about to find out.”

Gripping the trunk firmly, Patrick climbed up the tree and was soon high up, hidden among the leaves.

“Wow! There’s a real hoard up here!”

Daniel hopped around on the ground, wanting to climb the tree too when suddenly he heard a squawk, and a loud beating of wings. A large bird swooped down into the tree at just about the same height as Patrick. Daniel heard sounds of a scuffle and a moment later Patrick crashed down through the foliage, one hand grabbing at branches as he fell, the other clutching his watch.

“What happened?” asked Daniel, glad that he had not climbed up after Patrick.

“It was a magpie,” said Patrick, “not the leprechaun, and he nearly had me.”

The boys sat in the grass, feeling despondent. Daniel imagined how close he had been to getting the gold, if only he had not looked away. He poked idly at the map with a stick, then he rolled over onto his stomach. The map lay on the grass in front of him, and he could see the line of trees beyond it.

Suddenly he sat up.

“Patrick, look!” Daniel jabbed his finger at the map. “Lie down here, with your head level with the top of the long grass. Now look at the map and the line of trees – what do you see?”

“You’re right! These lines aren’t bark markings but the trees in their right position, and the one at the end must be-”

“The leprechaun’s!”

The boys set off at a run, bent over double to keep their heads level with the top of the grass, so as to check their progress against the map. They slowed when they approached the last tree and Daniel was sure he could hear the soft tap-tapping of a hammer. He lunged forward towards the sound and a flurry of green showed they had been right.

“You weren’t expecting us, were you?” asked Daniel, reaching to grab the leprechaun’s leg, but this time the little man was too quick and he darted out of the way, behind the tree. Daniel made sure not to take his eyes off him.

“Sure I did, jest haven’t had time to put the kettle on for the old cup of tay yet.”

The leprechaun lifted a big heavy kettle from a hollow in the tree trunk, waved it around until steam came out the spout, and set it back on the ground, where it sat, bubbling happily without any obvious source of heat.

“Been too busy counting the gold have you?” asked Daniel. “Where is it then?”

“What about the wish?” asked the leprechaun, “have you forgotten about that?”

Daniel and Patrick looked at each other. They had not forgotten.

“I think we’ll take the gold,” said Daniel.

“Ah, sure they all say that,” said the leprechaun, “they all think the gold will buy them everything they want, but they don’t know what trouble it is to spend leprechaun gold. No sir. Can’t just walk into a shop and buy fries and a drink with a solid gold piece – ye’d be arrested for counterfeiting. No, ye have to go and change it all at a bank, good and proper, and then they’d want to know where you got it from, in case you were laundering it, and they’d charge you commission.”

The leprechaun shrugged and turned away, “then the old historians and archaeologists and anthropologists and journalists would all want to see it – ye’d be lucky to keep a tenth of it. Ye’d be better off making a wish – then you could ask for paper money, like you’re used to. But if gold is what you want…”

The little leprechaun was hopping from foot to foot, just out of reach, but he did not run away while Daniel continued to glare at him. The boys had a hurried conference.

“What do you think?” asked Daniel, “I think he’s cheating us.”

“Maybe,” said Patrick, “but he has a point about the problems we’ll have with the gold.” He turned to the leprechaun. “If we ask for a wish can we make one each?”

The leprechaun put his hand on his hips and glowered. “Is it torturing me ye are?”

“A wish each or the gold,” said Daniel.

“Very well,” sighed the little man, “make your two wishes and then close your eyes and count to ten.”

“And have you disappear again? No way!” said Daniel.

“Fine, make the wishes, then shake hands on it.”

Daniel though for a moment. “I want a thousand, no a million dollars,” he said, “in notes of ten,” he added, to make quite sure.

“And I’ll have my own car,” said Patrick, “a red, sports one.”

The leprechaun screwed up his face for a moment and appeared to be concentrating hard. “Now shake each other’s hands,” he said.

Daniel and Patrick turned towards each other with hands outstretched, and as they did, their eyes moved off the leprechaun for an instant.

The little man vanished.

“Hey!” shouted Daniel, “what about our wishes? We’re entitled to them – fair is fair!”

The grass around the tree tinkled with laughter.

“Nothing is fair!” came the leprechaun’s voice from somewhere in the air. “I said you could make a wish and you did – so what are you complaining about? I never said I’d grant it for you! Hee, hee!”

And the grassy glade exploded with peals of laughter.

It was time to change schools again. I would probably be expelled for starting the fire in the chemistry lab, but it was such a spectacular explosion that it was worth it. The magnesium strips burst into an incandescent whiteness that seared my eyeballs, even with the safety glasses I had put on, while the copper filings sputtered into blue and green showers and made me wish I had thought to put them in a tube to make a firework. The glass bottles containing some of the solutions began to explode just as the overhead sprinklers came on and showered the whole room with water and by then a small crowd had assembled outside the lab, wondering who the culprit was.

“Kyle?”

Mr. Denby, the head of science, did not even ask what had happened; he searched the crowd for my face, then pointed towards his office. I grinned at my friends and walked into the small room, and out of another chapter of my life.

I have loved flames ever since we sat around a campfire back when I was three years old and my father showed me how chestnuts would pop if left in the heat long enough, while my mother transformed small cubes of yellow corn into white fluffy treats, accompanied by a staccato of shots. I sat up all evening, watching the orange flames dance on the chopped wood and change it from a yellow brown colour to glowing red and finally to dark black with a wispy beard of white ash.

As we grew older my father would build enormous bonfires out in the open field and my brother and I would compete to see who could create the most sparks and the loudest noise. We burned some weird things in our time, such as a mannequin from a store, whose arm waved a crazy goodbye as it melted; old aerosol cans, which made a huge bang and half a sofa which sent up clouds of black smoke so thick that it could be seen from three blocks away. We coughed for days after that fire, and that was the first time the police visited our house.

“No matches at school,” my mother warned, when she dropped me off at my first elementary school. “And no lighters, incendiary devices or candles, either,” she added after the first week.

It did not take long for me to work out how to make a flame with a magnifying glass and the sun, and I can still remember Lucy Shen running away howling to the teacher after I burned her picture of a tree. My magnifying glass was confiscated, but I soon found that spectacles, broken bottles and even cleverly arranged plastic could work just as well.

When I was eight I burned my first real structure: an old playhouse in the park. One of the doors had fallen off its hinges and not many kids played in it any more since the city had put up the shiny metal monkey bars, so I thought nobody would mind if I got rid of it. Starting the fire took a long time, because the roof was still wet through from all the rain, but once it caught and the flames licked up the sides, reaching higher and higher with their flickering points all stretching up to the stars, I thought it was the most beautiful thing I had ever seen.

Then the firemen came and poured water all over it and my lovely flames shrank and dwindled to nothing, leaving a single black wall standing amid a pile of singed planks.

After that I was sent to the counsellor.

“What do you see when you look at a flame, Kyle?” Mrs. Jakes asked, while she scribbled in her folder.

“Uh, flames, I guess,” I said, wondering if her glass flower vase would bend light enough to make a fire.

“Yes, but what do you feel?”

“I dunno, like I’ve had a cup of coffee, I guess.”

And so it continued, year after year. How could I explain to her the surging of energy that rushed through me when I saw the flames leap into life from a small spark? The way the flames danced, as if to a hidden rhythm, never following the same pattern? That the roar of the fire and the crackle of the burning wood spoke to me like a symphony?

My teachers did not understand this either. At first they treated me as if I were slow and fragile, then, after the first burning incident, they were more cautious, and eventually they all became afraid of me. That was usually when I was asked to leave the school, but I did not care; school was boring. But finally I got to high school and discovered the chemistry lab and a whole new world opened up before me.

It had been a good display, I decided, as I waited in Mr. Denby’s office. Maybe I should have put some of the paper closer to the centre of the fire, or perhaps opened up some of the Buntzen burners. Oh, well, there was always next time.

Some might say it is a weakness, and Sadie calls it her hobby, but to Howard the collection of garden gnomes that surrounds him is an obsession. There are gnomes along the path, on the front steps, in the flower beds, on the window ledges, in the pond; there is even a gnome umbrella stand in the hall. At first Howard thought it was amusing when Sadie bought a new gnome but when she had over a dozen and showed no signs of stopping he no longer saw the funny side.

“But I like the gnomes, Howard, they add character to the place.”

Howard was not so sure about that, but it was easier to tolerate the gnomes than to cross swords with his wife, so he came to an arrangement: Sadie could have as many gnomes as she wanted, provided none were placed in his vegetable patch, and none obstructed him when he wanted to cut the grass.

So when Howard finds a brightly painted gnome sitting under a rhubarb bush he is not very happy.

“Sadie, damn it, how many times do I have to tell you to keep those creatures out of the vegetables?” he says, heaving the gnome onto the grass at his wife’s feet.

“How did he get there?” she asks, taking the dead heads off the roses, “he should be on that stone over by the pond. It must be those kids again, coming in and moving my little people in the night.”

“Well, if we didn’t have so many of them, perhaps the youth would find something else to do,” puffs Howard, picking up the smiling gnome and shuffling over to the pond. Sadie follows Howard, stopping to pull up a weed between two flowering heathers before repositioning a small gnome holding a hunting rifle.

When he reaches the stone overhanging the pond, Howard sees an identical gnome, although it appears somewhat weather worn, and he lowers the new gnome onto the rock next to the old one.

“Surely we don’t need two the same,” he mutters, “can’t we call a halt to it if you have the whole collection?”

“Oh, my goodness! There’s two of him!” Sadie says, “I wonder how that happened?”

Howard has a good idea how that could have happened. Somebody probably received a gnome for a present and wanted to get rid of it without causing offence; it is not the first time they have found other people’s gnomes added to their collection.

“Well, we don’t want two, do we, so I’ll just take this one away,” says Howard, bending down to pick up the new arrival, his face turning pink from the strain. “They must be making them out of concrete now, instead of plaster; this weighs a ton.”

Howard carries the gnome around to the side of the house, intending to dump it, but with both hands full he cannot get the lid off the garbage bin so he takes it into the garage instead and puts it on his worktable.

Howard has his own weakness: he enjoys the occasional cigar, a habit he began in his teens and which he has not been able to shake. Sadie won’t allow him to smoke in the house so he usually paces up and down the porch, inhaling the warm smoke and enjoying the brief feeling of calm. When it is raining he retreats into the garage and cleans his tools, which is almost as relaxing as the smoking.

Howard lights a cigar now and looks at the gnome. The red paint on the pointed hat looks brand new, and the black boots are just as shiny, as if the little man himself had polished them. Howard puts the end of his lighted cigar against the toe of one boot and watches the paint blister and peel off, then he shakes his head and stops himself. Although he hates the gnomes, if somehow feels like torture, and Sadie would be upset if she saw him. As he puts out his cigar, saving the rest for another day he notices that the gnome’s toe is visible under the paint and it is not white, but a shiny yellow colour.

Howard takes a match from the shelf and uses it to carefully scrape away some more of the paint, revealing a distinct golden boot. His heart thumping wildly, Howard scrapes the paint from the gnome’s white beard, and discovers gold underneath there too. He picks at several other places on the gnome and each time discovers gold under the paint, then he stands back and looks at the little creature. ‘Worth its weight in gold’ suddenly has a new meaning.

Howard imagines all the possibilities: he and Sadie could go on holiday or build that second bathroom or maybe get a newer car or-

Just as suddenly, it dawns on Howard that somebody put the gnome in his garden and therefore it is likely that somebody will want it back. What if the gnome is not under the rhubarb when the owner comes back? Would they break into the house, tie him and Sadie up and demand their gnome back? Could Howard claim it was now his gnome as it was on his land?

Howard does not know how criminals operate, but he has seen enough TV to be worried, so he pulls down his box of paints and carefully touches up the paint on the gnome, covering all signs of the gold, then he carries the gnome back out to the vegetable patch.

“What are you doing?” Sadie asks, looking up from her weeding, “I thought you didn’t want any gnomes in your part of the garden?”

“I kind of like this one,” Howard says, and places it under the rhubarb again, making sure that it is visible, but not too obvious. He does not want to give the impression that he knows what it is.

Howard walks back to the house, goes to the computer and types ‘gold’ into the Google search. Pages and pages of gold prices and gold merchants come up and he spends some time navigating around the sites, reading up about gold and discovering that the worth is all determined by weight, so he goes upstairs and fetches the bathroom scales.

At the door he pauses. Should he take the scales out to the gnome, or bring the thing into the house? Either way, Sadie will think he is mad, but perhaps he can hide the scales better than the gnome.

Howard goes into the garage and puts the scales into a garden bag, along with a trowel and a pair of gloves. He walks back to the rhubarb, kneels down and carefully places the gnome on the scales, making sure to keep it level.

“What are you doing with the scales?”

Howard jumps, as if shot, and the gnome falls back into the earth.

“Gee, Sadie, don’t creep up on me like that,” he says, pushing the basket between the gnome and the scales. “I’m trying to work out how dense this soil is, and whether it is right for the rhubarb.” He knows this sounds ridiculous but Sadie just shakes her head and moves back to her weeding, so Howard quickly weighs the gnome then goes back inside to the computer.

After a bit more research Howard discovers that he needs to know if the gnome is solid gold, or just gold plate on something else. It feels heavy enough, but perhaps the gold is covering another metal. He looks out of the window and sees that Sadie is talking to the neighbour over the fence.

Howard finds a large bucket and takes it over to the rhubarb; it is too small for the gnome to fit inside entirely, so he goes into the garage and empties out one of his storage bins and brings that over to the rhubarb. When lying on its side the gnome fits inside this bin, so Howard drags the garden hose over and fills the storage bin with water, up to the brim.

“Whatever are you doing now, Howard? Are you washing that gnome?”

Howard nearly drops the hose in surprise, but he points it at the rhubarb and sprays the plant all over.

“I’m just watering the rhubarb, and that damn thing fell into my box of stuff.”

“You don’t have to keep the gnome there, you know; if you like it we can move it somewhere else.”

“No, I like it; I mean it’s fine here,” says Howard, turning off the hose and moving around to the other side of the rhubarb bed, while he keeps a close eye on the gnome in case the water has washed off the paint.

Once Sadie moves away Howard tops up the water in the tub, then takes the gnome out of the container and sets it back in the earth. Howard marks the water level on the side of the bin with a piece of tape, then he scoops out the water, one cup at a time and dribbles it onto the rhubarb.

“I say, Howard, that’s an odd way to water plants – new technique is it?”

Howard looks up to see Mrs. Fitch from next door staring at him. Sadie is nowhere in sight, probably she has had enough of chatting.

“Er, yes, I’m making sure they each get the same quantity of water. It’s part of an experiment, and now I need to go and record my data in the garden manual.”

Howard gathers up the bin and the hose, nods to Mrs. Fitch and hurries back inside, wondering if she will tell Sadie about Howard’s garden manual. This whole thing is becoming too much; perhaps he should have thrown the gnome out after all. He puts the bin back in the garage and relights his cigar, inhaling deeply until clouds of smoke swirl around his head and he feels himself relaxing.

All afternoon Howard walks back and forth, inspecting the gnome, moving it into and out of view, measuring it, feeling it, and in between, dashing back to the computer to read up about gold. After a while he becomes fairly certain that the gnome is solid gold, and a feeling of worry starts to grow inside him.

“Whatever has got into you, Howard?” Sadie asks as they sit down to dinner. “I’ve never seen you so interested in your vegetables. Are you entering a competition or something?”

“Yeah,” mumbles Howard, “it’s a new project.”

“You don’t have to keep the gnome there just for me; I know you don’t like them, and it is your patch of garden.”

“No, no, really, it’s fine. He’s going to be my scarecrow.”

Sadie looks at Howard as if he has become unhinged and Howard quickly changes the subject, asking about her sister’s health, a topic that is guaranteed to last the rest of the meal.

After supper, Howard takes a stroll around the garden, enjoying his final smoke, and making sure that the gnome is still in place, although he is not sure what he would do it if were gone. He checks on it again from the window before going to bed and wonders whether he should tell anybody about the golden gnome. Perhaps he should report it to the police, but then, there is no proof it is stolen property.

In the morning, after collecting the newspaper from the front porch, Howard checks that the gnome is still lodged under the rhubarb then opens the paper to the Classifieds section. He has no idea what he expects to find, but in movies secret messages are always sent this way so he reads through several pages of ‘help wanted’, ‘for sale’ and ‘companion sought’ notices before he gives up and sits, staring into space, munching on his cold toast.

“Howard!”

Howard jumps, knocking over his teacup.

“What is it, dear?” he asks, noticing that Sadie is frowning at him.

“I said, are you quite well? You’re behaving very strangely today. Perhaps you had too much sun yesterday, with all the work you did on your rhubarb?”

Sadie sniffs, as if she does not think the rhubarb merited such attention and Howard opens out the paper to the financial section and gives it a loud thwack to straighten it, and to indicate that he is busy contemplating important matters. He looks at the paper and really tries to concentrate but it is no good; all he can think of is that gnome and how it came to be in his garden. Finally, he decides to go and speak to the local police: they will know what he should do.

“I’m going out,” Howard says, putting on his hat and striding down the front path.

All the way to the police station he rehearses what he is going to say. ‘I have a golden gnome,’ sounds like a line from a movie; ‘somebody left some gold in my vegetables,’ sounds rude, and ‘my garden gnome is valuable,’ sounds ridiculous, so by the time he reaches the station he has no idea what he will say.

Howard need not have worried as the constable on duty is out and the receptionist gives him a form to fill out to record his complaint.

“In triplicate,” she says, paying no more attention to Howard.

Howard considers the form. He has not been burgled, assaulted, murdered, hit from behind or had his human rights violated so he ticks the box marked ‘other’ and writes, ‘I have a garden gnome which may belong to somebody else,’ signs his name and gives the form back to the receptionist who nods and adds it to a pile of papers in front of her.

As he walks home Howard worries that he should not have left Sadie alone with the gnome. What if the real owners show up and she does not know what they want? What if somebody else knows about the gold and steals it? He wishes he could smoke but he does not have his cigars with him. Instead he quickens his pace until he is almost running and nearly knocks into Mrs. Fitch coming out of her driveway.

“I’m back!” he calls into the house, “is everything alright?”

Without waiting for a reply Howard runs into the garden and over to the rhubarb patch where a depression in the soil marks the spot where the gnome had been. He looks all around the rhubarb but cannot see the gnome; there are not even any footprints in the soil.

“Sadie! Where are you?” Howard bellows and runs into the house, but he cannot find her anywhere, not even in the bathroom where she usually spends her mornings.

Howard can see the conspiracy now. The gnome was planted as bait and now Sadie has been kidnapped. He grabs the phone and dials the emergency number.

“Hello, Police? I was just down there with you reporting a gnome but now it’s gone and so’s my wife. Yes, I did fill out the form, in triplicate. I think they took her because the gnome is solid gold, but she doesn’t know that.”

As Howard speaks he looks wildly around, trying to see if anything else is gone, but he is too flustered to think. What if they demand a ransom for Sadie? What will he do?

Howard puts the phone down, hoping the police will come soon, and goes into the garage to find his cigar. He really needs a smoke after that shock; not only losing the gnome, but Sadie too. He puts the cigar in his mouth but does not light it, thinking instead of the little gnome’s shiny boot and the way the paint peeled off it.

Howard does not know how long he has been in the garage when he hears Sadie calling for him.

“Howard? Come in here and take your medicines. I returned that gnome to the Martins; their lad admitted to leaving it here for a prank. And the police said you were down there bothering them again. Don’t you know I always pop out in the mornings?”

Howard sighs. He remembers all the plans he had for spending the gold. Now he’ll have to come up with a new plan to escape from Sadie and the gnomes.

Everyone was staring at me as my wife handed me the painting she had pulled off the wall then removed the carved wooden cylinder that was taped to the back of the canvas and hid it in her pocket, while the guard waved his arms and babbled into his radio.

“Quick, we must get out of here before they stop us!” she said, heading towards the exit, and she elbowed her way past gaping tourists and the gesticulating guard, intent on reaching the street and the next stage of the search.

I spared a glance at the museum staff, who were already re-hanging the painting, and the guard, still talking into his radio, wondering how many times a week they had to endure these crazy re-enactions then followed my wife down the back stairs of the Louvre and out onto the streets of Paris where the rain splashed onto glistening cobblestones and the traffic sped by, horns honking, oblivious to our plight.

“We must travel to the east,” Marlene said, consulting her booklet. “That’s where we can find somebody to decipher this puzzle. And we only have six hours before they’ll be onto us.”

I looked back at the famous museum, half expecting to see commandos rushing out of the glass pyramid to take us captive but instead I saw a park cleaner sweeping up the debris from the morning’s visitors and I felt a tinge of regret: my first time in the Louvre and I had not even had a chance to see the Mona Lisa. As I watched the even strokes of the broom the man turned and stared straight at me.

I panicked, even though I knew he was probably just a park cleaner, but all the same I had no desire to be captured by the other side so I hailed a cab and, without looking back, I pushed my wife inside and slammed the door.

“Versailles,” I said, giving the name of the first place that came into my mind.

“No, not Versailles,” squawked my wife, thrusting a map under the driver’s nose. “Here! Ici! We want to go here, I mean, ici!”

The taxi sped off into the traffic and I sank back onto the seat, wondering how I had ever agreed to this nonsense.

It had all started a year ago when my wife suggested we should go on a tour of the Scottish highlands. Imagining that we would be striding across moors stalking grouse and dining on haggis in famous castles, I readily agreed, only to discover that my wife had other plans: retracing the footsteps of the hero in one of her romance novels. To my amazement, the publishing company, who obviously could spot a money-making stunt, had created a tour that took fans to all the places mentioned in this book and for the two weeks of our journey I had to endure a gaggle of ladies, my wife included, clucking over the site of the wedding chapel where they were married, the inn where they fought off the redcoats, the cave where they were held prisoner and other unremarkable locations, with not a grouse, haggis or castle in sight. To make matters worse, the tour guide, dressed in a kilt, had played the role of one of the characters, causing the ladies to swoon and blush and behave like heart-struck teenagers all through the trip.

“We are not going to Scotland again,” I declared upon our return to the safety of our house and the sanctity of my study, “next year we’ll go to Paris or Rome.”

While I went back to my business my wife undertook her own research. She was so pleased with the results of the romantic rendezvous that she wondered what other books had spawned tours of the locations the characters had visited and she found a company that specialises in re-enactments of fiction. Not only can you visit the location where the hero walked, you can experience the story for yourself, solving clues along the way, emerging victorious at the end, no doubt with a pre-printed merit certificate signed by the author and a 50% off voucher for a repeat experience.

Romance books are not normally filled with action, at least, not the sort that you can recreate in public, but spy novels and thrillers are perfect fodder for re-enactment scenarios and since the idea was first floated a host of companies had sprung up to provide the thrill of the chase, as it were, with safety clauses built into the contract. I was glad that my wife did not like to read Stephen King novels, but she was a keen fan of Dan Brown, which is why after breakfast this morning we had found ourselves outside the Louvre, eagerly anticipating solving the mysteries of the Da Vinci code.

Well, when I say eagerly, I mean Marlene, of course; I would much rather have spent the morning in the Impressionists gallery, but it was her dream vacation, so I agreed to tag along.

It was not going to be exactly like the book, otherwise the punters could just read up on the precise locations and solutions to the mysteries and there would be no fun in the experience – if you could call racing around Paris fun. Instead, the tour company had devised a series of puzzles that were loosely based on the book but changed with each tour so that you could not give away the clues to the next unsuspecting victims.

I wondered if the tour companies wrote their own scripts or employed a team of mystery writers to do it for them. Perhaps there was a job opportunity there; I could write clues sending the participants to my brother’s hotel.

“Who comes up with these questions?” I asked once the taxi had stopped swerving round corners like a Formula-1 racer, and I had an opportunity to examine the carved cylinder, a small wooden tube which was covered in symbols like a scientific journal.

“The Illuminati of course,” said my besotted wife, grabbing the cylinder from me, “and Dan Brown is helping us to expose them.”

I rolled my eyes and wondered if there would be any decent beer in Versailles, or wherever we were going, or perhaps a small drinking establishment that I could park myself in while my wife indulged her fantasy but suddenly the side window shattered and something whistled past my head and embedded itself in the side of the car.

“They found us!” said the driver, swearing under his breath and accelerating hard.

“Who? What?” I stammered, bending down so that my shoulders touched my knees.

“They’re after this,” said my wife, tucking the cylinder into her ample bosom and sliding down the seat.

“Can you lose them?” she asked the taxi driver.

“Oui, oui, madame!” said the driver, nodding his head enthusiastically and taking a sharp left turn.

I wondered if he was part of the re-enactment or whether he just happened to be there at the right time, but surely they could not just shoot at any random taxi; it would have to be all pre-arranged, and given the forms we had signed, and the liability we had waived, not to mention the insurance we had been obliged to take out, this was probably all planned.

There were no more shots but I was not taking any chances with my head so I stayed crouched on the floor, wondering how they had found us. As I wriggled around, trying to avoid the pieces of broken window glass I felt something hard in my back pocket and pulled it out. We had each been issued photo ID passes which had got us into the Louvre in advance of the crowds of tourists but as I examined the barcode and felt the weight of the plastic I realised that the ID must also be a tracking device.

I was tempted to throw the thing out of the window and tell Marlene we would finish this tour on our own, but then I realised we would have a lot of explaining to do to the local police, and we would have no protection, if you can call a flimsy piece of plastic protection, should the re-enactment villains persist in pursuing us.

The taxi came to a stop, engine idling, no doubt for a quick getaway, and the driver reached behind him and opened the door.

“Notre Dame!” he said, pointing at the famous church, whose spires towered above us.

It was either the right place or Marlene was desperate to get out of the taxi because she practically fell onto the pavement and pulled me out after her, then the taxi sped off without waiting for payment. That was one part of this adventure that I did like.

“Now what?” I asked.

“We go inside the church,” she said, consulting her booklet, “and find the Keeper of the Key.”

“Oh,” I said, none the wiser, thinking for the hundredth time that I really should have read the novel before I came along on this caper. “And how do we recognise him?”

But Marlene had already turned and was striding towards the church door, ignoring the line of tourists waiting to climb the tower hoping for a glimpse of the ghost of Quasimodo. I gave them an apologetic shrug and hurried after her.

In the cool interior of the church I took a moment to adjust my eyes to the gloom that was pierced by coloured motes of light from the stained glass windows high above. My footsteps echoed a measured beat on the stone floor, contrasting with the clicking of my wife’s heels as she hurried away from me down the centre of the church. As she passed one of the side chapels a man wearing a long red robe stepped out from the shadows and beckoned to her. She moved towards him and after a moment she pulled the cylinder out from her blouse and passed it to him.

I had to dodge around a large group of tourists, each listening to the history of the church on individual hand held speakers, and when I caught up with Marlene the man in the robe was examining the cylinder as if it were an aged bottle of wine.

“I thought we were supposed to keep that,” I said, “and don’t we need a key?”

“It’s okay,” said Marlene, “this is Monsignor Philippe. He’s going to help us decipher the code.”

Just then a flash of light blinded my eyes as one of the tourists snapped a photograph of the carved pillar behind me. I stepped backward, blinking, and trod on the foot of an elderly lady who grimaced and bent over, massaging her toes.

“Sorry, er pardon, Madame,” I said, while a stream of visitors pushed past me.

A man took the limping lady’s arm and escorted her away, while she scowled and shook her fist at me and the tourists moved on to the next statue, clutching their portable audio guides. I looked around for Marlene and saw she was turning back and forth, searching for something.

“What’s wrong?” I asked.

“He’s gone!” she said, “Monsignor took the cypher and vanished!”

“Isn’t he supposed to do that?” I asked, beginning to feel a bit worried.

“No! He was supposed to help us solve the puzzle and lead us to the next clue.”

I looked around the vast cavern of the church but there were no men in robes, no lost keys or ciphers and no likely looking bestselling authors lurking nearby.

“Maybe he’s double crossed us,” I suggested. “Don’t the books usually have a good guy who turns out to be a bad guy?”

“But that’s not until day three,” Marlene wailed, “It says so in the booklet. Here; I’ll show you.”

She reached into her bag for the re-enactment booklet, the set of instructions for the game which also contained the emergency number to call if something went wrong and the details of how to quit if you were not satisfied. It was not there.

“I had it a minute ago,” she cried, “I was consulting the diagram of the church layout. It was right next to my ID card.”

With a gasp Marlene looked up. “My ID card’s gone too!”

“What do you mean gone?” I asked, putting my hand into my pocket, but even as I spoke I knew what had happened.

We had been robbed. Ether by the re-enactment company or by common Parisian pickpockets, but either way we were lost in a strange city with no identification, no money, no phone and no belongings.

“What shall we do?” Marlene sobbed as I stood looking at the flecks of dust floating in the shafts of coloured light that angled towards the floor from the lofty windows.

“Do? We’re in Paris; we’re going to stroll arm in arm along the Seine and later we’ll sit at a small café and have a delicious meal.”

“But, what about our plans, and the re-enactment and our money and everything?”

“Oh, I’m sure we can change our plans,” I said, putting my arm around my wife, “I can get my brother to wire some funds and as for re-enactment, we could try re-enacting our engagement, and then we could go and really tour the Louvre.”

As we walked out of the church, holding hands for the first time in many years, I caught sight of the woman whose foot I had stood on and she smiled at me, slightly inclining her head. I winked at her, then steered my wife towards the riverbank and our real holiday.

It wasn’t really stealing, Daniel thought to himself for the hundredth time, as he joined the two wires together and heard the engine come to life; just borrowing. He had done this every night for the last month and he still got a thrill out of driving away behind the wheel of a brand new car.

“Where are we going?” asked his younger brother Tyler, eyes wide with excitement.

“To the other side of the city. You always take the car far away from its own lot, but be sure you remember where it came from.”

Tyler nodded and ran his hand along the sleek hood. This was a flashier model than the ones Daniel normally borrowed, but he had wanted to show off on his brother’s first night.

The boys got inside the car, wrinkling their noses at the smell of polish, and Daniel drove slowly out of the lot, stopping the car on the street to replace the chain across the exit before joining the stream of traffic that pulsed through the city like an artery. He was careful to match the speed of the other cars and used signals for every turn, melding into the flow, until he pulled into the far end of the parking lot outside one of the larger casinos.

“Now, we wait,” Daniel said, studying the gamblers who were coming out of the main doors.

He watched men walk briskly to their cars, couples hail taxis and slide into the back seats of the cramped cabs, and valets hold open the doors of limousines for smart, young people who appeared to tip well. After half an hour or so a man stumbled out of the casino, looked at his watch and began walking out towards them.

“Here’s the first customer; I know this guy,” said Daniel and eased the car forward until it came alongside the man.

“Would you like a ride, sir?” Daniel asked in a cheerful voice, “only fifteen dollars to anywhere in the city.”

The man swayed and peered in at the two boys.

“Ah, Miguel, it’s you!”

Daniel silenced his brother’s confused look with a quick frown and a shake of his head while he leaned over the back seat to open the rear door.

“That’s right, sir, and this is Paco, my assistant.”

Tyler smiled and nodded mutely while the man fell into the back seat and yanked the door shut.

“Nice car, Miguel, did you get a raise?” he slurred.

“No sir, it’s my turn to take this car tonight; tomorrow I’m back to the older model.”

“Well, so long as it gets me home that’s what counts. Westmore Villas – you know the place.”

The man slumped back into the plush upholstery and closed his eyes, while Tyler made faces and gesticulated to Daniel who had already pulled onto the main road heading east.

They drove in silence apart from the wheezing of the man in the back which sent wafts of alcohol tinged breath around the car. Tyler opened his window and Daniel closed it again, motioning to his brother to sit still. Twenty minutes later they pulled up in front of a red brick apartment building and Daniel turned to the man.

“Sir, wake up, sir; we’re here.”

The man sat up, rubbing his eyes, and stared out of the window. After a moment he grunted, pulled a twenty out of his wallet and handed it to Daniel.

“Thanks, Miguel, see ya next time.”

Daniel reached behind him and opened the door. The man peeled himself out of the car and stood in front of the apartment, fumbling in his pocket. Daniel gave a wave then drove away taking a different route to the one they had come by.

“See, it’s simple, like I told you,” he said, “just never give your real name and always ask for fifteen dollars. Most people don’t have change so they’ll give you a twenty and let you keep the rest. And go for the ones who are a bit drunk and walking slowly.”

Daniel picked up two more passengers before turning the car over to Tyler and borrowing another one from a different lot. He wondered if he should have given Tyler the minivan and kept the luxury car for himself but he could have that car any time he wanted, and after all, this was Tyler’s first night on the job.

All night Daniel ferried people around the city; mostly short rides making twenty dollars each time but he was lucky enough to get fifty dollars from a man who wanted a fast ride to the train station. Once Tyler had learned the ropes he would have to get his friends in on the scheme; it was so simple. Those dealers had no idea what a goldmine they left sitting out each night.

Just before the dawn began to tickle the tops of the buildings the brothers met in the parking lot behind the main movie theatre.

“Well?” asked Daniel.

“Wow!” said Tyler, holding up a fistful of notes, “we’re rich!”

Daniel laughed and told his brother to follow him back to the first lot. He wanted to return the fancy car before the first shift of salesmen arrived, and two boys driving a minivan would attract less attention.

As he approached the first lot he saw they were too late; a couple of dealers and a cop wearing a bright yellow jacket stood by the empty spot where the car had sat. He slowly drove past the lot, waving his hand to Tyler, hoping that his brother would see the signal and know to follow him but Tyler just waved back and drove the car into the lot.

Cursing his luck, Daniel looped around the block and parked his minivan at a gas station, then sauntered past the dealer’s lot, trying to spot Tyler without being noticed himself. He need not have bothered with the secrecy as a small crowd was forming on the sidewalk gaping at the cop who was holding a wriggling Tyler in a tight grip.

“You little thief!” shouted the dealer, shaking his fist at Tyler, “you’ve been stealing cars off this lot!”

“No, I never,” said Tyler, his teeth chattering, “I found it over by the mall with the engine running and I was just bringing it back. How can I be stealing it if I brought it back?”

Daniel had to admire his brother’s quick wit. He would probably get away with it as, after all, he had not actually stolen the car, and there was no way to tell who had taken it, but it meant that their careers as taxi drivers were over. He would have to find something else to borrow instead.