Free Floors #2: 3 Below by Patrick Carman Page A

straight and stared down at Leo.
    “It doesn’t matter if you believe it or not, it’s true. Eighteen of your precious hours have already passed. You have six hours to come up with the rest, and we both know that’s not going to happen.”
    Leo started to back away, and then he had a thought.
    “What’s Mr. Yancey got to do with this?” he asked.
    “That’s none of your business!” she yelled. Ms. Sparks pocketed the seven hundred thousand dollar note and brushed a duck feather off her shoulder with a sour face. “And when I own this hotel, there will be no ducks. I won’t be running a zoo with monkeys and birds and who knows what else!”
    Ms. Sparks didn’t know how right she was.
    “Stay close by in case I need you,” she went on. “And don’t even think about leaving the hotel. I’ve assigned a guardian for you, since your parents are gone and everyone else in this hotel is stark raving mad!”
    “A guardian?”

    “He’s waiting for you in that hovel you call a room. He’s not to let you out of his sight. It’s one thing — the only thing — he happens to be good at. He knows how to keep track of someone when the need arises.”
    Leo didn’t like the sound of a guardian one bit, especially one who had a weird super-ability to keep an eye on people. It would greatly complicate things if he and Remi were to make it back under the hotel and find the gear Merganzer needed. He hadn’t counted on all this trouble and wished his dad were there to help him.
    Remi hadn’t returned in the duck waiter when Leo passed by, and he needed to get Blop from the basement room. The world felt like it was falling apart as he walked the steps down to the basement door.
    “Ew,” he said, crinkling his nose. He hadn’t even gone inside and already he could smell Claudius. When he entered the basement, it reeked of wet cat fur. A small, unhappy-looking man was sitting on his bed holding a wadded-up cat leash in his hand. His skin was pale, he had a thick, drooping mustache, and there were large bags under his eyes. There was a frailness about him, like a soft summer breeze might knock him over.
    “You must be the guardian,” Leo said. Mr. Carp was staring at the call center wall where Daisy, the mechanical shark who delivered commands from the hotel guests, was quietly resting.

    “Claudius doesn’t like your shark,” Mr. Carp said. “It makes him nervous.”
    “If it’s any consolation, Daisy makes me nervous, too. You never know when she’s going to wake up and deliver bad news.”
    “I see,” Mr. Carp said. The cat meowed and rubbed up against Leo’s leg, leaving a trail of fur behind on his overalls.
    “I’m Mr. Carp. And this is Claudius,” Mr. Carp said, pointing down at the cat.
    “I see,” Leo said, for he had no idea what else to say.
    “She asked me to keep an eye on you and the other one — Remi, is it? You’ll need to stay close by.”
    “What happens if we don’t?” Leo asked, uncertain how much power Mr. Carp actually had.
    Mr. Carp shrugged his shoulders as if he didn’t really care.
    “Will it be all right if I use the extra bunk while I’m visiting?” Mr. Carp asked, looking at Clarence Fillmore’s empty bed. “I think this is what Ms. Sparks had in mind. It’s very nice down here. Much nicer than my apartment.”
    The basement was cozy for a maintenance man and his son, with its glugging water heater and hotel parts everywhere, but it was by any reasonable standard acrummy place for a normal person to live. Leo could only imagine what sort of place Mr. Carp rented.
    “You can stay — just don’t touch anything,” Leo said. He felt sorry for Mr. Carp, but at the same time, he was feeling a little better about things. There was no way this guardian would be able to keep track of Leo and Remi. Things were looking up.
    Mr. Carp reclined on Leo’s dad’s bed and Claudius jumped up next to him. This, Leo knew, meant he’d have to burn the bedding when the cat was