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critical part of the story. Nevertheless, he headed home, walking slowly at first but then picking up speed as his resourceful mind dealt with the loss of his wallet. He began to form a plan.
    “We’ve lost the scroll, but we haven’t lost the story,” he told Snowy, who paced him along the sidewalk. “
Karaboudjan
. That’s an Armenian word. That’s our lead, Snowy.” He kept thinking as he kept walking, going over everything that had happened since Nestor had escorted him from Marlinspike Hall the night before. “What was Barnaby Dawes trying to tell us when he said our lives were in danger?”
    He broke off as he and Snowy approached his apartment building. Two deliverymen in coveralls were carrying a large wooden crate from a red delivery van toward the front door, which was open. Mrs. Finch must have let them in.
    As Tintin and Snowy got to the door, another workman appeared in the hallway. “Mr. Tintin? Delivery for you.”
    Tintin looked back at the crate, which the two men were bringing closer to the doorway. It didn’t look like it would even fit through the door. “But I didn’t order anything,” he said, and he was about to turn back toward the third workman when a handkerchief was clapped over his mouth and nose.
    “Well,” the workman said, “that’s because it’s you that’s getting delivered.” Tintin struggled for a moment, but there was a heavy, sweet smell and he had already breathed in whatever soaked the handkerchief. He felt himself falling, and then he blacked out completely. The last thing he heard was Snowy barking.

THE DELIVERYMEN QUICKLY packed the unconscious Tintin in the crate and hauled it back toward the van. The word KARABOUDJAN was visibly stenciled on the side of the crate. “Quick!” the third workman was saying as he put the soaked handkerchief back in his pocket. “Get him in the van!”
    Snowy was watching all of this from the sidewalk, where he had scooted out of the way of the crate. But now was the time when a dog had to take action! He sprang forward and sank his teeth into the third workman’s leg. The other two already had loaded the crate containing Tintin into the van. They looked up as the third yowled in pain.
    “Get off me, you confounded mutt!” he yelled, shaking Snowy off into the hallway. Snowy landed and spun across the slick floor before scrabbling to his feet and charging again—but the workman slammed the door in his face.
    Snowy heard the van’s engine start outside, and he knew he didn’t have much time. He ran up the stairs and into Tintin’s apartment, leaping up onto the desk and bracing his front paws on the windowsill. If it was good enough for a cat, Snowy figured, it was good enough for a dog.
    The workman he’d bitten was getting into the van as it pulled away from the curb, out of Snowy’s jumping range. He whined anxiously and tensed as another truck approached. Could he do it?
    He sprang out the window as the truck was about to pass. It was a fire truck, and Snowy landed between two rungs on the ladder laid across its roof. Crouching against the wind, Snowy kept an eye on the van, which was just in front of the fire truck. He would have to be ready to jump off if it turned.
    But it didn’t turn right away. Instead, it suddenly slammed on its brakes. The fire truck followed suit, its brakes squealing as the sudden slowdown shook the ladder loose. The ladder shot forward, extending out over the van, taking the surprised Snowy with it. He tumbled from the ladder right onto the van’s hood. Inside, the three workmen gaped at him. He tried to keep his footing on the slick hood, but the van swerved and Snowy was thrown off onto the street.
    He rolled a couple of times and came up running. Ahead of him, the van was turning toward the waterfront—Snowy could tell by the forest of cranes that sprouted around the docks. He jumped from the street onto the low trunk of a passing coupe. The driver shouted at him, and he hopped from