Flash Flood by Chris Ryan

material, searching for the inflation valve. They didn’t have much time.
    Richard found it. ‘It’s here,’ he called. ‘And there’s no gas canister. So what do we do, blow it up like a balloon?’
    It was true. Where there would usually be a tube of compressed gas to inflate the raft, there was just a tab of black fabric. Richard glared at Ben, as thoughthis was all his fault. He really is a sore loser, he thought.
    Suddenly, behind them, there was a bang. Cheryl screamed and Kabeera jumped. A jagged spar of glass the height of the door crashed down into the table between Ben and Richard. It smashed into shards like daggers. They stood frozen, shaken. Ben slowly looked round.
    The glass door had cracked from top to bottom. The door handle was metal and it must have expanded, sending stresses through the glass. Hot smoke began to billow through the hole.
    Kabeera was yelling but the smoke caught her throat and she started coughing again. Cheryl looked at her and suddenly understood what she was trying to say. ‘Use the fire extinguisher!’ she yelled. ‘Blow it up using the fire extinguisher!’
    All at once they were acting together, like a team. Ben pulled the fire extinguisher off the wall. Richard smoothed down the fabric of the raft so that Guang could locate the valve again. Kabeera was coughing, but she and Cheryl managed to push the window open wide.
    Ben put the nozzle of the fire extinguisher up against the valve and pulled the trigger. There was a hiss as the foam flowed into the material. The raft began to take shape – then stopped.
    Ben pressed the trigger again, but the extinguisher was empty. And the raft was only half inflated.
    The temperature was rising and the hot smoke was starting to fill the room.
    There wasn’t another fire extinguisher; and anyway, there was no time to use it. Guang’s voice rang out. ‘ Let’s go! ’
    Cheryl and Kabeera helped to drag the raft into place on the sill. The smoke curled out of the window, making dark clouds in the wet air. Richard dragged a chair across the carpet to act as a mounting block. Kabeera pulled her headscarf up a little higher to try and protect her throat, but she was still coughing as she climbed up.
    One by one they scrambled onto the raft. Kabeera and Cheryl each went to the front and hung onto the ropes. Ben climbed out and inched his way across. The raft felt soft, like a lilo feels when it is going down. Would it hold? As he looked down he saw thewater surging less than a metre below, smashing a wooden chair against the white walls. He remembered those people who had jumped from the London Eye, just bags of bones in the tide by now.
    He must have frozen where he was on the sill. Guang tapped him on the shoulder and pointed. ‘You go over there and hang onto that rope in the middle.’
    Ben had little choice. Water was better than fire.
    Guang and Richard held on at the back, then they pushed away from the window frame. The raft slid easily on the wet windowsill. For a moment it was airborne, then it plunged into the water.

Chapter Eleven
     
    Ben clung on. Filthy Thames water sluiced over his head. The water was icy cold, sending pains all over his body and making his fingers go numb instantly. His brain played him terrifying images – the woman struggling to climb the coral-tree while the water battered its branches like an angry demon trying to shake her loose.
    Freezing spray filled his eyes, nose and mouth. It tasted of mud and oil. They were travelling fast, as if on rapids, completely at the mercy of the current. The raft wobbled and undulated under them, as though it was about to fold in half at any moment. Ben couldmake out shapes crouched against the other end, but the spray kept forcing his eyes closed. The only things he could see with any certainty were right beside him in the water, buffeted against the raft: a blackboard sign from a pub; litter bins, surrounded by a confetti of KFC wrappers, coffee cups, tickets,