The Explorer's Code, page 5
Carefully, Anna took the books and set them aside. They were so old, she was afraid that touching them would make the pages crumble. But they stayed intact. She placed them a few feet away from the shelves, patting the cover of the top book (an old copy of Treasure Island) to assure herself that they’d be fine there. She also moved the plant, leaving the shelves bare.
Now for the bookcase. Anna almost laughed out loud. It really was like a moment out of a Virginia Maines adventure. When Virginia traveled to France, she found a secret room behind a tapestry in an old castle. It turned out the room was full of old treasures taken during the Crusades. The story had made national news in France. Virginia had been honored by historians in the city. And now, Anna was doing the same thing!
She braced herself along the side of the bookcase and shoved. It didn’t budge.
“Huh.” Anna stepped back. Odd, that it didn’t move at all. As heavy as a bookcase like that would be, it should have at least rocked as she pushed. Anna was only thirteen, but she wasn’t weak. She’d just climbed a wall, for crying out loud. But the bookcase didn’t move a millimeter.
She moved to the front and grabbed the sides of the bookcase, pulling on them as hard as she could. Nothing moved.
Maybe this was what was locked. Anna pulled out the key again and, holding it near her eye, searched the shelves for a keyhole. Maybe it was hidden inside one of the designs carved on the bookcase. That curving line could hide a keyhole … no? Maybe it was sneakily placed at the very back, low, almost covered by the shelves. Or not.
After twenty minutes and some frustrated growling, Anna conceded defeat. There was no keyhole anywhere on the bookcase. She moved back to the side and, after counting to three, pushed the bookcase so hard her shoulder popped.
The bookcase didn’t even shudder.
Gasping and clutching her aching arm, Anna gingerly picked up the fake plant and books and put them back exactly where she’d found them. After all that work, all that pain, for nothing, she was 100 percent convinced that this bookcase was hiding the entrance to the third floor.
But any secrets hidden up there would have to stay hidden. Because Anna couldn’t open the door.
* * *
A code was like a locked door. As soon as you had the key, it opened easily. Unfortunately for Charlie, he had no idea what the key was.
He had been right: The numbers on the hotel doors were out of order. He’d gone down the hall, up the left side and then down the right, writing each dark, almost-invisible second number into a notebook until he had the following:
3-5-1-18-13-5-15-18-19-1
But what did it mean? At first it seemed like it could be a sequence of odd numbers, but those eighteens threw everything off. Could it be a math equation? A pattern, and the missing numbers were the answer? Or maybe the evens were the clue?
Charlie felt a failure twice over. First, he hadn’t managed to drum up the courage to climb that wall when Anna asked him to. Such a coward.
And second, Charlie had blown Anna off when she asked if he wanted to go exploring. That was unlike her—when was the last time she’d asked him to join her adventures? He’d wanted to. But then she smirked, and Charlie remembered: Anna didn’t care about codes and numbers. She’d think what he was doing was stupid or boring.
He’d tell her about the code. Just … later. Maybe he was completely wrong about this and the numbers really were in a different order a long time ago. If so, he didn’t need Anna saying he just needed everything to be a math problem.
The worst thing, Charlie decided, chewing on his pencil, would be if the code was actually straightforward, but you needed to know a key to solve the rest. It could be like the cryptograms in the puzzle books he got for his birthdays. Sometimes, S was really the letter R, but sometimes it was A or L or any other letter. If you already knew one, you could figure out the rest. But Charlie didn’t have the key.
Or maybe he did. Energized, he tapped his pencil on those number eighteens. Sometimes S meant R, but in the A1Z26 cipher, where “1” meant “A” and “26” meant “Z,” 18 meant R! A commonly used letter in English phrases! And 5 would be E, the most common English letter.
Charlie translated the numbers into letters, taking only a moment to make sure that each one was correct before moving on. Now the message read,
CEARMEORSA
Well, that meant nothing. At least, not yet. Charlie was positive he had solved the right code, even though it was gibberish. Look at all those vowels. Look at those Es and As and even the Rs, though they weren’t vowels. This didn’t look like when he usually failed to correctly solve a code—those were full of strange letters or had no vowels at all (like QXTYDDV), let alone common ones like E and A, and common consonants like R. This looked like a real word. Just not one he’d ever seen before.
Charlie thought and thought until his mom tapped his shoulder and said, “Anna came back a few minutes ago. We’re going to lunch.”
Charlie welcomed the break. He was sure he’d made the right move in translating the numbers into letters, but that only opened up a new puzzle. Now, he couldn’t figure out what the word meant, or if it needed another code to solve.
But he’d solve it. He’d eat a good meal, and he’d go back to the code. The numbers would haunt him until he did.
* * *
The lunch bell rang, and while Emily took a moment to enjoy the fact that she was in a place that had an honest-to-goodness lunch bell, it meant she and her camera had to clear back out of the dining room. She’d gone back in after the elderly couple left so she could get some shots of the furniture, as well as some pictures of the overlook. But when a tour group of elderly women wearing ice-cream-parlor colors and smelling heavily of sunscreen entered the dining room, she had to put her camera away.
The nice-looking woman and her husband, a thin man with a thick beard but a shiny bald head, entered as Emily was leaving and introduced themselves to her as Rosie and Xavier. Rosie gave Emily a wide smile, but Xavier just stared at the girl. A little unnerved, Emily hurried past.
A mustachioed man was coming down the stairs.
“Oh, hello. Enjoying the house?” he asked as Emily passed.
“Yeah,” she said. “Sorry. I need to get my parents.”
Emily’s mom and dad were far back in the upstairs hallway, snapping pictures with the phones they had carefully smuggled inside.
“Hey,” Emily said, making them both jump. When they saw it was her, they smiled and put the phones away.
“Be careful,” her dad said. “We thought you were Mr. Llewellyn snooping around.”
“No, just me,” Emily said. “How’s the research?”
Her parents glanced at each other and beckoned Emily to follow them into their Rome suite.
“It’s promising,” her mom said once the door was safely closed. “It’s too soon to draft a report to the Virginia Historical Society, but I’m optimistic.”
“Me too.” Her dad handed Emily his phone, showing her a picture of a big bookcase. “It’s a perfect match for the one the Gardners had. This house is untouched, or about as untouched as it can be after so many years.”
“If we can document it,” her mom said, “we might be able to prove Idlewood should be protected as a historical treasure.”
“You’d better work fast,” Emily said. “You were right. Mr. Llewellyn is selling the house after this weekend.”
Her father looked up from his phone. “How did you find that out?”
“I asked him.” Emily smiled.
Her parents did not smile. “What do you mean, you asked him?” her dad asked.
Why weren’t they pleased with her? “I didn’t ask directly,” she said.
“But I’m guessing you got a reaction out of him,” her mom said, setting her laptop aside. “Which means he’s probably suspicious now.”
A twisty, nauseous feeling was growing in Emily’s stomach. “Well, maybe, but—”
“Emily, we can’t have this! Not again,” her mother said. “Losing the house in California was bad enough, but to lose Idlewood, too—”
Emily felt cold prickle over her skin. Northern California. Her parents had been studying the history of an old house, currently a bed-and-breakfast, that some reports said had ties to John Muir. But the house was going to be torn down. The Shaughnessy adults went to visit the house and speak to the owner, but when they did, presenting their case for why the house should be protected and how they thought they could do it, the owner kicked them out. He said he’d rather lose the house than keep pouring money into maintaining the old building and that if he saw them hanging around, he’d call the cops.
Two days later, the house was gone.
And now Idlewood was facing the same problem.
“He’s selling the house,” Emily said. “Not tearing it down.”
“But the company buying it would!” her dad said. “Or they’d strip it and remodel it into some fancy new resort. They won’t protect it.”
“And now you’ve made Mr. Llewellyn suspicious of us,” her mom added. “What if he finds out what we’re trying to do and kicks us out? What hope does Idlewood have then?”
Emily stared past her parents, at the beautiful mural on the wall behind them. It was a bustling Roman marketplace, so detailed Emily could see the dents in a centurion’s armor.
So beautiful. And so doomed.
“Okay!” Emily picked up her bag, full of its disguised book and a wad of pictures. “What do you want me to do?”
Her mom sat down on the main room’s couch. “Emmy, we’re glad you want to help,” she said. “But you’re a kid. You should be enjoying the vacation.”
“I told you, I want to help,” Emily said.
“Like I said, we’re grateful. But our timeline just moved up. We only have three days here, and now we can’t even count on that. Your father and I need to gather more evidence. We need to show that this house truly hasn’t been altered since the days of the Gardners. If we do that, we might be able to convince the Historical Society to step in and protect Idlewood.”
“Are you sure it’s enough?” Emily asked. She squeezed her bag’s strap. “Lots of houses have been kept the same as they were in the past.”
Her father shook his head. “Not like this. Most have been remodeled to look like they did, not actually stayed the same for so long. Elaine Gardner’s order—”
“Yes! Elaine Gardner’s order! Why did she make it? Don’t you think figuring that out is what’s going to make this house more than just some old house? Could it because of what Si—”
“Never mind that,” her mom said. “We told you, that document doesn’t have enough credibility to base our actions on. We have to go on what we can prove.” She sighed. “Emily, I understand wanting history to be exciting, but this isn’t some silly treasure hunt.”
Emily was stung. That wasn’t what she was thinking at all!
But her mom was still talking. “It’s enough that the house has stayed the same after all these years. It’s precious and unique. We’ll be able to save it if we can document just how unique it is. We don’t need to go looking for a deeper mystery. Sometimes, you do what you can, and that has to be enough.”
Her parents were firm. So why bother fighting them? Emily took a deep breath. “Okay. I’m sorry.”
Her dad squeezed her shoulder. “We know you’re just trying to help. Now let’s go to lunch.”
Emily wasn’t hungry. “You go ahead. I think I’ll go downstairs and work on some math homework first.”
“Okay, sweetie. After lunch we can…” He looked at the itinerary. “Play croquet.”
Emily made a face, and he laughed. “Or maybe not. I think it could be fun. And it could give us a good look at the outside of the house.”
Her mom perked up. “Do you think we could sneak our phones out there?”
As her parents discussed how to best capture Idlewood’s facade without anyone seeing, Emily left the room. In the hall, the family with the other kids her age were going down to lunch already. Both the redhead and her brother looked as disgruntled as she felt, although the boy’s eyes were far away and he bumped into the stair’s bannister.
Emily rolled her eyes and followed them downstairs. They don’t get it, she thought. Sure, Idlewood was old and special, but not many people thought that mattered anymore. There were lots of old houses. But people liked mysteries. There was a history here, surrounding why Mrs. Gardner had ordered the house to remain as it was. Maybe her parents could save Idlewood by showing how alike it was to the original. Maybe. But if not, Emily would be ready with her own pictures, with evidence pointing to a reason why Mrs. Gardner wanted the house kept pristine. The papers hidden in Emily’s book would guide her. It didn’t matter that Mr. Llewellyn was suspicious; a kid could move around without people paying too much attention. Or, well, maybe not, she thought, remembering the redhead’s “arrest” that morning.
But still, Emily wasn’t stupid, and she wasn’t useless. She’d show her parents that she was right and that this house’s fate hinged on learning why Mrs. Gardner had made her order. While her parents were out playing croquet, Emily would find the evidence she was looking for.
Emily sat in the entry hall, “math” book on her lap, and waited for the other family to go inside the dining room, followed by her parents, before she took a few pictures of the walls and furniture. She opened her book on a whim, to the pages that showed the entry hall back when Idlewood belonged to the Gardner family.
The house really had stayed the same. Looking at the black-and-white pictures in the book and then at the room around her, Emily could see no difference besides the color.
No, wait. There was one difference. Emily glanced down at a picture of the carved door with its dragon statues. Statues, plural, one on each side. But now, one of the big, heavy statues was on the other side of the room.
Emily frowned. Was this a clue to the past? Making sure no one was watching, she snapped pictures of both statues to study later. Mrs. Gardner had wanted the house to stay the same, in every way. If Emily and her parents were ever going to understand Mrs. Gardner’s reasons for that demand, then these details mattered. The statue had probably been moved when Mr. Llewellyn corrected the original builders’ “errors.”
Emily rose from the chair, leaving her book tented over her camera, and approached the carved door. It would be locked, of course. But Emily didn’t care about going inside. Instead, she knelt by the bare spot on the other side.
Just as she thought: The ground was etched with notches where this bronze Chinese dragon statue had once been. Well, if she was going to save Idlewood, then she should start by honoring the memory of the people who built it, and she could do that by moving a statue back to where it was supposed to be.
Emily looked around. The room was empty. It was just her, the statues, and her task.
It wasn’t easy. The big, heavy statue made a scratching sound as Emily pulled it, so she had to waddle it over to prevent damaging the floor. It also caught on every rug, so Emily had to stop, pull the rug back, shove the statue past, and then replace the rug. Once she got it across the room, she had to turn it around and maneuver it into the notches on the ground.
“Come on, you,” she grunted, giving it one last push. The statue jolted a few inches, landing in the notches with a satisfying click that seemed to resonate deep in the stone and echo through the foundation of the house.
“Good.” Emily sat beside the statue and wiped the sweat from her forehead. Moving a statue wouldn’t change the world, but it was a start. She looked at the two dragons, right next to each other. Was it important that they stay together?
She’d come back and figure it out later. Now, lunch. She’d worked up an appetite moving the statue, and the smell of roasted ham floated out of the dining room, making Emily’s stomach growl. So she took a few more pictures (with the statue in the right place now) and ran her camera and book back to her room before joining her parents for an authentic 1920s lunch.
* * *
Anna hadn’t really cared for lunch. It was ham sandwiches and some salad loaded with cottage cheese. She would have preferred spaghetti, but her parents liked the old-fashioned food from an old-fashioned time, and that made them happy, which meant they gave her a quick “don’t do it again” lecture about going through other people’s rooms before turning back to their meals.
Charlie wasn’t much fun, either. Anna had to shake him out of his thoughts to get him talking, but before long, he was lost in his own world again. Not even mentioning the library was enough to keep him in the present.
The only other thing to do was listen to the other guests introduce themselves to one another. The couple Anna had spotted outside (the ones with the little bundle), their sport sunglasses pushed up on their foreheads, were talking to the Matching T-Shirts family, and two single guests, Pins-All-Over-Suitcase Man and the Book Lady, had chosen seats next to each other and were having a fevered conversation in low voices. The woman had one of her books on her lap. This one was titled DNA Coding for Fun and Profit.
The slew of old women in pastel shorts and blouses were buzzing in and out of the room so often that Anna couldn’t count them. What room could fit all of them (and the thick fog of coconut scent they carried with them)?
Anna’s parents were busy talking to the couple from the airplane room.
“This is a nice house,” Mr. Mustache was telling them. “But I think the weather is too wet here.”
“Not good for the respiratory system,” his wife, Quilted Bag, said, waving a hand at her throat. “That time we visited Key Largo was much more invigorating. Still, the trees are lovely.”
“Why come, then?” Anna’s father asked.
Mr. Mustache settled back in his chair. “Contest winners,” he said, patting his wife’s arm. “We enter so many contests for vacations. That’s how we went to Key Largo. And when I looked up the history of Idlewood, I wanted to come see it for myself.”
