The Explorer's Code, page 8
And just imagine! If she were the one to unlock it all, her parents would finally know she had what it took to be a historian like them.
Sitting silent among so many people was getting a little old. Emily turned to the boy sitting next to her. “Hey, Charlie.”
He jumped like she’d poked him with her fork. “What?”
She smiled at him. “How did you like the Rome suite?”
“Um, I really liked it. The paintings on the walls were really neat.”
“I think so, too. What did you like about them?”
Charlie reddened. “I don’t know. There was … just a lot to look at, you know?”
He peered at her through his glasses, which made her feel a little like a specimen under dual magnifying lenses. “I guess. I’ve been pretty busy.”
“Busy doing what? You can’t play croquet all day.”
Emily scowled. “None of your business.”
“Fine.” He shrugged. “I thought if we were interested in something, we were supposed to own it, right?”
“Yeah, but … that’s different.”
They sat in a silence broken only by the ambient chatter of dinner. Then Charlie said, “By any chance, have you seen anything like a key in your rooms?”
“A key?” Emily asked at the same time as the redhead. “What kind of key?” the other girl continued.
Charlie shook his head. “I don’t know, Anna. Probably not a real one. A picture. I … I heard about old-fashioned Roman keys beings really cool, and I thought the Roman room might have something like that.”
“Oh,” Anna said, shifting in her seat. Her eyes flicked up at the ceiling, back at the door, and then down to her plate.
“I’ll keep an eye out,” Emily said. “But I haven’t seen one yet. Old keys are pretty cool, though,” she added. “The Romans used to wear them on their fingers because they didn’t have pockets.”
Charlie’s eyes lit up. “That is pretty cool. I wonder if they ever put them on the wrong finger and got them stuck there.”
Emily laughed. “Maybe.”
“Um, Emily, right?” This was the redhead, Anna. “You know a lot about history?”
“A bit,” Emily said, though she allowed the truth of yes, I know a heck of a lot to slide into her voice.
Charlie heard it. “Is history your thing, then?”
Emily gave a modest shrug. “It interests me. So I pick up some interesting facts.”
“Not math, then,” Charlie said, looking back at his dinner.
But Anna’s eyes gleamed. “What do you know about Idlewood?” she asked. “Before dinner, I read the little history they gave us, but it wasn’t a lot.”
Emily snorted. “No, it isn’t.”
“So you know more, then? What happened here? When, and why?”
Oh, those were some interesting questions. Emily could tell a lot. She could talk about Mr. and Mrs. Gardner and how they met and how the sister of a famous lady explorer had come to be a rich man’s wife, and maybe she could even regale them with what she thought of as the golden age of Idlewood, when Virginia Maines brought home stories and treasures from her travels, or she could go further and tell them all about how those glory days shattered apart with one horrendous deed—
But no. First, those stories weren’t proven: All Emily had were theories and a few passing mentions in an old document her parents had dismissed as “not enough.” Second, these kids didn’t want the whole tale. Charlie was a math guy, and as for Anna … kids like her weren’t interested in history. She was just bored and looking for conversation. And sure, the true tale of adventure and scandal and fallen heroes was interesting, more interesting than Roman key rings, but if she raised that story, then what? If they knew everything, they’d turn the history into nothing more than a treasure hunt, and she didn’t want that for Idlewood.
“Idlewood was built in 1885 by the Gardner family,” Emily finally said. “They lived here until 1929, when they moved to South Carolina.”
“And that’s when Elaine made the house a hotel,” Anna said.
Emily frowned at the very familiar use of Mrs. Gardner’s name. “Yes, Mrs. Gardner did,” she said.
“Why’d she do that?”
Oh, Emily had theories. But instead she said, “Who knows? Maybe the Gardners just wanted to live somewhere closer to civilization. People move. But some think Mrs. Gardner saw a chance to help out the community. She hired local people to run the place once the guests started to arrive.”
“What did the house look like before the renovation?” Charlie asked.
Emily waved her hands. “Like this. Mrs. Gardner was adamant that the house stay just as it was, except for some small alterations.”
Charlie raised his eyebrows. “So the numbers on the doors were there before?”
Both girls stared at him. “Added later,” Emily said. “When it became a hotel. They’ve probably been updated since then, though, to keep them nice and shiny.”
“Hmm,” Charlie said.
“What?”
“Oh. Nothing. Just wondering who oversaw the renovations.”
Emily had been wondering a little about the renovations herself. The house’s second floor had been closed until this weekend. It made sense that Mr. Llewellyn would fix it up. But he said he’d changed things. Small things, yes, but what if he altered something that made this house inauthentic in some way?
That only meant Emily had to work harder.
“The renovations? Probably the Gardners, to some extent,” she said, pulling herself from her worries to answer Charlie’s question. “But they would have needed workers to supervise the work on the ground. I bet there are books about Idlewood’s history in the library.”
“Thanks. I saw the library today. I definitely want to explore it some more.”
Anna laughed. “And I’ve been wondering how long it would take for you to go there. Not long, I guess.”
Emily turned to Anna. “What’s your interest in the house?”
Anna met Emily’s eyes, and her gaze hardened. For a moment Emily saw, again, the girl who’d unapologetically gone into the airplane room without asking. “Just interested in the place I’m staying at,” she said. “I keep feeling like there’s more to Idlewood than meets the eye.”
A cold chill went down Emily’s back. Anna sounded like she knew something, but if she did, why was she asking? Did she, like Emily, have another reason for coming to Idlewood? Or was she just some bored kid who’d stumbled into evidence of the Shaughnessys’ theories?
Either way, this girl was dangerous. Reckless, fearless, dangerous. If Emily had harbored any desire to reveal her theories about Idlewood, Anna would take that tiny bit of knowledge and start knocking down doors. She’d trample any historic evidence Emily needed and ruin Idlewood, all on her own.
Anna tilted her head. “So, Emily, what do you know about Virginia Maines?”
That name! Emily stood up, grabbing her plate at the last moment to keep it from spilling all over the carpet. “Can’t help you there. I’m not into Indiana Jones–type history,” she said. “I’d better go do some homework before bed.”
She hurried off. That was way too close. She’d have to keep an eye on Anna. Idlewood itself was counting on her.
Emily strode into the entry hall and froze.
The bald man from the Arctic Circle room was standing over the dragon statue that Emily had moved across the room. His hand was on its head, and he was bent over it almost protectively.
Emily hurried past, causing him to glance up at her with a quizzical expression on his face. She’d hidden her bag with its camera and all its interesting pictures and notes in the library after leaving Charlie in her family’s suite, so she went there to claim it before bed. Her bag was on the third shelf from the left, tucked high between two stacks of Agatha Christie novels, first editions. She’d climbed on an old armchair and grabbed it when she heard a knock.
She glanced back at the door, but no one was there. No, the knocking was coming from inside the room. Still up on the chair, Emily scanned the library.
There. Through a few gaps in the shelves, she could see a man, suitcase stuck full of travel pins, wearing a stethoscope and tapping at the wall. One knock, then a step forward, then another two knocks. Searching.
Emily lowered herself off the chair as quietly as she could and tiptoed out of the library. Once out the door, she started running.
The bald man was gone when she reached the entry hall, but there was a short woman, probably one of the tour group, bent beside the carved door, peering at the locks. Emily’s eyes narrowed. Anna, the bald man, Suitcase Man, the short woman … it had not been easy for the Shaughnessys to get a reservation at Idlewood. They’d had to fight for it, and they did because they had a better reason than just “we need a vacation.”
It hadn’t occurred to Emily that the other guests might have motivations that were just as strong.
Ten rooms. Ten groups. How many of them had come for their own secret reasons? The treasure of Virginia Maines, if real, was a powerful draw.
But searching for that treasure the wrong way could damage an old and important house. Emily hurried to the Rome suite. Her parents needed to know what she’d seen. They’d know what to do.
“Mom! Dad!” she said as she came back into the room.
No answer. Her parents must still be at dinner, or going to see the pianist Mr. Llewellyn had brought in to play a selection of old music. Or maybe they were out collecting proof that Idlewood was a living photograph of the past.
Should she go get them? No. Here, alone in her family’s suite, Emily was sure she was overreacting. So what if Anna and Mr. Llewellyn and Suitcase Man and Short Lady and all the rest of the guests and even the rest of the world was against her? (Not that she knew they were.) Were they looking for treasure? Did they want to solve the mysteries of Idlewood? That was just fine.
Because come hell or high water, Emily Shaughnessy would do it first. She was better prepared than any of them. She’d been the one wandering the halls, documenting every room like the historian she was. If there was a clue in the house, she already had a picture of it.
Virginia Maines. Why had Anna mentioned that name?
Never mind. If Anna knew something, there was no time to lose. Emily pulled out her history book and the stacks of Polaroids she’d taken throughout the day and got to work.
8
SATURDAY MORNING dawned clear and pretty, and Charlie’s parents had remembered their idea about taking a prebreakfast hike on the Appalachian Trail. “It’s the perfect thing to wake up our appetites,” his dad said.
Charlie’s appetite wasn’t the only thing that needed waking. He’d gone to the library after dinner and stayed up late, searching for anything he could on the building and renovation of Idlewood. Emily had been right. The house had been built in the late 1800s, renovated for hotel use in the late 1920s, and Elaine Gardner oversaw the renovation, demanding that the house remain unchanged. Charlie assumed she wanted the house to be the same in case she ever got to live in it again. The man in charge of the day-to-day construction was named Silas Silver.
Could Silver have been the one to nail the original numbers on the doors and leave the clues in the Roman suite? It would be easy for him to do so, a few strokes of paint here, an order to rearrange numbers there. What was he trying to tell Charlie?
Charlie yawned as he followed his parents out onto the grounds. The pond had a thin layer of mist hanging over it, and the sun cut through it in strips. Pretty, but come on! It wasn’t helping him solve the puzzle.
He’d worked all night—or it felt that way—searching for the code word that would unlock the Caesar cipher. “Idlewood” didn’t work, nor did “Gardner,” “Elaine,” “Everett,” “Silver,” or any other name he could connect to the house.
This morning, he couldn’t stop thinking about those names, even though they were wrong. They kept circling in his brain.
Maybe it was good to get out of Idlewood. A walk would refresh his mind.
It wasn’t a long walk to the forest trail. A few other guests were out enjoying the morning. Braid Lady, now with her hair in a messy bun, was reading a book titled Monkeys, Mobsters, and More near the flower beds, and the man from the Sunglasses Couple was standing beside the tower, cradling something in his arms. When the man saw the Hendersons, he jolted and quickly stepped out of sight.
Charlie frowned. What was that about?
“Hurry up!” Anna called, and Charlie raced to join his family, who had pulled ahead.
As they hiked, Charlie had to smile. The only reason Anna wasn’t leading the pack was because she kept zigzagging across the trail, climbing rocks, examining trees, and glancing back at Idlewood with a distant look on her face. Like a bee buzzing from flower to flower or a pirate searching for treasure.
If Charlie had that kind of restless energy, maybe he would have figured out the code by now. Or figured out why the code mattered.
“Anna, get down from there!” his mom called about twenty minutes into the hike. “You’re going to get poison ivy.”
Anna, who had been using a thick vine to climb an old, gnarled tree, jumped down, grinning. “Any poison ivy that grew here has been dead for a long time.”
“That just means the vine is old and brittle,” their mom said. “Can’t you just stay on the path?”
“What fun would that be?” Charlie muttered. Anna flashed a smile in his direction as the Hendersons kept walking.
As their parents forged ahead, Anna dropped back to walk beside Charlie. “What was that?” she said, cupping an ear. “Am I right in assuming that you might be willing to climb the next one with me?”
Charlie’s stomach lurched just imagining it. “Um, not today.”
“Oh.” Anna’s face fell.
She wants me to. Really? Why? Charlie tried to pick at the problem that was Anna. “Maybe someday,” he said. “But … I kind of want to just enjoy the weekend.”
“Okay.” Anna jumped off the path to climb a rock.
Their parents stopped once they realized their kids had fallen behind. Charlie’s dad’s shoulders slumped as he saw his daughter perched on top of a rock. “Honey, I know Idlewood isn’t your dream vacation, but the longer we’re out here, the longer before we can eat breakfast.”
“Sounds like you managed to wake up your appetite,” Charlie said. He eyed the rock. It wasn’t that high.
“Yes, and I’d like to put it to sleep again.” His dad grimaced. “They have omelets, Anna! We can escape the house again later, but can we get a move on now?”
Anna shrugged, up there on her rock. “You go ahead. I just want a few minutes here.”
Charlie’s parents looked at each other, probably considering all the other times they’d left Anna unattended and something bad happened, going all the way back to Charlie’s first birthday, when they found Anna chin-deep in a bowl of blue icing, wearing half of it as well as a big grin.
But now Charlie was surprised to see Anna gazing at Idlewood with a dreamy frown. She won’t cause trouble this time, he thought. There’s more going on than meets the eye.
So he did the only thing he could think to do: squeeze his lips together and clamber up on the rock with Anna. “I’d like a few minutes, too,” he said. “It’s nice out here.”
“Okay, if you’re sure,” his mom said, and when Charlie nodded, their parents turned and went back to the house.
Charlie glanced down. Whoa. The rock hadn’t seemed so high from down there. He turned his attention to counting the shiny flecks of mica in the stone.
“You didn’t have to do that,” Anna said.
Charlie risked a look at his sister. She was digging a stick into a crack in the rock.
“I wanted to,” he said.
“Really?”
“Yeah.” He patted the stone. “It’s a good rock. I wonder how long it’s been here.” Maybe his mysterious code-maker had come out here for lunch. It would be a good private place to plan a cipher, away from the house, surrounded by trees.
Thinking about that kept him from focusing on how high up he was.
Anna smiled. “I know! Imagine who else might have climbed this rock. She probably came here all the time.”
She? Mrs. Gardner? Was she the one to set the clue in the doors, if it wasn’t Mr. Silver? “We should bring Emily out here,” Charlie said. “She knows a lot about the house.”
And with that, Anna’s smile vanished. “Oh. Emily. How did you meet her, again?”
“I went to see the Rome suite,” Charlie explained. “Her family is staying there, so she let me in. It was pretty easy.”
“Right,” Anna said. “I should have asked permission. I know. You don’t have to tell me.”
“I wasn’t,” Charlie started. He’d thought he was doing so well, but then he had to go and mention Emily. That seemed to be when things went wrong.
But it was fine. He could fix it.
Charlie opened his mouth to tell Anna about the code he’d found, but he stopped himself. Talking about codes wouldn’t fix whatever he’d put between Anna and himself—she’d think puzzling over numbers was dorky. But she liked climbing rocks and exploring rooms. So maybe talk about that?
“I wish I’d gone with you,” he said, feeling the awkward shape of the lie in his mouth. “To see the rooms. I bet they were pretty amazing.”
Or maybe it wasn’t a lie. Charlie was glad he hadn’t gotten into trouble, but he did want to see the rooms. Maybe the key to the code was in one of them.
“Yeah, they were,” Anna said. “Rosie and Xavier have one with the northern lights painted on the ceiling, and then there was one designed to look like the inside of an airplane.”
“Sounds cool. Cool, but really … gray.”
Anna shrugged, sliding a foot off the edge of the rock. “Not entirely. There were windows painted with blue outside, and the border around the baseboards had a bunch of red dragons on it.”
She fell still, then a smile grew across her face. Anna laughed, jumping off the rock. “Now I get it,” she whispered when she landed, just loud enough for Charlie to hear it.
