Labyrinth Society (7 page)

Once she chilled out, Mia told us, in one long breathless rush, what happened at her last foster home and what Devon had told her in the attic.

"I'm not a thief, you guys! I swear!" Mia sounded like she might cry.

We knew she wasn't a thief because Mrs. T. would have hardly let her come live with us if she thought for even a minute she couldn't be trusted. We're real big on trust in our business. Lily put an arm around Mia and we all took turns jumping all over Devon's case, which didn't faze her one little bit.

"And I'd do it all again," Devon said, rubbing both sides of her head and probing her scalp for hair loss. "Isn't the first thing they teach us is to protect the Society at all costs? Mrs. T. said not to tell her, so I didn't tell her!" said Devon defiantly.

I noticed she was staying out of arm's reach of Mia who still had steam coming out of her ears, not to mention more than a few strands of long blonde hair dangling from between her clenched fists. We were all silent for a few long awkward minutes. Devon was right. We are supposed to protect the Society. It was lesson number one. But Devon had no business lying to Mia and making her think we didn't trust her.

Alex finally consulted his watch and spoke up. "Mia, sweetheart, I know you've got loads more questions. They'll have to wait though, because we've got a necklace to track down and we're already behind schedule."

"What are you looking for? Can I help?" Mia asked, perking up considerably. "I may as well, since I'm already here."

This was the first time she seemed genuinely excited about anything since I'd met her. It was a good sign and Lily and I exchanged relieved looks. We're a tight-knit group, and always have each other's back. Morgan "the Flake" Lake turning out to be such a disaster was a real blow, not to mention the wasted time it took to train her.

"No!" Devon wailed. "You haven't been trained and you'll just mess things up. You can wait here for us until we get back."

"Not so fast, Dev," said Alex, holding up a hand. "A little on-the-job training might not be a bad idea, and we could use the extra help."

Devon stalked off in a huff, and the rest of us got busy quickly filling Mia in on our mission. We had been hired by the Price Institute, a small privately funded museum in London, to track down a necklace owned by Marie Antoinette. It went missing during the French Revolution. The journal of a French priest named Father Jean Billon was found in the museum's storage a while ago. It had only recently been translated; it made mention of the necklace.

Marie Antoinette gave a lot of her jewelry to friends for safe keeping with plans to get it all back after the revolution ended. This particular necklace was given to the captain of the palace guard, a man named Pierre Garrin, to take to one of the queen's close friends. It never made it because as he was leaving, the palace was stormed by an angry mob. They attacked him and left him for dead. The royal family was taken to Paris and put under house arrest. His daughter, Avril, found him. Before he died, he gave the necklace to Avril. She held on to it, planning to return it to the queen herself after the revolution ended, thus hoping to earn herself a place at the royal court.

However, after Marie Antoinette's execution, Avril got sick and died of tuberculosis. Father Jean Billon gave Avril her last rights; before she died, she told him about the necklace and how she'd given it to someone closely connected to the queen, who'd hidden it. According to the journal, when Father Billon asked Avril Garrin where the necklace was she said:
Le chemin que Renee La Faussi a marché mènera la manière
. Translation: The path Renee LaFaussi walked will lead the way. We had no idea who this Renee person was or what path she walked. As for the necklace, the only description we had of it was from the journal. It was described as having a flat octagonal shaped pendant made of platinum and pearls.

"So how are you going to track down a necklace when you know so little about it?" Mia asked us.

"Same way we track down everything — teamwork," said Alex smiling.

"Actually, we're going to split up, Mia," said Lily pulling a blue blazer with a gold crest on the right breast pocket from her backpack. "Devon and I are going inside the palace to try find a painting of Marie Antoinette wearing the necklace, since we haven't turned up any paintings of her wearing a necklace with an octagonal shaped pendant, while Tomi and Alex head over to the Church of Saint Cecelia. We're going to search birth and death records to see if anyone named Renee LaFaussi even existed. We haven't found a trace of this person in our research so far."

"What's with the blazer?" Mia asked.

"We think the painting is in the private apartments of the queen, which aren't included on the regular tour. We're hoping a lot of the personal paintings of Marie Antoinette, the ones not commissioned as PR to improve her funky image as the Queen of Debt, are in her private rooms. You have to get here early and wait in a long line to see those rooms unless you already have a tour booked in advance, which we don't," I explained.

"Yeah, Devon hacked into Versailles computer system and found out a private girl's school from Connecticut called St. Albans is here on a class trip and is scheduled for a tour today, which includes the queen's private apartments. Me and Devon are going to pose as St. Albans students so we can get into to the palace with their group to search for any portrait showing Marie Antoinette wearing this necklace," Lily said, putting on the blazer and fluffing out her wavy hair.

Before Mia could ask anything else, Devon came running back to where we were. She was already dressed in her blue blazer. "Come on, Lily, St. Albans's bus just pulled into the parking lot."

"Hold up," said Alex before the pair of them could leave. "Actually, I think it would be better if Lily went with us to the church. We'll need all the help we can get searching through all those records. Plus, Lily speaks a little French, which will help us out a lot. Mia, you can go with Devon to look for the painting."

Devon's mouth fell open. "You can't be serious! She'll just slow me down! She doesn't know what she's doing!"

"How hard can it be to look for a painting? Sounds pretty easy to me," Mia said happily putting on the blazer Lily had, with great reluctance, just taken off.

Lily was struggling not to look mad and failing miserably. She shot Alex an evil look and would barely look at Mia. I'm betting she wasn't so happy she'd taken the French class I talked her into last summer. I couldn't blame Lily for being disappointed. I'd take touring the palace of Versailles over searching through a bunch of boring old records in a musty church basement any day. But I was also the only one who spoke fluent French, so I was the one who'd have to deal with the priest at the church where the records were kept. It was an important job, but hardly an exciting one.

"If we find the necklace in enough time, maybe we can all see the palace before we go," I added hoping to appease everybody. I hate conflict of any kind. It's so bad for the digestion. I'm allergic to drama. So, I'm always the peacemaker when trouble rears its ugly head. Plus, I was still feeling jumpy from the brawl we'd just broken up.

"This ain't a field trip, Tomi," Alex said irritably. "We're here to work. Now, let's get crackin'. We'll meet back here in two hours."

See, told you so. All work and no play. The four of us silently followed Alex out of the maze and split up once we got to the palace's crowded cobblestoned courtyard. Lily, Alex, and I passed a group of about fifty talking and laughing teenage girls wearing blue St. Albans blazers on our way to the crowded vendor-filled parking lot. Through the palace's ornate wrought iron gates, a ticked-off looking Devon and an excited Mia lurked in a nearby doorway waiting to join them. Mia was a little too excited, which worried me. Alex was right. This wasn't a field trip, or a game, and for the first time I regretted not telling her more. I sure hoped Alex knew what he was doing. ‘Cause Devon could end up bald.

"This is just great!" exclaimed Alex as he rattled the handle on the Church of Saint Cecelia's large wooden front door. St. Cecelia's was the only church in Versailles with the birth and death records for the years we needed to track down Renee LaFausse. And now there was a locked door between those records and us. Alex glared at me.

"Hey! It's not my fault," I protested. "They didn't say anything about it being closed when I called here two days ago."

Okay, I lied. I meant to call, truly I did. But I forgot. I didn't think it would be a big deal. I mean how was I supposed to know a church would be closed on a Sunday? And I knew I should 'fess up and admit I'd forgotten to call. Believe me, I could feel the tiny teeth of my lie embedded in my buns. But Alex would go ballistic and it wouldn't change the fact the church was closed. According to the sign on the door, it was closed for repairs to the roof and wouldn't be open again until the following Sunday. Alex ran down the church's steps, shaded his eyes and peered up. Lily and I followed him.

"Roof looks fine to me," he exclaimed irritably. "And where are the roofers?" He was right. There were no roofers to be found anywhere. And no repairs of any kind were being done to the church.

"Uh, guys. It's Sunday, remember," pointed out Lily. "What idiots would be working today?"

"You mean besides us?" I said, cutting Alex a look. He was too busy scowling up at the roof to notice.

Don't get me wrong. I adore Alex… most of the time. He was fun to be around and always watched out for us, especially when we were on a job. He kept us safe, and when he was around we all worked together like a well-oiled machine. But when it came to his precious schedule, he had tunnel vision. He had our missions planned out down to the last second. The only problem was when things didn't go as planned, Alex got cranky because he hated having to wing it.

"So now what?" asked Lily, following Alex back up the church steps and watching while he glared at the locked church door like he could scare it into opening.

"Desperate times call for desperate measures," he replied. He took his backpack, or his rucksack as he called it, off and rummaged through it until he found his lock picking kit.

"Are you crazy?" whispered Lily. "We are not going to break into a church. We may as well take an express elevator straight to H-E-L-L." She made an L with her thumb and index finger and tapped it twice against her forehead. I coughed to keep from laughing. Alex didn't realize she'd just called him a loser in sign language.

"Says the girl who hasn't been to mass since her granddad went into the home," snapped Alex. Lily turned bright red, and she and Alex launched into full scale bickering, which is so bad for a person's attitude.

A group of old French women walked by carrying canvas bags filled with groceries. They stopped to stare at Lily and Alex and were whispering amongst themselves and giving the three of us dirty looks as Alex and Lily continued to bicker. Not cool. We were attracting way too much attention.

"
Bonjour mesdames
!" I gave the ladies a wave and a smile. And they crossed themselves and hurried off down the street.

I left Alex and Lily, who were still arguing, and walked around to the side of the church. There was a narrow alley between the church and the building next door. A little further on, there was a set of steps leading down to a doorway. It was probably the church basement and I bet the records we needed were down there. Looking around to make sure no one was watching, I headed down the steps and jiggled the doorknob. I couldn't believe it when it turned. The door was unlocked. I pushed and it opened halfway with a loud creak. I hesitated. I hadn't picked the lock, but would going inside a closed church be the same as breaking in? Besides, if rule number one was to protect the society at all costs, rule number two was don't get into trouble with the law. One of us girls getting arrested in a foreign country would cause Mrs. T. a lot of aggravation, not to mention attracting a lot of attention. I didn't know what France's equivalent to juvie was, but something told me spending time there wouldn't exactly be life affirming.

I was still standing in the basement doorway when a long, loud moan came from inside. I was so startled I jumped back and scraped my elbow on the brick wall behind me. Ow! Then I heard it again. Only this time it wasn't a moan. It was a man's voice.

"
Aidez-moi
," the man called out. "
Aidez-moi
!"

Help me? He was calling for help. I screamed for Alex and Lily before pushing open the door all the way and rushing inside. Even with the light streaming in from outside, it was dark in the basement. My eyes took a few seconds to adjust to the darkness. And I had just spotted a figure lying on the floor several feet from the door when Alex and Lily came rushing in behind me.

"Blimey!" said Alex, running over to the person on the floor, who turned out to be a priest.

He was lying on his side near another set of steps leading up into the church. I spotted a light switch on the wall behind him and ran to flip the switch. Once the lights were on, I could see there was a big gash over the priest's right eye and his lip was split. There were papers and folders all over the floor. Big filing cabinets lining the basement walls had been overturned. I asked him in French what had happened. His eyes got big and he started pointing up the steps.

"
Les hommes chauves! Les hommes chauves
!" the priest kept saying.

"What's he saying?" asked Alex.

"He keeps saying the bald men, the bald men," I said. He kept trying to sit up but we couldn't tell how hurt he was and kept pushing him back down.

I asked him if these men had hurt him.

"
Oui
," he replied. "
Voleurs dans les archives
!"

"Thieves in the archives!" I said, and suddenly Alex was on his feet and headed up the steps.

"You lot stay here. Call the cops and see what else you can get out of him before they get here."

"Be careful," Lily called out after him then pulled out her cell phone.

"Can you hear me, Father?" I asked the priest in French. His eyes focused on my face but he didn't speak. I tried again. "What's your name?"

"Pere…Pere Alain Crozier," he replied.

"Father Crozier, my name is Tomi. Do you know what the men were looking for?"

"
Voleurs
!" he said, getting all riled up again.

"Were they looking for information about Father Billon?" I asked on a whim. I figured since he was a priest, too, he might have heard of him. The name seemed to get his attention. His eyes got big. I got the feeling he knew exactly what I was talking about.

"Do you know anything about Renee LaFaussi or Marie Antoinette's necklace?"

He didn't answer and turned his head away. So, he did know what I was talking about.

"I swear we don't want it for ourselves, Father," I assured him. "We work for a society searching for lost artifacts and historical stuff for museums." I said. But he just blinked.

I started to ask him another question when Lily started yelling into the phone in broken French even I could barely understand. I started to grab the phone out of her hand when the priest grabbed my arm. From inside the pocket of his long black robe, he pulled out a card and pressed it into my hand. Then he grabbed the front of my shirt and pulled me roughly towards him.

"
Recherchez le chat noir
," he whispered and then passed out.

Look for the black cat? I was confused. Did this guy just asked me to find his cat?

We were long gone before the police got there. I flagged down a passerby to sit with Father Crozier before we took off. Alex had searched the church and found no men but discovered the priest's office had also been ransacked. Someone was looking for something, and we knew whoever had broken into the church and attacked the priest was looking for the exact same thing we were.

"How would anyone else even know about Marie Antoinette's necklace?" asked Lily. “The Price Institute said they just found out about it and we were the first people they called.”

"What I wanna know is how they knew to come here? They must have all the same info we do," said Alex, looking like he was ready to punch someone.

"Do you think they hacked into our computer?" I asked.

"The firewall security at the estate is top of the line," said Alex, his forehead was wrinkled in concentration.

"Yeah," added Lilly. "Devon's been trying to hack it since it was installed, and if she can't get past it, no one can."

Alex and Lily were still talking and we were waiting for the traffic light to change to cross the street, when I noticed a black SUV with tinted windows. It was parked at the curb about half a block behind us. We crossed the street and something told me to look back. The SUV was now following us. We walked another half a block with the SUV still trailing us when I finally nudged Alex and whispered for him to look back.

"Looks like we've got company, ladies."

No sooner had Alex spoken than the SUV parked at the curb. The passenger side door opened and out stepped a woman with short white hair wearing a pink suit and a straw hat with flowers and a pink ribbon on the brim like she was on her way to a garden party. We recognized her immediately. Suddenly it was all crystal clear.

"Good day, Mr. Duncan, girls. Please excuse me if I don't recall your names, but I do believe you have something of mine," said Dr. Regina McFarland.

A long time ago, Dr. McFarland used to be an archeologist, and a colleague of Mrs. T.'s husband Dr. Tarpley, until she got caught selling antiquities on the black market. Now she was nothing more than a treasure hunter who sold art and antiquities to the highest bidder and didn't care how they'd been acquired or where they'd come from. Mrs. T. called her a vulture. To anybody else she was probably just some old lady. But if you got closer you saw where her right hand should have been was a metal hook. She also had a deep scar running from the corner of her left eye through her cheek and down to her chin. A black pipe hung out of her mouth. She could have been Captain Hook's mother. Not nice, I know, but it's still the truth. I didn't even want to think about how bad her karma must be.

"What are you on about?" asked Alex, stepping in front of us and towards McFarland. Alex hadn't got within a few feet of the old woman when two bald guys as big as linebackers jumped out of the backseat. Guess now we knew who'd beaten up the priest and trashed the church archives.

"There's a journal in your possession belonging to me," McFarland said, taking the pipe out of her mouth.

I couldn't believe it. How did she know about Father Billon's Journal? The Journal was in my backpack. I tried hard to keep my expression neutral so she wouldn't know I had it.

"Journal? What journal?" asked Alex.

"The Journal the Price Institute gave you, of course," she rolled her eyes in exasperation. "I gave it to them to authenticate for me. They had no right to give it to you. And I want it back."

"Don't be daft. We don't know anything about any journal. Me and the girls are here on holiday, right girls?" Lily and I just nodded. McFarland sighed impatiently.

"I don't have time for this nonsense. Roy, Max search their bags," she commanded, motioning to her goons.

The big bald guy closest to me reached out and grabbed my backpack. But I grabbed one of the straps and pulled back with all my might. He jerked the backpack so hard a couple of my fingernails broke when he ripped it out of my hands. Then he shoved me and I went flying backwards and landed on the sidewalk hard on my butt.

"Ow! Dude! I weigh ninety pounds!" Bald Guy actually laughed and I thought Lily was going to burst a blood vessel.

"Hey, Cue Ball!" shouted Lily. She lifted her right knee almost to her chin. Her arms were up and tucked close to her upper torso. Her hands were fisted. She pointed her toe, leaned back, pivoted on her left foot, turned out her hip, and landed a perfect roundhouse kick in Bald Guy's face. Her leg snapped out and back so fast it was a blur.

He instantly dropped my backpack and clutched his nose. Blood streamed from between his fingers. He flew at Lily in a rage. But before he could get his hands around her neck, I jumped up and kicked him hard in his left kneecap I leaned back and put all my weight, and some serious anger, into it, just like Lily once taught me. I know I said I wasn't a fan of senseless violence. But, kicking this guy made a whole lot of sense to me.

Bald Guy had only winced when Lily kicked him in the face. But he screamed and grabbed his knee when I kicked him. Lily tried to deliver a swift karate chop to the back of his thick neck but her hand kept bouncing off. Bald Guy kept grabbing for Lily with one hand, while protecting his good knee with his other. Finally — in a very un-karate like move — she clasped her hands together in one big fist and swung out like she was swinging a tennis racket, connecting with Bald Guy's jaw, and knocking him out cold. Note to self: Never tick off Lily.

Alex was holding his own against the other guy who was wearing a gold tracksuit, which matched my high-tops perfectly. When tracksuit guy punched Alex in the stomach, Lily and I started to run over to help him. But Alex, who was now pinned against the side of SUV, shook his head at us.