Chapter 24: Not-So-Good Morning

It wasn’t an exact mirror image, but it was close.  At seven o’clock the next morning, Drew Lawrence opened his door and glanced down the hallway to his right.  At exactly the same time, Renee Lawrence opened her door and glanced down the hallway to her left.

“Renee,” whispered Drew.  “Do you have any idea where Edward is?”

“No,” said Renee.  “I was going to ask you the same thing about Carol.”

“She’s not around either?” said Drew.  “That’s funny.  I wonder where they went.”

Renee shrugged.  “I hope they’re alright.”

“Odd,” said Drew.  “Maybe they’re already downstairs for breakfast.”

There was no sign of the two downstairs, though.  Schlegel and Bourdon were already there, eating and having an argument about cars.

“You can park twice as many of them on the street as you can a regular car,” said Bourdon.  “They save so much space!”

“Sure, they do,” said Schlegel.  “A Fiat also takes less space in the junkyard after a truck bulldozes it because the driver couldn’t see it.”

“That could happen to any car,” Bourdon argued.

“True, but with others, you at least have some chance of survival,” said Schlegel.

“Good morning,” said Mr. Hallett, wandering into the room.  He sat down and began helping himself to a plate of pancakes on the table.  “How is everybody?”

Schlegel dropped his glass of orange juice.  “Drat!” he said, his voice sounding a little distant.  “Better before I dropped this, John.”

“Here, let me get you some napkins,” offered Mr. Hallett.

“Thank you, but I can clean this up myself,” said Schlegel, staring at Mr. Hallett with a queer expression.  “Sleep alright last night?”

“Sure, I slept fine,” said Mr. Hallett.  “What about you?”

“Yes,” said Schlegel, mopping up the last few drops.  He began chewing a pancake thoughtfully—until he accidentally bit the tip off his fork.

“I’m glad you’re here,” said Bourdon.  “I can’t seem to make Schlegel here understand the practicality of Fiats.”

Mr. Hallett laughed.  “You’re on your own, Jean-Luc,” he said.  “I can’t understand it myself.  Where are Carol and Edward?” he asked his “children.”  “Are they still sleeping?”

“We don’t know,” said Drew.  “Edward wasn’t around when I woke up.”

“Neither was Carol,” said Renee.

Schlegel stared at the group with a look of intense contemplation.  Then, he started, as if an idea had just come to him.  As soon as that look had crossed his face, it was gone, and he was back to his pancakes.

“Not around?” said Mr. Hallett.  “That’s funny.  I don’t know where they are, either.  Did they leave a note or anything?”

“Carol might have,” admitted Renee.  “I didn’t search the room that carefully.”

“Hopefully they didn’t go exploring,” said Schlegel.  “California can be a dangerous place at night.”

“Oh, I’m sure they didn’t,” said Mr. Hallett.  “Carol and Edward are way too responsible for that.”  I think, he thought to himself, though I’m really not sure.

“Morning, dear,” said Mrs. Hallett.  “Where are Carol and Edward?”

“I was just going to ask you that,” said Mr. Hallett.  “They’re missing.”

“Missing?”

“We don’t know that for sure,” said Drew.  He laughed.  “Maybe they got up for an early round of billiards.”

“Peculiar,” said Mr. Hallett.  “Steve, have you seen Carol or Edward this morning?”

“Good morning, John,” said Blaine, walking in.  “No, I haven’t.  Why?”

“Excuse me,” said Schlegel, pushing past Blaine and heading through the door.

Bourdon poured himself another cup of coffee.  “Ah, cappuccino!” he said.  “You light up my mornings like none other can!”

“I wouldn’t worry, John,” said Blaine, sitting down.  “This is a big house.  They’ll probably turn up sooner or later.  I think they’re old enough to take care of themselves.”

Schlegel returned.  “Hey!” he said.  “Where’s my car?”

“Your car?” said Blaine.  “The BMW?  Wasn’t it in the garage?”

“It’s not there now,” said Schlegel.  “I just checked.”

“Don’t look at me!” said Bourdon.  “It was too big for me!”

“I didn’t use it,” said Hallett.  “I haven’t been to town since yesterday.”

“Did your wife take it?” Blaine asked.

“No, she’s still sleeping,” said Schlegel.  “I’m going to call the police!  That’s a valuable car.  It’s a special edition!  If your petty California auto thieves so much as scratch the door, I’ll hold you responsible, Blaine!”  With that, he stomped out of the room.

“Missing kids and stolen cars,” said Blaine.  “What a morning!”

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

By ten o’clock, there was still no sign of Carol, Edward, or the missing car.  The police were looking for the car.  They were not searching for Carol or Edward.  Mr. and Mrs. Hallett hadn’t told the police about them, thinking their “children” might be off doing spy work.  Schlegel had agreed, when he’d heard they weren’t planning to tell.

“It’s too early,” he said.  “They have to be missing at least 48 hours for you to file a missing persons report.  We all saw them at dinner last night.”

All the police had discovered, so far, was that whoever had taken the car had made a strangely sharp turn to get past the front gate.  They had no other leads and had left to investigate other cases.

Drew borrowed the Quattroporte and headed out for a drive, hoping to find out himself what had happened to his siblings.  Renee, meanwhile, remained at the Blaine mansion.  She searched her room thoroughly, only to find that Carol had left her compact.  She did remember how Carol had moved her bed the night before.

“As if she was waiting for something,” Renee thought to herself, “but what?”

Renee’s fancy gadget was a stuffed purple unicorn.  The heart on its chest slid open to reveal a computer screen.  She activated it and reported Carol and Edward’s disappearance back to Washington.  She’d just put the unicorn back in its hiding place when the door opened and a familiar figure came in.

“Carol!  Where were you?”

Renee’s older sister looked tired, disheveled, and worried.  Urgently, she put a finger to her lips.  She grabbed a notepad and wrote, “Where’s Schlegel?”

Renee read it and shrugged.  “Probably in his room.  Why?” she wrote.

Carol took back the notepad and wrote two words.  “It’s him.”

“Really?” Renee mouthed.

Carol nodded.

“You and Edward—” Renee mouthed.

Carol nodded again.  She walked over to her compact and picked it up.  Flipping it open, she placed her fingerprint on the scanner.  However, the device wasn’t going to work this time.

Low Battery flashed the screen before going black.

Carol grimaced and turned to her sister.  “May I borrow your unicorn?” she mouthed.

Renee nodded and went to get it.  Carol, meanwhile, flopped down on her bed.  She drummed her fingers nervously against the bedpost, anxious to report to Washington.

Then, the door flew open.

“Schlegel!” exclaimed Carol.

“Did you have a nice ride last night?” Schlegel asked.

“What ride—”

“Don’t ‘what ride’ me.  You know full well what I’m talking about.  Very clever.”  Schlegel rubbed his hands.  “I was sure it would be your father in that car last night, not you and your brother.  I never suspected you all until this morning.  You had me going for a while.  It’s all four of you, right?”

Carol gulped.

“That’s all I need to know,” said Schlegel.  “My boss will be very happy to know.”

“Germany?” asked Carol.

Schlegel laughed.  “Hah!  You think?  No, Germany’s my cover scheme.  I’m an official ambassador for them, but my loyalty’s with the Donnerreich.”

“The Donnerreich?”

“You’ll be one of the first Americans to know.  We’re a small but powerful subset of the German navy.  Originally, we were a special squad, assigned to only the most important missions.  We carried out our job so well, the government allowed us to work without supervision.  That played right into our hands.  We longed to make Germany an even greater world power, and that’s what we’ve set out to do.  Right now, we’re in the building stage.  Once we’re ready, we’ll go out and conquer.  By the time we’re done, the Germans will be happy to hand over full power to us, and we will be totally and completely in charge.”

“So that’s why those submarines weren’t accounted for at the Graz Conference,” said Carol.

“You’ve got it,” said Schlegel.  “One of them is docked just off the coast at this moment, in fact.  The moment your Mr. Blaine finishes his invention, those plans will be transferred to it.  The American government will never see them.

“Unfortunately,” he continued, “I can’t have you running around telling everybody about this.  You understand, of course.  A car accident would have been the perfect way to get rid of you, but there are other ways.  For you, I think we’ll use an overdose on allergy medi—HUH!”

Schlegel clasped a hand to his side before collapsing, unconscious.

The vent popped open on the ceiling, and Renee dropped out of her hiding place, unicorn in hand.  “I think you heard all that,” she said to her gadget.  “We’ve got him under control now.  Carol and I will—oops, it looks like she’s fainted.”

Don’t blame Carol.  She’d been through a lot over the past twelve hours.