The King's Clue

Chapter 1

The last place Amy had expected to go searching for clues was this tiny Elvis Presley museum. An older woman greeted them. After her experience with Isabel Kabra in Australia, Amy was suspicious of the woman. Dan must have noticed because he whispered, "Just relax, okay Amy? Keep an eye on your valuables this time." Amy said nothing but put a hand protectively over the jade necklace Grace had always worn.

./\/\/\/\/\.

They walked past shelf after shelf of Elvis everything.

Man, some of this stuff would be great in my collection, thought Dan. But wait. There was no collection anymore. He had sold all his stuff at the pawn shop back in Boston. Except for a few things. Yes, there were still a couple pieces of Dan's collection with him.

Dan hoped that there wouldn't be any Cahills at Graceland, because he and Amy had only come here after she remembered something they had seen in Grace's mansion. Hopefully none of the Cahills had noticed this small detail. Grace always kept a few records in her house,and most of them were by Elvis Presley. Amy had remembered seeing Grace's writing on one of the albums, Blue Hawaii. It said, "Elvis was in the hunt" They didn't know exactly what to look for, but Graceland, Elvis' former home, seemed like the most likely place to find any secrets belonging to "The King".

Back at their hotel room, Dan wondered whether suffering through yet another museum had accomplished anything.

"What do we know, Amy? We have no idea what we're supposed to be looking for!"

"The museum didn't do us any good, but I have an idea. I need to see the cover of Blue Hawaii. Look it up on your laptop."

Dan pulled his laptop out of the backpack. He pressed the power button. Nothing happened. He did it again. Nothing happened. "Uh-oh."

"What, Dan?" said Amy.

"I think the laptop's battery is gone!"

"Say what?" yelled Nellie over her blasting iPod.

"I said the laptop's battery is gone!"

"What happened to it?"

"I don't know! Now I have to buy another battery. I haven't had my laptop out of the case since Australia. Do you think our dear relatives have been following us?"

"There's no way unless we have another tracking device in our luggage. Or on Saladin. Let's check our backpacks."

Amy and Dan checked their backpacks for anything suspicious, but found nothing. Hopefully we're just being paranoid, thought Dan. They agreed to keep an extra sharp eye out for other Cahills.

"Nellie!" yelled Dan.

"What?"

"We need to go to Staples!"

"Let's go then!"

./\/\/\/\/\.

At Staples Dan noticed a limo speeding away from the parking lot.

"I think we have company, Amy," said Dan, pointing to the limo.

"Let's hurry up and get the battery," she replied.

When Nellie opened the door to the hotel room, she exclaimed, "Whoa!"

Their hotel room had been ransacked. Everything was gone, and the hotel furnishings that remained were overturned and scratched.

"Great! Just peachy! The hotel will charge us for all this destroyed stuff! We're lucky that you brought the laptop with us to Staples, Dan or it would be gone too. We better leave before anyone finds out. Also, we have to buy new clothes!"

They left the hotel without any hitches. Dan wondered who the limo at Staples had belonged to. After putting a new battery in the laptop, he found the cover of the album Blue Hawaii by Elvis Presley.

"Here it is Amy!"

Amy came over to look at the cover.

"What do you think, Amy? Any wonderfully geeky ideas coming to mind yet?"

"Shut up, Dan! I think that there's a reason Grace chose that album. Notice that she picked one with a location in the title? I bet she meant that the clue is in Hawaii!"

"That's great, but how are we going to find it when we get to Hawaii? I don't think Elvis ever lived there or anything."

"I don't know either, but I just remembered something. When Grace plated this album to me, she didn't start it on the first song. I bet that it would help if I could remember which one it was."

Nellie didn't listen to Dan and Amy's conversation until she heard, "...when we get to Hawaii..."

"Are we going to Hawaii? I'm suddenly starving for food made with coconuts!"

"I think that we should go to Hawaii. What do you think, Dan? And do you have any other ideas about the clue?"

"I guess we'll just go to Hawaii and take it from there. I bet you're going to want to buy lots of books about Elvis and Hawaii before we leave, right?"

"Maybe..."

"Good thing we have cash from the Cobras and the Visa gold card. I think there's $40,000 left on the Visa."

./\/\/\/\/\.

Meanwhile in the Kabras' limo...

"Ian! Where are the Cahill brats now?"

"They are getting in that horrid rental car. Why does the nanny insist on getting the slowest, ugliest cars?"

"Who cares? Driver, follow them!"

At Staples, Natalie and Ian followed the Cahills and Nellie as inconspicuously as they could. Ian was confident they hadn't been noticed. All they did was buy a new laptop battery. The Kabras left Staples minutes after the Cahills.

"Good job, Drew," Ian told their butler, examining the items Drew had found in the Cahills' hotel room.

"I searched everything, Mr. Kabra. There was nothing else to find. I would have taken their computer, but that annoying boy decided to take it with him."

"I don't think that any of this is related to the clues, Drew."

"Yes, I agree. What a shame."

Natalie chose this time to interrupt their conversation. "When are we going to make our move, Ian?" she demanded.

"You haven't much time to wait, Natalie."

Author's Note: Sorry Ian and Natalie didn't do much here. I just wanted to make sure they weren't OOC. Don't worry; they'll be more exciting later!