A/N: The cheapskate has returned! :P
Nancy woke up early the next morning already pumped up and ready to go. Getting out of bed she slipped on a bathrobe, opened the door, and walked down the hall to Frank and Joe's door. She knocked. "Let's get up guys! We need to get to Fort de Buoux!"
"It's five-thirty!" came Joe's muffled exclamation. "I'm not even going with you two."
Nancy sighed and walked in. Joe was sitting up and rubbing his eyes while Frank had a pillow over his head. "You're going to the library," Nancy replied in an annoyed voice. "You need to get up early enough so that you have plenty of time to find out where your Edward V was buried, and don't give me junk about not being able to find it in the books. If you look hard enough you're bound to find something."
"All right, Nancy," came Frank's voice. It wasn't exactly annoyed but you could tell that he wasn't exactly a morning person. "We'll be right up." He pushed back the covers, got out of bed and proceeded to fumble around for his bathroom supplies.
"Good!" Nancy said in a pleased voice. She left their room shutting the door behind her. Returning quickly to her room, Nancy quickly took a shower and was finished eating a quick breakfast of cereal as Frank and Joe arrived in the kitchen.
"Just give us five minutes or so," Frank yawned, "and we'll be ready to go with you." They sat down and under Nancy's intense gaze quickly ate their cereal which Nancy had already laid out.
In what seemed like no time at all Frank and Nancy found themselves walking up the narrow and steep path towards the Fort. "Do you think there might be something in those ancient burial grounds? Frank asked. "If Joe is right, maybe the cache is buried with someone or disguised as a burial."
"Was Edward V buried in France?" Nancy asked, already knowing the answer. "Claude is the key! He was right in front of me and we overlooked him. I had a dream last night! In it was this little boy carving that same figurine that is one of the clues. He was sitting on that staircase carving just like we saw him. During World War II, Claude would have been a boy that old."
"It doesn't seem like good detective work to base everything on a dream," Frank pointed out as they passed the rock on which Joe had 'conveniently' slipped on their first visit. "I think that you've just kind of gotten set on this Claude guy a little too much.
"We'll see who is right when we get to Claude then," Nancy announced. "I'll be that we go right up to him and he might be able to tell us exactly where the cache is!"
*
Grumbling, Joe exited the house and limped down the street to where he could catch the next bus to the local library. As he slowly walked his mind swirled with facts and possibilities. Where was the cache? Footsteps seemed to sound behind him. Joe whirled around quickly to see who was out on the street at this hour. There was no one in sight.
Frowning he turned around and continued to walk. The footsteps continued, or maybe it was his imagination. Every time he turned around there was no one in sight. With relief he finally arrived at the bus stop just as the bus arrived.
The ride to the library was even more tedious. Almost every single face on the bus seemed familiar to him. What was going on?
*
Frank and Nancy were the first tourists of the day to arrive at the small gate-house. "Early birds," the gate guard commented. A different one this time. They paid their admission and Nancy dragged Frank towards the fort in which the spiral staircase that had been in her dream was. They arrived, but there was no Claude.
"Where is he?" Frank asked.
Nancy shrugged, "The gate guard the other day could have sworn that Claude spent all of his time here."
"Maybe this guard will know something." Frank suggested.
The pair made their way back to the gate booth to question the guard. "There's a recluse who spends a lot of time here isn't there?" Nancy asked. "Wasn't his name Claude?"
The guard scratched his head, "You mean that he isn't on the staircase?"
Nancy nodded, "Precisely, where is he?"
"I couldn't say," the guard answered in a sociable voice. "Sometimes he disappears for a while and then he comes back. You know, he was around during the war. I'm quite the war buff myself. They say that his parents were spies and all that. This is one of the places in which they spent a whole lot of time."
Nancy cut in before the guard could go on, "What would make him disappear? Do you have any idea?"
"I don't know for sure," the guard replied as he stepped in the booth to grab a take-out foam cup of coffee. "The other guards and I have a theory though."
"What is it?" Frank asked. He was now interested in Claude as well. This had all sparked his interest.
"Well you see, when Claude was a young boy he could usually get around without making a whole lot of noise. That and the fact that he was small and considered insignificant due to his you know, mental problems. Anyway, they say that Claude used to be a guard, sort of a sentry who could raise the alarm or something."
"He couldn't even defend himself at that age!" Nancy exclaimed. "Why would they make him a guard?"
"Well, not like a fighting the guard," the guard explained. "More like a watcher who could warn."
"Why was that needed?" Frank asked.
"Sometimes spies would defect to the Germans, you know, give up. These people were of course very valuable to the Germans. They knew all of the codes and signals and could pose as double agents if they were disguised."
"What about it?" Nancy said.
"Claude's parents were so influential that they had seen or had run across every single spy. Their son was never far from them so he saw them too. So, they would tell him who the traitors were and set him to watch everyone who came in. They did this because Claude never forgot a face. Not only that, age, surgery, and disguises never fooled Claude either. No traitor ever made it past Claude's watch no matter how well he or she was disguised."
"So what's your theory?" Frank inquired.
"You know, some of those people could still be around. They might come here as tourists to visit their old hideout for sentimental reasons. Even the traitors. As I said, age couldn't fool Claude. The other guards and I think that Claude hides when he sees one of those traitors on his mental list. There's no one to tell now, so all he can do is hide until they're far away." The guard explained.
*
Joe excitedly slammed the book shut. "It's been in front of us all along," he marveled to himself. He quickly scanned the bookshelves and tables around him before standing up. He grabbed all of the books he had been studying and placed them onto a shelving cart for the librarians. He grabbed his study materials and limped out of the library to catch the next bus back to where he was staying.
He found himself back at the house a half-hour later. Frank and Nancy were pacing in the library when he joined them. Before he could even speak Nancy burst out, "We were so close Joe! As long as anyone is searching we'll never be able to contact Claude."
Joe grinned, "Forget him! I know where the cache is."
"How!" both Frank and Nancy exclaimed.
Joe casually limped over to a chair and sat down carefully, "Well, it was elementary my dear Watson."
"Cut it Joe! What did you find? Do you know where Edward V was buried?" Frank pressed him.
Joe nodded importantly, "Why yes I do. Both Edward V and his brother were murdered by Henry VII after he took the throne. Henry kindly blamed the former king that he has deposed, Richard III. Researchers have only just figured that part out. Anyway, they were renovating the Tower of London and they found the two bodies. Only skeletons actually, but it was them."
"WHERE!" Nancy yelled in frustration.
"Under a staircase."