"Turn the lights off. We may be in the woods but that light is still visible to the house." Lindsley leaned over the front seat and spoke to Vaughn.

With the lights off, Vaughn had to slow the car even more. The only light was coming from the moon, and even that was partially obliterated by the trees.

"Stop here." Vaughn obeyed and parked the car about fifty yards from the house. "Here comes the fun part."

The three crept toward the house, silently, watching to see if there was any motion in the house.

"Vaughn," Sydney said stopping in her tracks. "Look."

Vaughn followed her pointing finger to a window on the west side of the second floor. A silhouette of a man appeared for a second then disappeared a moment later. Vaughn nodded, yet kept moving.

They moved to within five yards of the house when Lindsley motioned everyone to stop. She knelt down at what looked like a simple tree stump. Placing both hands on it, she nudged it once to the left, then to the right, and finally pushed it forward, revealing a hatch-like door.

"Let's go."

After replacing the stump and shutting the door behind them, Lindsley led the trio down a ladder and into the study. It wasn't much- just a desk with a computer on it and several filing cabinets.

"Just look for something suspicious, I guess," Lindsley shrugged her shoulders.

Sydney glanced at Vaughn and then went right to work.

Ten minutes later, they were no closer to finding what they were looking for than when they had begun the search.

"Lindsley, are you sure it's down here?" asked Vaughn.

"Agent Vaughn, this is the only place my father felt secure about. If it's important, it's here."

They worked for another five minutes in silence until Sydney whispered, "Guys, I think I've got something." She held up what appeared to be a receipt. Lindsley grabbed it.

She starred at it, at first with no comprehension of what it said. But then, like a flash of lightning, she understood. "We've got to go."

"What does it say?" asked Vaughn, rising from his position on the ground.

"It says Lindsley holds the key," replied Sydney. "It's a receipt from a toy store."

Lindsley brushed past Vaughn on her way to the ladder. He caught her arm and asked, "What does it mean?"

Lindsley looked at his hand on her arm. He withdrew it. Icily, she replied, "It means you've got to listen to me if you want to get it." She began to climb the ladder.

"Wait!" said Sydney sharply. "Listen." Above, they could hear feet moving and some talking. The only word any of them could make out was 'car'.

Lindsley's eyes widened in fear. "What are we going to do?"

Sydney thought for a moment. "You said that this room is connected to the house, right? So we can go through the house."

"That's not a good idea, Syd. If there're men out there, there has to be someone in the house as well."

"Agent Vaughn, what if we make a diversion?" Lindsley asked hopefully.

"What kind of diversion?"

"Well, if you follow that ladder all the way up," she said pointing to a similar ladder on the opposite side of the room. "It goes into the attic. There's an electrical panel on the second floor. If someone cuts the power, we may be able to distract them enough so that we can get out."

Vaughn thought a moment and then nodded his head.

"Alright then," said Lindsley as she quickly moved across the room. "I guess I should go up since I know the house the best."

"I don't think that's a good idea, Lindsley," Sydney caught up with her. "What if you run into one of the men up there?"

Lindsley paused, resting her hand on a rung of the ladder. She sighed. "I just don't feel right sending someone else to do my work."

"It's not your work Lindsley." Her face contorted with concern. "I'll go up. Just tell me what to do."

Lindsley gave a weak half-smile. "Ok. Go up this ladder. You'll end up in my parents' closet at first. Just look up, and you'll see another hatch. Go through that. You'll get to the attic then. Go to the other side of the attic and you'll come to another hatch. Be careful when you let it down. It's one that has a ladder attached and it will fall straight down. When you get down to the second floor, go the back of the hall. There are a load of pictures on the wall, but behind the one of my parents and me at the Tower of London is a panel. I guess the surest way is just to pull all of wires. That should be it

"That seems easy enough..."

"Oh, Sydney, I forgot to mention that the attic isn't completely floored." Sydney was confused. "Some of it you can just walk across, but other parts all you have are the beams and rafters."

"Oh. That should be ok," she reassured the young girl.

"It's dark up there, take this," Lindsley reached into the top drawer of the desk and pulled out two flashlights, handing one to Sydney and one to Vaughn. "You might need a torch."

"Sydney after you cut the power, we'll need to meet somehow and get back to the car."

"Agent Vaughn, we can just take my car. It's in the garage. Sydney, meet us in the den, it's right next to my parents' room."

"Ok, wish me luck." Sydney disappeared up the ladder.

Still looking up the small hole through which Sydney had disappeared, Vaughn said, "Now's the hard part."

"I wouldn't worry. I'm sure she can handle it."

"No, not that. She can handle it," looking directly at Lindsley, he finished, "The hard part is waiting."

Sydney brushed yet another cob web out of her face. The dust almost choked her. The ceiling of the attic wasn't high enough for her to stand erect, so she crouched, resulting in a literal pain in the neck. The ladder hadn't been too hard to get up, and this attic wasn't that bad either, but Sydney kept thinking that everything was just too easy. Missions weren't supposed to go easy. In the faint light of the flashlight, Sydney could see the hatch door leading to the second floor.

"Here it goes."

"Sydney should be getting there soon." Vaughn leaned against the ladder.

Seated in the chair at the desk, a thought suddenly occurred to Lindsley. "Agent Vaughn, do you think we'll have problems getting out of the country?"

Vaughn shifted. "Well, only if they find our aliases. Why?"

"Well," Lindsley pulled out the drawer from which the flashlights had come. Turning it over, she dumped out its contents and carefully removed the underside. "Just in case we do run into some sort of trouble, these might be useful." She held up three passports.

Vaughn leaned over and took one from her hand. Paging through it, he discovered that it had a picture of Lindsley's father, although it actually belonged to a man named Pierre Montage. It was a French passport.

"What are these for?"

Lindsley smiled. "Well, my parents were cautious people, for good reason I guess. But they always had these 'just in case.'"

"Just in case?"

Lindsley simply smiled.

Sydney opened the door, peeking into the hall below. She heard voices coming near. From what she could judge, there were two.

"Alright, just stay here and keep watch. We'll find them." The man who spoke passed by quickly, but the other stayed just below the door.

Am I not the luckiest gal in the world, Sydney thought.

Stealthily, she poised the ladder and then let it go. It hit the man squarely in the head, knocking him unconscious.

"That was easy," she whispered. "Now for the picture."

She climbed down the ladder, carefully missing the motionless man. Sydney glanced down toward the end of the hall. It was covered in pictures. Running quietly she looked up and down the wall, trying desperately to locate the picture that she needed.

This is insane, she thought. They're all of Lindsley and her parents. Sydney felt bitter for just an instant, wishing that she had been as close to her father as it appeared that Lindsley was to both of her parents.

Finally, she found it. Pushing it to the side, Sydney yanked all the wires.