The next day soon came. It was a beautiful day that came after the night of rain. Miss Clavel and Charlotte walked out of the boarding school to get some work done to find Madeline and Darla. Pepito snuck out from the bushes as he saw the women leaving to the police station. Urchin joined him. Miss Clavel and Charlotte left the house just the same as before. Pepito carried his cage with Urchin as they snuck into the boarding school so they could scare their temporary caretaker so they could sneak out to help find Darla and Madeline again. Unfortunately, they didn't count on Pepito's cat. The mouse yelped from the sight of the cat and fainted inside of his cage.
"Carumba!" Pepito yelped. "She's borrowed my mother's cat!"
"What do we do now?" Amber frowned.
"Looks like we might need to scare this feline." Urchin said as Atticus came over.
"Please, allow me." Atticus volunteered.
"Oh, by all means." Urchin smiled to the older boy.
Atticus soon used The Stare on the cat to scare it away. The cat soon yelped through mews and ran away.
Atticus then smirked as that worked. "Good kitty~"
"Now we can send in our little mouse." Urchin smiled.
Pepito opened his cage and set it down on the floor.
"Mousey... Mousey..." Atticus knelt by the cage. "Cheese..."
"WHERE?!" The mouse suddenly woke up.
"In the kitchen." Amber smiled.
The mouse soon scampered out of the cage and ran into the kitchen. Miss Murphy soon shrieked and panicked at the sight of the mouse.
"Now?" Urchin asked.
"Now." Pepito nodded.
Back in the workshop, Madeline and Darla were working together to make special knots in the laces and Fifi nodded to them to show her approval of this and where one of the other girls nodded to Fifi. LaCroque and Henri then walked by which made the girls get to work so the adults wouldn't suspect anything. Non seemed to have a suspicion about the girls.
LaCroque inspected the girls and swiped one lace from a blonde girl with glasses. Henri looked with her as they noticed something strange about the lace. Non saw this as well and saw what each lace spelled. Henri spotted what the lace spelled out.
"I can read!" LaCroque scoffed at him. "Come up here, all of you!"
"Yes, ma'am." Darla said.
"Aha!" LaCroque smirked as she showed the lace which spelled out cries for help from the girls so they would have a way out of here and she mocked the girls for their efforts to become free at last like they deserved to be instead of trapped in here. "'Elp, I am a prisoner in a lace factory', you vill stand 'ere all day, all night, all year, 'til I find out who is responsible for zhis sackerage!"
Non nodded with a firm look.
"Perhaps a spool and thread, ma'am?" Darla suggested.
This made the girls giggle.
"You zhink this is a 'oliday?!" LaCroque glared before she took out her scissors. "Get back to your bobbins, brats!"
"Y-Yes, ma'am." Darla gulped.
The girls soon rushed back to their tables, but Madeline stayed put. Henri and LaCroque were on their way up the stairs and Madeline snuck a piece of cheese and hid it in her apron before going back with Darla and the others. Non didn't understand why she did that so just decided to not do anything about it.
Madeline came back to the others. "Darla, I 'ave a plan." she then told her cousin.
"I had a feeling you did." Darla whispered.
Madeline did her plan with cheese involved while the laces were being weaved.
Mortimer sniffed the cheese and soon scampered out. "Ah, zhere is nozhing like fromage~" He soon went straight to the laces.
"Oh, no!" The blonde girl with glasses cried out. "Madame LaCroque, zhe zhread is broken!"
LaCroque picked up the lace and it withered in her grip which made her growl out of frustration. Mortimer did the same thing to the next lace. Fifi, Darla, and Madeline quietly giggled to this.
"Ooh, la la, monsignors, my zhread is broken too!" A brown-haired girl called out.
Henri and Non soon came to the girl to see her broken thread. Madeline hid a giggle as her plan was working like a charm. Mortimer soon did the same to her lace.
"Uh-oh~" Darla and Madeline giggled innocently.
LaCroque turned to the girls, looking rather annoyed.
"Mine too!" A girl with short curly hair called out.
"STOP!" LaCroque snapped as she finally had enough. "Vhat is going on?" she then glared at Darla and Madeline. "Vell...?"
"Is there a problem?" Darla asked.
"Merci beaucop, girls." Mortimer said sluggishly before going back into his hole as he was now full.
Meanwhile with the others...
They were at the train station with Maisy and Genevieve along with Patch.
"We're coming, Darla." Maisy said as soon as she came out with the dogs.
Genevieve and Patch soon began to sniff out for Darla and Madeline's scents until they ran into a familiar looking bead.
"We found something!" Patch smiled.
"What is it?" Pepito asked.
"A clue?" Chloe asked.
"A heent?" Danielle added.
"A lead?" Nicole even asked.
"A scent?" Urchin asked the dogs.
"A bead and a familiar one at that." Patch said.
"That looks like Madeline's necklace bead." Amber pointed out.
"She must have left it as a trail for us to follow." Maisy said.
Genevieve came up to a puddle of water from last night's storm before whimpering.
"Don't tell me the rain washed away the trail!" Urchin frowned as he stood with Pepito.
"No, it couldn't have." Atticus said.
Genevieve soon ran up the stairs which prompted everyone to follow her. There were luckily more beads shown and all they had to do was follow them.
"There we go, that's our trail!" Cherry told the girls.
"Follow the trail!" Atticus smiled.
They soon followed the trail of the beads that had animal symbols from Madeline's mother's necklace.
A couple of birds came up to one bead and one even pecked at it.
"Shoo!" Maisy zipped in to scare away the birds so they wouldn't take the bead away and where the birds did instantly fly away.
Cherry soon practiced a magic stunt she saw in a movie once and grabbed one bird before it flew away.
"Nice." Atticus said.
Cherry smiled innocently.
"You don't kill them anymore." Atticus smiled back.
Cherry soon threw out the bird and it flew off into the sky.
They all continued to follow the beads, but there weren't anymore seen as they came into an alley.
"What the?" Urchin asked out of confusion.
"Now where do we go?" Patch pouted.
"We start looking for them by the tracking device, but first, we start looking for the rest of the beads." Amber said.
Atticus took out the device for when the time would be right.
There wasn't much luck in finding the other beads until Amber looked to see three young boys playing with them and using them as marbles.
"Ooh, la la, marbles!" Nicole beamed.
"Now is not the time for marbles." Cherry said.
"But look!" Nicole pointed out before taking one bead to show her. "Exactly like-"
"Hey! What are you doing?" One boy glared as he came up to her to take the bead back. "We found them!"
"Where did you find them?" Atticus asked.
"Over there!" The boy pointed afar from the distance.
Nicole reached into her pocket and took out her prized bag of actual marbles. "Trade?" she then offered.
"Nicole, are you sure?" Cherry asked.
"I must... For Madeline and Darla..." Nicole sighed as she traded marbles with the boy in exchange for the necklace beads.
"Alright, now we can use the tracking device," Atticus said. He then pulled out the antennae and turned on the device and there was a beeping to show where Darla's exact location was. "Alright, we've got her signal." He smiled.
They then followed after Atticus to track down Madeline and Darla even further.