§ § § -- September 26, 2004
"Someone seems to have been trampling in our grass," was the first thing Christian said when he appeared at lunch on Sunday.
Roarke and Leslie both paused to stare at him in surprise. "Good afternoon to you as well, Christian," Roarke replied pointedly, but with a humorous touch to his voice.
Christian grinned sheepishly. "I'm sorry, but it's been on my mind the whole morning. I haven't had a chance to mow the lawn since we got home last Tuesday, and the grass is tall enough to hold depressions. Not that I could get prints, but someone was definitely trespassing on our property." He glanced at Leslie and said half-jokingly, "For all I know, I'm being stalked by Janine Polidari."
Leslie had to laugh at that. "Well, I don't think she's the culprit. Camille told me on Friday that Andrea worked out a deal with her ex-husband's parents, and they're letting Janine live with them and finish high school with her old friends in Brookline. I doubt she'll be back except to visit, because her next step is college—and there's no college on Fantasy Island. In the end Janine got exactly what she wanted."
"I have to be honest…it's a relief to hear that," Christian said with a grin. "Not that I disliked her at all, but her crush on me was out of control. It's a shame none of our friends' children are old enough to drive as yet; I still think it would be better for us to hire someone to do the food shopping. I'll just have to advertise again." He frowned. "However, that still doesn't explain those apparent footprints in the grass. I'm not sure whether I should try to mow now."
Roarke smiled. "Perhaps you should leave the grass as it is for a time," he said, "at least until the next development in this little mystery of ours. You might wish to leave an outside light on through the night, to discourage further such episodes."
‡ ‡ ‡
"All right. What did you learn when you went to take those vials from the hospital?"
"Quite a bit. It's easy enough to pick the lock on that door in the basement storage room. There's only a skeleton staff during the night, and not very many patients—either this is a smaller island than we thought, or it's quite sparsely populated. Several doctors also have their offices in the hospital building, and that includes the pediatrician. I took a look at her appointment book for the coming week, and the name Enstad is written on Wednesday for 1:00. We may be able to make our move then if the conditions are right."
"Excellent work. Perhaps our sisters' loss will be a little less detrimental to the end goal; you've stepped nicely into their shoes. And you, what about the house?"
"Quiet. They have a servant there who stays all day cleaning house and whatnot, so there's always someone at home. They keep all the first-floor windows and doors locked, and when I went back last night to try the upper windows, I found those locked as well. The grass is long, needs mowing…I suppose the servant doesn't do yard work."
"And of course, you walked on that grass, didn't you. Don't you know that long grass will hold depressions? Mash it flat and it can't rise again because it's too heavy. It's too bad you weren't one of the ones who was killed back at the royal castle!"
"Don't be so quick to criticize! If it weren't for me, we wouldn't be here and you know it. It's going to take all three of us to handle them in any case."
"Don't you ever stop arguing? If we can just keep things together, soon we'll achieve our goal and we'll have the revenge we've waited so long for."
"You're right. Two and a half days to wait…it's hard to believe we're so close. But we've been patient, and soon we'll see the rewards."
§ § § -- September 29, 2004
"Are you sure you can handle the triplets by yourself, my love?" Leslie asked, watching anxiously as Christian strapped in the last baby.
"Don't worry—if I need help, someone will come out," Christian said. "I know you're nervous, but they'll be back safe and sound after their appointment. Perhaps it's as well you have too many things to do—you were a wreck at their first round of immunizations."
"Christian Enstad…" Leslie growled, and he grinned, leaning over to kiss her.
Roarke, chuckling, patted his daughter's shoulder. "Good luck, Christian."
Christian smiled. "I'm sure it'll all just be routine. I'll be back with the triplets a bit past two or so." He got into the driver's seat and piloted the car down the lane, while Leslie lingered on the porch steps, staring after it.
"Leslie, you'd better get started," Roarke advised. "There's a great deal of preparation that needs to be done." A team of amateur vulcanologists was due on the island that weekend, with a shared fantasy to discover a foolproof way to predict eruptions; and among other things, a path to Mount Tutumoa had to be cleared out for them.
Leslie sighed and followed Roarke into the house. "I don't know how much they're going to get out of this fantasy, to be honest. Mount Tutumoa's extinct."
"Not quite, my dear Leslie—merely dormant," Roarke corrected her. "You may recall a fantasy back in late 1981 in which a vulcanologist had a somewhat similar fantasy. Mount Tutumoa erupted then, but fortunately it was a minor eruption and confined to a two-mile radius around the mountain. There have been no signs of Tutumoa resuming activity, but if our guests' fantasy is successful, we may obtain a means of knowing not only when an eruption will take place, but how severe it will be."
"That could definitely be useful," Leslie agreed. "Okay, well, in that case, I guess I'm off. See you in a few hours, Father."
"You know where I will be if you need me," Roarke told her, and she smiled acknowledgement before leaving.
By the time she had a chance to pause and check her watch, it was past three and she could feel the physical signs of approaching feeding time. She'd had to drive close to the other end of the island where the mountain was actually located; the closest large structures to it were the high school and the pineapple plantation, both located in the foothills just past the most extreme reaches of the lava flows in the 1981 eruption Roarke had mentioned. It would take her some forty minutes to get back to the main house, and she wondered if she could make it before the triplets upset the whole house with their hungry screaming and before she started leaking. She needed to get back anyway, even if it weren't for the triplets; she had a report from the pineapple plantation, and an eleventh-grade geography class at the high school had a request for Roarke regarding a field trip.
Leslie piloted the jeep out of the dirt road that provided the only vehicular access to the mountain itself, and was about to let fly up the Ring Road when she spied a figure standing at the corner of the pavement and the dirt access lane to the plantation. She slowed to see if the person needed a ride and discovered it was Maureen. "Fancy meeting you here," she said with a grin, pulling to a stop beside her friend.
Maureen laughed. "I'm glad we did. I took one of the ferry buses down here, but I don't know the bus schedule very well, and I was about ready to head back to the plantation so I could call Grady for a ride." She was referring to a public bus service that shuttled island residents back and forth between their homes and the ferry to Coral Island. "I'm glad you came along. What're you doing all the way down here?"
"Heading back," Leslie said with a grin as Maureen climbed in. "I've been doing some preparatory work for Father, and I finally got enough done that I can take a break and go feed the triplets. What's your excuse for being here?"
Maureen laughed and said, "I met someone whose husband works at the plantation; they live in one of the apartments down here. She's a maid at the hotel, and she has a three-month-old son and a five-year-old daughter. We were eyeing the same magazines and books in the bookstore in town, and we noticed our tastes were practically identical and laughed at it, then introduced ourselves to each other and struck up a friendship. You'd like her a lot, Leslie, I think. Her name's Pualani and she's a sweetheart. We were talking about everything imaginable…her weird new neighbors, the latest books, what her little boy did."
"Sounds like fun," said Leslie. "Where's April?"
"With Grady," said Maureen. "Since he works from home, he usually watches her if I have to do grocery shopping or something."
Leslie grinned. "Then they're probably on their way to pick up Brianna from school, so you might not have reached him unless he thought to take his cell phone with him."
"True," Maureen agreed, rolling her eyes. Grady was known as a bit of a technophobe and had only grudgingly bought a cell phone the previous year; but he never remembered to keep it on him, which had led to a lot of good-natured ribbing. "Anyway, thanks for the ride, Leslie, I really appreciate it. Hey…didn't the triplets have a doctor's appointment today?"
Leslie nodded. "Christian took them in since Father and I had so much to do for this one fantasy coming up. Once I get to the main house and get the triplets fed, I'll call him and find out how they did. Do you want me to drop you off first?"
"No, go back to the main house first," Maureen said. "If Christian's at work you'll probably need a warm body to hold the third triplet for feeding."
The drive back went faster than Leslie had anticipated, partly because she and Maureen chatted the entire way; just over thirty minutes had elapsed when they arrived. Inside, it was surprisingly quiet; Roarke was still out, but they had expected that. "I don't hear any babies crying," Maureen remarked. "That might be a good sign."
"I'll go up and check on them," Leslie said and headed for the stairs while Maureen took one of the chairs in front of the desk. She glanced into her old bedroom; the bassinets that Mariki and the kitchen staff had scrounged up for the triplets' use when they napped here were all empty, and Leslie blinked in amazement. Had Christian taken the babies home? Frowning, she retreated downstairs.
"You're empty-handed?" Maureen asked in surprise.
"The triplets aren't here," Leslie said. Maureen gave her a strange look and she added, "I mean, they're not in the bassinets in my old room, and I don't see why they'd be anywhere else. I wonder if Mariki and the staff have any ideas."
"It's worth trying," Maureen said, rising. "Let's go in and ask."
Mariki and her three staff were chopping vegetables; they all looked up when Leslie and Maureen came in. "Can we help you, Miss Leslie?" asked Mariki curiously.
Leslie looked around; it was just the four women. "The triplets aren't with you guys?" she asked, staring at Mariki.
Mariki stared back in surprise. "No, I'm sorry, Miss Leslie," she said. "Matter of fact, we haven't seen anyone at all since lunchtime."
"Christian didn't drop in and ask you to keep an eye on the babies till either Father or I got back here?" Leslie asked, feeling the first stirrings of alarm.
"No, no one at all was here," Mariki said and glanced at the kitchen clock, then looked again, harder. "Great Pele, I didn't know it was that late in the day! By the way, Mr. Roarke asked me to clear out the closets upstairs, and I found a few things that belonged to you that you might want. Why don't you go up and take a look at them?"
Distracted, Leslie nodded. "Yeah, sure…thanks, Mariki, I'll get up there later. Well…maybe Christian just took the triplets home. I'll call our house." She managed to produce a smile for Mariki, but by the time she and Maureen were back in the study, she was already shaking her head. "There's no reason for him to have taken them home. He should have brought them back here."
"Call his office," Maureen suggested. "It's possible something happened…maybe he wasn't feeling well or something, and had to go home."
They looked at each other for a long moment, both unsure of the plausibility of this, but in the end Leslie nodded, picked up the phone and punched out 464. When Julianne answered, she said, "Hi, Julianne, it's Leslie—could I talk to Christian?"
"He isn't here, Miss Leslie," said Julianne. "Was it supposed to be a major appointment at the doc's office? I mean, that's the last we saw of him—he said he had to take the triplets in for their next round of vaccinations, and that was before he left for lunch. He hasn't been back since then."
"Has he called?" Leslie asked, her alarm rising.
"No, not even that. We figured something unexpected must've come up. Let us know when you find out, huh? I hope one of the babies didn't get sick or anything."
"Me too," Leslie mumbled. "Okay…thanks, Julianne." She hung up and reported, "He hasn't been back to the office since he went to lunch—he left directly after lunch for the doctor's office, with the triplets."
"Wow," said Maureen, frowning. "What if you call your house?"
"I could try," Leslie said with a sigh. She punched out 695 and waited through the usual four rings, then heard hers and Christian's message on the machine. She frowned heavily, but stuck it out; when the beep sounded she said, "Christian, are you there? It's just me—if you're there, please pick up."
She paused, and then heard a click before a hesitant, "Hello?"
"Ingrid," Leslie exclaimed. Ingrid's English was still shaky, and her own jordiska was little better. She plowed ahead anyway, using what she knew. "Var är Prins Christian?"
Ingrid said something rapidly and Leslie broke in, "Langsammere plissa!" Christian had taught her this phrase to use when someone spoke more rapidly than she could follow; it meant, "More slowly, please!" Ingrid repeated herself, carefully pacing her words; Leslie still didn't get everything, but it was enough to tell her what she needed to know. She thanked Ingrid and hung up, then said, "Ingrid said she's been alone in the house all day—at least I think that's what she said, I'm still not too fluent in jordiska. But I did get that they aren't at the house. Something feels really wrong here. I wish I knew where the heck Father is."
"Didn't he say where he was planning to go?" asked Maureen.
"Well, I know he mentioned he was going to get a team of people together to clear out a path in the jungle to Mount Tutumoa from the vehicle-access trail, but other than that I really don't know, and I'm not sure if he meant to stay with them or not. This is really scaring me, Maureen."
Maureen shook her head and remarked, "It's starting to sound pretty fishy to me too. Christian's never struck me as the kind of guy who'd go off and do something out of the blue, without telling you about it. It's possible he could've gone off to visit somebody, or else maybe something happened to the car and he's waiting for help to come. Did he have his cell phone with him?"
"As far as I know he did," said Leslie. "I can't believe I didn't think to call that first." She punched out the number, her teeth clamping her lower lip while she waited through several buzzes. When the answering system kicked in, she shook her head and cut the connection without leaving a message. "No answer." She gnawed on her lip, then decided, "I think I'll call Anna-Kristina."
But she could tell from Anna-Kristina's surprised tone that Christian and the triplets weren't there either. "I didn't hear from Uncle Christian at all," the princess said, "and I really wasn't expecting to. Why do you ask?"
"Well, I was just looking for him. Thanks for your help." Leslie hung up and stared at Maureen. "Where else could they be?"
"The doctor's office?" Maureen offered a little hesitantly. "I know that sounds pretty farfetched, considering it's almost four o'clock and the appointment shouldn't have lasted that long, but maybe the doctor can tell you something."
"I hope so," Leslie said fretfully and bit her lip, this time punching out the number for Dr. Corbett's office. She had to wait for the pediatrician to come to the phone, but soon was able to ask a few questions, which got her nowhere.
"Uh-oh," Maureen said when Leslie hung up.
Leslie nodded. "She said she helped Christian strap the babies into their car seats, and then he drove off like normal. She didn't notice anything, and she said he didn't mention any problem with the babies, or anything strange in whatever conversation they had during the appointment. And she said Christian looked perfectly well himself."
Maureen considered for a moment, then offered, "Let me try something." Leslie gave her the phone, and she called her own house, only to learn from Grady that not only were Christian and the triplets not there, but the Enstad house looked abandoned. "He said the garage door's up but there's no car in the driveway."
"That's no surprise," Leslie muttered. "I guess we might as well call the others."
They took turns phoning Myeko, Camille, Lauren, Tabitha and Katsumi; but all five women told them Christian had never dropped in with the triplets. "Sounds like a great mystery to me," Myeko remarked. "If you need help solving it, just yell at me."
Maureen laughed when Leslie told her that. "Well, at least she's willing to help. At the moment, Leslie, I think the only other thing you can do is wait for Mr. Roarke to come back and see if he has any ideas. I guess you can take me home…though if you want, you might go upstairs and look through those things Mariki mentioned and take them back, and drop them off at your house, if you want any of them."
Confused at first, Leslie suddenly fully remembered Mariki's reminder about the closet-cleaning. "Oh, that. I guess we might as well. Come on up with me."
In the guest/entertainment room, the two friends spied a small pile of articles in front of the closet door. There were a few books and knickknacks, along with several frames that leaned against the wall. Leslie picked up the first one and smiled wistfully. "I can't believe I left that here all this time. This was done by Tattoo—remember when he gave it to me for my fifteenth birthday?" It was a depiction of the Champs-Élysées in the spring, boasting a riot of vivid colors from the blue sky and water to the green grass to the reds, pinks, purples and yellows of the many flowers; several people were shown picnicking or strolling along, and one was even walking a dog.
"Oh yeah…I still remember your face when you unwrapped it," Maureen said. "I can't believe you couldn't have found a space for that in your house somewhere and hung it! Wait till Christian sees it, he'll probably say the same thing."
"Obviously that's coming home with me too," Leslie remarked with a grin and set the painting aside to take with her. "I remember he gave me three over the years…" She let the sentence hang while she lifted the second frame and displayed a scene of a rainy street in Paris. "Oh, I totally forgot I had that one. I think it was a Christmas gift one year."
"That's pretty too. Take it home," said Maureen. "If those other two are Tattoo's paintings too, you should take them all with you."
"Yeah," Leslie agreed, picking up the third frame. This time it was one of the many highly coveted paintings Tattoo had done in his last few years, depicting a small French country cottage surrounded by trees sporting brilliant autumn foliage. "Another present, the first Christmas after I came back here. He used to do a lot of these in the last five or six years of his life, trying to put away enough money for his family to live on before he died and they had to get by on their own. I was lucky enough to get one of the earliest ones."
"That's beautiful," said Maureen. "Grady was interested in trying to get one, but he can't even find one on the online auctions. They always go for astronomical prices." Just then they heard Roarke's voice call from downstairs, and she added, "I'll go tell him we're up here and we can ask him about Christian and the babies." Leslie nodded, and Maureen went for the stairs while she set aside the painting and reached for the last frame. She knew full well that Tattoo had given her a total of seven paintings before his death. Three of them were here, having previously hung in her old room; she had arranged for three others to be displayed in bungalows, and the last one hung in Roarke's study. So what was this one? She hoisted it away from the wall and turned it around to look at it, then froze and gasped.
"Oh my God!" she shrieked in horror. The portrait dropped out of her numbed fingers and hit the floor; the glass shattered and the frame cracked.
Maureen's head popped around the stairwell at the noise. "Leslie, are you all right?" she demanded.
Roarke appeared behind her, stepping around her and half jogging down the hall; Maureen came hastily after him. "Leslie, what happened?" Roarke asked, taking in her white face and the ruined frame at her feet.
"Th-this portrait," Leslie stuttered, her teeth beginning to chatter. "Father, I know who our assailants were in Lilla Jordsö, and now they have Christian and the triplets!"
