What Lies Beneath ▸ House of Anubis [1]

chapter twenty-one. house of cat-nap

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After we saw Patricia's unconscious friend get abducted by Victor, she spilled everything. How Rene was actually called Rufus and how he's a private investigator helping her to find Joy. He wanted to know if she had seen anything that looked like the Eye of Horus or an Ankh cross, and that's the reason why she wanted our necklaces. He thought they had something to do with Joy's disappearance. And he had asked to see a photograph of me when she told him about the Ankh. Suspiciously, he never asked for one of Nina. Just pictures of me and Joy.

Nina and I wound up telling her what we knew, too—about the locket and charm, the phonographic cylinders, and about how we saw her private investigator visiting our friend Sarah. But she didn't know who the Lily he had mentioned was. We still have no idea about her, whoever she is.

"So you saw Rufus visiting this old lady Sarah?" Patricia says, looking around at Sibuna. We haven't let her into our mystery club yet. It's almost curfew, and we're sat at the table in the dining room, going over what we know.

Nina confirms, "Yeah, she's the one who gave me the locket and told me to find the girl with the cross—Ashley."

"The locket and cross Rufus is so interested in," Fabian adds.

"Maybe Rufus was a jewelry trader," Amber speculates. I look at the wall behind her, biting my tongue. "And Victor also collects diamonds."

Ignoring her nonsensical suggestion, I lean forward and venture warily, "Okay, hear me out here, but what if the second voice on those recordings is actually Victor? Could that be possible?"

Nina shrugs. "I don't know. That would make Victor about a hundred and twenty."

"Remember—Sarah on the recording," Fabian remarks, "she talked about experimenting in the cellar. And what was Victor making a toast to when he drank that funny colored stuff down there?"

"Life," Nina recalls, her voice breathy. "So you're saying that Victor has some kind of an... elixir that keeps him from growing old?"

Whoa. Are we seriously, genuinely suggesting that Victor's over a century old and is secretly, like, some kind of mad scientist? Are we having this discussion right now?"

"Oh, yeah, and a jewelry heist is such a crazy idea," Amber comments sarcastically.

"This is mad," Patricia remarks. "What does any of this have to do with Joy or Rufus?"

Fabian sighs. "I don't know."

"What about the cat?" I ask. It had escaped from our room while Amber was sleeping and we have no idea where it's gone.

"I hate to break up this cozy little chat," Victor says suddenly from the door, and God, I hope he didn't hear any of that, "but ten o'clock is fast approaching. I shall, of course, wish to hear a pin drop, so I suggest you start getting ready for bed immediately."