The Vanishing Stair (Truly Devious #2)(48)

“Look,” he said. “Is it weird if I give you my phone number? Just since you’re working with my aunt and . . .”

He looked toward the kitchen, where Fenton was humming loudly.

“. . . you may, you may want it. Or. You may not.”

“Sure,” Stevie said, offering her phone.

She wasn’t sure why he was giving her his number—whether it was the smile he had given her before, or the erratic nature of Fenton that suggested that something was not quite right with this whole arrangement. It was a phone number in any case, someone else to connect with.

It wasn’t the worst feeling.





13


AT SIX THAT EVENING, AS THE DAY DREW TO A CLOSE AND THE SHADOWS fell over Ellingham, Stevie Bell stood in her room, tucking herself into the suit that still smelled strongly of mothballs and must from the costume attic. She stood before the mirror and did what the famously fastidious Belgian detective would do—she adjusted her mustache until it was perfect. She tucked a pillow into her front to fill out her belly a bit and take up some of the extra space in the baggy suit. She’d found a walking-stick prop and some white gloves, and the overall effect was pleasing.

This tunnel stuff was stupid. If there was a tunnel under Minerva, someone would have found it by now. David. Ellie. Someone. It would have loomed large in the legend.

Still, a passable effort would need to be made. Hercule would look.

The source of the tunnel would have to be on the first floor. This meant the possible entry points were the kitchen, the common room, the hallway, either one of the two bathrooms, or any of the three bedrooms. She had already crawled all over Ellie’s floor. There was no evidence of a tunnel in there. Of course, entrances could be carefully hidden, but still. She got down and examined her floor, crawling, tapping, picking at the boards. Nothing.

She could check Janelle’s room later. Janelle was deep into her Wonder Woman transformation and could not be disturbed. But it seemed unlikely that the bedrooms were the source. The entry would have to be through the floor.

She went to the kitchen, poking into the back of the cabinets with her stick. It was possible the refrigerator or the stove or dishwasher could have been covering the opening, but then, surely these spots had been checked. You needed to hook these things up with water and gas. The refrigerator was heavy. A hollow spot under it would likely have been found.

She walked around the common room, looking at the flagstone floor. This was a more promising area, as any one of these stones could be a hatch. But it certainly appeared that the seals were tight. Similarly, the bathrooms showed no sign of having a passage anywhere in the floor.

It was a perfunctory check, and she would look more later, but it really seemed that Fenton had to be wrong. Maybe there was a tunnel somewhere on the campus that had not been found, but it probably wasn’t here.

She was crawling down the hallway, examining the boards, when Nate came up behind her.

“What are you doing?” he asked.

Stevie stood up and adjusted her pillow stomach.

“Nothing,” she said. “Thought I dropped something. Is that your costume?”

Nate was wearing his normal clothes—his grayed-out cords and a loose T-shirt.

“I don’t do costumes,” he said.

Janelle’s door swung open, and Wonder Janelle stood in the doorway.

“You think you’re getting away with that?” she said to Nate. “I guessed this was going to happen.”

She reached behind her door and plucked out a long gray cloak made of some coarse material, a wizard hat of a similar color, and a gray beard. She extended the outfit in his direction.

Nate stared and did not move.

“You just . . . had that there?” he asked.

“EBay,” she said. “And a little sewing. Take it.”

Nate took the costume and put it over his arm.

“And here.”

She reached back again and produced a tree branch that had been roughly fashioned into a staff.

“How . . .” he said.

“Listen to me,” Janelle said. “A lot of bad things have happened this year. It’s been scary and sad and horrible. But we’re here, and this is a holiday, which means we are going to celebrate because not everyone from this house can do that. So put on this wizard stuff, let me fix my tiara, and we go.”

She shut her door.

“She’s had this,” Nate said. “All along.”

“She’s Janelle. She can see around corners. Are you going to wear it?”

Nate felt the material between his fingers, then picked up the staff and examined it.

“It’s a pretty good Gandalf outfit,” he said. “I guess she made this staff? Like she went out and found a branch?”

“Because she’s Janelle,” Stevie said.

They went to the common room and Nate started to slip into the robes. There was the creak of footsteps moving overhead. Janelle stepped out of her room, her tiara now perfectly in place, with a round shield on her back and a sword in her hand. She regarded Nate with a satisfied nod.

“Good,” she said. “Team Minerva. Where’s David?”

There was a patter of steps and the ungodly creak of the stairs, then, out of the dark of the hall, he emerged.

“Oh,” Janelle said. “That’s . . .”