The Maze of Bones (The 39 Clues #1)(41)

"Are you sure we should go down there?" Nellie asked.

Amy nodded. The dates were getting older. On the other hand, there were no metal pipes on the ceiling up ahead, which meant no electric lights.

"Anybody got a flashlight?" she asked.

"Yeah," Nellie said. "On my keychain."

She pulled out her keys and handed them to Amy. There was a little push-button pin light. Not much, but better than nothing. They kept going. After a hundred feet, they emerged in a small room with only one other exit.

Amy shone the flashlight on an old plaque framed in skulls. "1785! These have to be the first bones put down here."

The wall they were looking at was in bad shape. The bones were brown and crumbly, and some had scattered across the floor. The skulls along the top had been crushed, though the ones quilted into the wall looked fairly intact. They were done in a square pattern -- nothing exciting.

"Search around," Amy said. "It has to be here."

Dan stuck his hands into some of the gaps in the bone wall. Nellie checked the top of the stack. Amy looked into the skulls' eye sockets with the flashlight, but she saw nothing.

"It's hopeless," she said at last. "If there was anything here, another team must've found it."

Dan scratched his head. Then he scratched a skull's head. "Why are they numbered?"

Amy wasn't in the mood for his games. "What numbers?"

"Here on the forehead." Dan tapped one of the skulls. "This guy was number three.

Were they on a football team or something?"

Amy leaned in closer. Dan was right. The number was very faint, but scratched into the skull's forehead, like someone had carved it with a knife, was the Roman numeral III.

She examined the skull below it. XIX. A square pattern. Skulls with numbers. "Check them all. Quick!"

It didn't take long. There were sixteen skulls woven into the pile of bones, done in four rows and four columns. Three of the skulls didn't have numbers. The rest did. They looked like this:

[proofreader's note: the numbers on the skulls are

XVIII

III

VI

IV

XIX

XI

I

XV

IX

XVI

II

VIII

XIII

A few of the skulls have no numbers on them.]

A chill went down Amy's back. "Coordinates in a box. A magic box!"

"What?" Dan said. "What magic?"

"Dan, can you memorize these numbers and their placement?"

"I already have."

"We need to get out of here and find a map. This is the clue -- well, the clue to the real clue, whatever Franklin was hiding."

"Wait a sec," Nellie said. "Franklin scratched numbers on skulls. Why?"

"It's a magic box," Amy said. "Franklin used to play with numbers when he got bored.

Like when he was sitting in the Philadelphia Assembly and he didn't want to listen to the dull speeches, he would create magic boxes, number problems for himself. He would fill in the missing numbers. The sums had to match, horizontally and vertically."

Nellie scowled. "You're telling me Benjamin Franklin invented sudoku?"

"Well, yeah, in a way. And these -- "

"Are coordinates," Dan supplied. "The missing sums show the location of the next clue."

Clapping echoed through the room. "Bravo."

Amy turned. Standing in the entrance were Ian and Natalie Kabra.

"I told you they could do it," Ian said to his sister.

"Oh, I suppose," Natalie conceded. Amy hated that even underground in a room full of bones, Natalie managed to look glamorous. She was wearing a black velour catsuit, so she looked eleven going on twenty-three. Her hair hung loose around her shoulders. The only part of her outfit that didn't match was the tiny silver dart gun in her hand. "Perhaps it wasn't all bad that Irina failed us."

"You!"

Dan yelled. "You convinced Irina to set us up at the ?le St-Louis. You almost got us buried in cement!"

"A shame it didn't work," Natalie said. "You would've made a fine welcome mat for the mausoleum."

"But -- but why?" Amy stammered.

Ian smiled. "To put you out of commission, of course. And to give us extra time to find this place. We needed to make sure this wasn't some clever misdirection by our dear cousin Irina. I should've noticed the magic box earlier. Thanks for your help, Amy.

Now, if you'll move aside, we'll just copy down those numbers and be off."

Amy took a shaky breath. "No."

Ian laughed. "Isn't she cute, Natalie? Acting like she has a choice."

"Yes." Natalie wrinkled her nose. "Cute."

Amy blushed. The Kabras always made her feel so awkward and stupid, but she couldn't let them get the clue. She snatched up a leg bone. "One move and I'll -- I'll crush the skulls. You'll never get the numbers."

It didn't sound like a very convincing threat, even to her, but Ian paled. "Now let's not be stupid, Amy. I know how nervous you get, but we won't hurt you."

"Not at all," Natalie agreed. She pointed her dart gun at Amy's face. "I think poison six will be adequate. Nothing lethal. Just a deep, deep sleep. I'm sure someone will find you down here ... someday."