Jostling him aside, Alice crouched down. Daniel heard a scraping noise, then she rose.
“I’ve jammed a dagger beneath the door,” she explained in a whisper. “But it won’t keep them out for long.”
Even before she finished speaking, the door shuddered as the pirates tested her theory.
“Let us in,” Mrs. Rotunder called out in a voice as sweet as Mrs. Kew’s tea. “We only want to chat!”
“Chat you right off the plank,” Millie added, chuckling.
“Millie!” Mrs. Rotundertsked with exasperation. “I’m trying to fool them into a false sense of security.”
“They’re spies, not idiots,” Millie retorted. “Well, notcompleteidiots.”
“Fair point,” Mrs. Rotunder said, and the thumping against the door grew louder.
Daniel began to shove at the walls. “It’s a secret room,” he whispered to Alice, “therefore it must have a secret exit.”
“That is a fallacious statement if ever I heard one,” Alice said, but she joined him in his efforts. “I must say, Mr. Bixby, being in mortal peril is no excuse for illogical—”
She fell abruptly silent. Groping through the darkness for her, Daniel felt her hand catch his. She pulled him forward, and he stumbled with her into a newly opened space. A dim light above indicated she had found a secret staircase. Daniel closed the door behind them, Alice wedged her last dagger beneath it, and they hurried up toward the light.
Thud!The pirates broke through the first door.
“No one here!” came a shout. “Muriel Fairweather, you’re a liar!”
“I told the truth!” Muriel replied indignantly. “They were here a moment ago. They must have found the secret passageway!”
“A pirate telling the truth?” The pirates laughed.
“How rude! Edwina Ogden, I demand you apologize!” There followed the sharp sound of a sword being drawn.
“I’m a widow,” Mrs. Ogden replied. “That means I never need to apologize again!” Another sword scraped from its scabbard.
“En garde!”
“En garde!”
Metal clanged.
“Take that, fiend!”
“Be careful of my hat!”
The agents reached the top of the stairs and cautiously entered a room that glowed with the soft golden light of dimmed gas lamps. They stared in confusion at an assortment of beds, rocking horses, and tall standing easels displaying art. Not immediately seeing an exit, they grabbed paintbrushes as makeshift weapons and pressed themselves against the wall at either side of the half-open door, listening to evaluate the threat of pursuit.
Thud!The second door below slammed open.
The agents exchanged a grim look and tightened their grips on the paintbrushes.
“More stairs? Really?” came Mrs. Rotunder’s cry.
“I am as fit as the next person,” replied Millie the Monster (a tiny woman whose age had long ago gone for a stroll in the mists of time and never been seen since). “I could continue this pursuit for hours. But frankly”—she paused for a heaving breath—“it has become boring.”
“I’d rather be playing with The Baby,” Muriel added.
“Dearest Evangeline! I have never seen a more prodigious child!” Mrs. Rotunder’s voice faded as the pirates began to leave. “Only four months old, and yet at luncheon last week I looked away for no more than a second and she stole my teaspoon.”
“Ridiculous name, though,” opined Millie (short for Verisimilitude).
