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“We wanted to try to get into Carole Gossette’s files,” said Madame Arbour. “She oversees both the Patagonia and Luxembourg projects. We thought we might find out what GHS Engineering was really doing.”

Armand sat forward. “You mentioned Patagonia earlier. What’s that about?”

“Seven years ago the regional government realized that an abandoned mine was poisoning the drinking water of a town downriver,” she explained. “GHS Engineering was contracted by the Chilean government to build a water treatment plant. Which they apparently did.”

“Apparently?” asked Reine-Marie.

“According to what I was seeing coming across my desk, it was taking a very long time to build. Far too long. I wasn’t suspicious of anything at first, except maybe government corruption, payoffs. The usual. Contractors prolonging construction to make more money. I did see that one of the first things GHS did before even beginning the project was to order a water sample taken and analyzed so they’d know what was coming down from the mine.”

“That makes sense, doesn’t it?” said Reine-Marie.

“Yes. What didn’t make sense is that the detailed results of that test were missing. What I did see was that GHS bought the mine and closed it.”

“But why buy it?” asked Daniel. “If it was already abandoned and closed?”

“Exactly,” said Madame Arbour. “So I began to look closer. What really triggered my suspicions were the containers coming back from Chile. The documentation said they were equipment, but the weights didn’t make sense, and the destinations didn’t either. They cleared customs in record time, then the containers moved from site to site, eventually ending up in smelters. You don’t melt down an excavator.”

“The mine had been reopened,” said Jean-Guy. “They were shipping back ore.”

“And hiding the fact,” said Madame Arbour.

“But why? What’s in the mine?” asked Daniel. “Gold?”

“Something even more precious.”

“Diamonds?” he asked, and when Madame Arbour shook her head, he said, “Uranium?”

Madame Arbour held up her hand to stop the cavalcade of guesses. “Rare earth minerals.”

Daniel leaned back on his crate. “Wow. Are you sure?”

“Pretty sure. There was a mention, just in passing, in a report from a Chilean geologist. But it didn’t say what sort.”

“What’s a rare earth mineral?” asked Reine-Marie. “It sounds familiar.”

“The market went wild for them a few years ago,” Daniel explained, “when scientists realized what they could be used for.”

“Like?” asked Armand.

Séverine Arbour ran through some of the uses. Everything from laptops to medical equipment. From nuclear reactors to airplanes.

“And there’re experiments with next-generation telecommunications,” said Jean-Guy.

“Shit,” said Daniel. “If you could get in on the ground floor …”

“Yes,” said Séverine Arbour. “You could make a fortune. The thing with rare earth minerals is that they tend to be far stronger than other minerals. Last longer, are lighter and easily adaptable. Versatile. Pretty much an engineer’s dream.”

“What kind did they find?” Daniel asked.

“That’s the problem,” said Jean-Guy. “And that’s why we wanted to find the water test. We don’t know.”

“So you don’t know what it might be used for,” said Armand.

“Exactly,” said Arbour.

“Is that what they’re trying to cover up?” said Reine-Marie. “Not that they found the minerals, but what they’re doing with it? And that’s what Stephen and Monsieur Plessner found out?”

“I think so,” said Jean-Guy. “But when we went to GHS, Loiselle interrupted us.”