Hidden Pictures Read online

  “When I first met Lucas, I was looking at this photo,” Bess said. “He said that capturing this moment was just pure luck. The bird started to take off at exactly the right time. But when I asked how he knew that, he said he was just assuming and quickly changed the subject.”

  I thought about it for a moment. “Lucas does study art history,” I said. “Maybe he read it somewhere.”

  “Yeah,” said Bess. “Maybe.”

  “Hey!” called George, in a whisper-shout. “Aren’t we going through here?” She was standing near the STAFF ONLY hallway and had her hand on the door handle.

  “Actually,” I said, “there’s one more thing.” I walked over to where one of the security cameras was hanging from the ceiling and pointed up at it. I had thought there was something off about these cameras, but now I had George here to test that theory. “What do you think of these cameras, George?” I asked.

  She walked over to stand next to me, then looked directly up at the underside of the video camera with her face scrunched up.

  “Hang on,” she said. “I need a better look.”

  She walked out of the room and soon returned with a chair she said was from the front desk. After placing it underneath the camera, she stood up on the chair and was high enough to be nearly eye level with the camera’s blinking red light. She used her own phone’s flashlight function to get a better look.

  Eventually she shook her head. “If this is their camera,” said George, “then their security system is ancient. It shouldn’t even still be working.”

  “Is there a way to tell if it is?” I asked her.

  Instead of responding, George hooked her finger on one of the wires coming out of the camera. To our surprise, the wire popped right off from where it had appeared to be leading into the ceiling.

  “George!” said Bess. “Did you break that?”

  “No,” said George with a grin. “It’s fake! Look, the end of the wire just attaches right back onto the ceiling, like a sticker. But it doesn’t actually lead anywhere.”

  “What about the flashing red light?” I asked.

  “The light is probably battery powered,” George said. Then she tapped the side of the camera’s body. It sounded hollow. “But there’s almost nothing in here. There’s no way this camera is recording anything.”

  This meant that Susan had been lying about the security footage. Which meant that she had also lied about the police watching that footage. Anyone could be sneaking around this museum at night, and there wasn’t any way for her or the police to know.

  “Great,” I said. “Thanks, George.”

  She hopped down off the chair, and Bess carried it back to where George had found it. I made my way over to the STAFF ONLY door and placed my hand on the door handle.

  “Ready?” I asked, glancing at Bess and George behind me. They both nodded.

  The staff hallway looked even more crowded in the dark. I pulled my phone out again for the flashlight, but we still had to keep our eyes down and step carefully to avoid tripping over anything. I could feel all the dust back here tickling my nose again.

  When we reached the bookcase, I turned to Bess and George. “We’ll have to squeeze through one at a time,” I said. “And we should try to be as quiet as possible. We don’t know who might be back here.”

  My two friends stood silently as I went first, sliding in between the bookcase and the wall. The keypad above the door handle looked identical to the one on the outside of the building. I typed in Beverly’s combination. I held my breath, but I didn’t actually need to be nervous. Once again, there were the flashes of green light and the sound of the door unlocking.

  “We’re in!” I whispered back to Bess and George. At the edge of the bookcase, I could just make out Bess giving me a thumbs-up.

  The door opened to the closed-off wing of the museum. I wasn’t worried that anyone would be able to see light back here, so we all pulled up our phones’ flashlights. The room was filled with what must have been statues or sculptures, all covered by large white sheets. There were also a number of boxes and crates stacked against the walls. Two doorways led out of the room: one was directly across from me, and the other was to my left. As I waited for Bess and George to come through the door behind me, I looked around and couldn’t help but find it all very spooky.

  Bess, apparently, agreed with me. As soon as she stepped through the door, she said, “This place is really creeping me out.”

  “Same,” I said back, as George came through the door next. “But don’t forget to whisper.”

  Bess nodded, and I watched as she pulled out her pepper spray and held it in front of her. She noticed me watching her, so she shrugged and said, “What? It’s come in handy before.”

  I couldn’t really argue with that. I started to walk forward, when George whispered my name from where she was hunched near the wall on our right side. “Look at this,” she said.

  I made my way over to her and crouched down next to her. It was a rectangular vent, and when I looked through it, I had a clear view of the DeSantos exhibit. I raised Riley’s camera to my left eye and looked through the vent. I smiled.

  “Nancy?” asked George. “Why are you smiling? This is so creepy.”

  “Because,” I said. “Look through Riley’s camera.”

  George did, squinting. She looked back at me and shook her head. “I don’t get it,” she said.

  “This is how whoever is behind all this was taking photographs of the people visiting the exhibit,” I said. “They were taking them through here. Except whoever they are messed my photograph up. Do you remember that vertical line running down my torso in my picture? Whoever took the picture must have accidentally caught a piece of this vent in the shot.”

  Bess knelt down next to us. She asked to take a look as well, and I passed the camera over to her. “Yeah, that’s exactly what this looks like!” she said, with the camera pressed to her face.

  “That’s partly why I needed to borrow Riley’s camera tonight,” I said. “To see if I could find anything that looked similar to that line.”

  I took the camera back from Bess and snapped a quick photograph through the vent. I made sure to catch one of the vent’s vertical lines in the image, so I could compare it to the picture of myself later.

  I walked over to each of the doorways and looked through them. The one that had been directly in front of us was just as messy as the room we were standing in, filled with more crates and statues and white sheets. The doorway off to the left, on the other hand, was nearly empty.

  “Let’s try this one first,” I said, pointing at the more cluttered hallway. I knew it would be more difficult to walk quietly if we went this way, but if I wanted to keep something or someone hidden, I would put as many obstacles in the way as possible. Maybe the kidnapper was thinking along those same lines.

  As we walked, I began taking photographs of anything that looked interesting, just in case I needed evidence of this place later on. I didn’t want to miss a thing. It was nearly impossible for us to make no noise at all. Every once in a while, one of us bumped into a crate or statue, and once George tripped over one of the sheets.

  After a while, the hallway turned off to the left. As we rounded the corner, I looked as far down as I could see in the low light. It looked as through the hallway would eventually turn again, and I wondered if it just ended or if it made one large circle, connecting back to the first room we’d seen.

  Closer to us, and on the right side of the hallway, I could also see the outline of a doorway. There were noises and what looked like the lights of flashlights or lanterns coming from within it. I could hear something that sounded like hushed voices. I gestured for Bess and George to stay very quiet.

  We started walking forward slowly. Anyone could be in that room. It could just be Grace and Jacob, talking to each other or trying to find a way to escape. Or it could be Grace, Jacob, and their kidnapper. Or it could be multiple kidnappers. I braced myself for any pos
sibility. Bess held her pepper spray up higher.

  The three of us were standing as close to the doorway as we dared. We leaned back flat against the wall. Carefully, I leaned over and peeked around the doorframe.

  It was Grace and Jacob. But they were… laughing? They didn’t seem to be trapped at all.

  I glanced around the room, looking for more clues about what was going on here. There were two sleeping bags, and enough food to last at least a few days. They seemed to be talking and joking with each other, leaning up against the back wall. There was nothing keeping them here that I could see. It looked more like they were here for an extended sleepover than because they had been kidnapped and trapped.

  I leaned back around the doorframe and looked over at Bess and George. “They seem… fine,” I whispered. “I don’t think they’ve been kidnapped.”

  “So what do we do now?” George whispered back. “Call the police?”

  Calling the police did seem to be the best idea. I nodded at George and gestured back toward the exit, thinking that we could use the phone at the front desk. The three of us began to turn around, and I watched as Bess’s foot twisted itself in one of the sheets collecting on the ground. She only tripped a little, but it was enough to make her step down too hard and too loudly.

  The three of us froze.

  “Who’s there?” called Jacob from inside their room. Neither Bess nor George said anything. Instead they both looked at me as if I might tell them what to do next. I wasn’t sure what the best move would be, but I knew we couldn’t let Grace or Jacob get away.

  Both of them stepped out of the doorway. They took one look at the three of us, standing in the hallway, and before we could say anything, they both pushed past us and took off running down the cluttered hallway, back the way we’d come.

  “Go that way!” I called out to Bess and George, pointing after Grace and Jacob. They both began running, but instead of joining them, I turned and began heading the other way.

  Grace and Jacob had been moving quickly, both probably heading for the door behind the bookshelf. I didn’t think we would actually be able to catch them just by running after them. But if this hallway really was a circle, maybe I could run around the other way and head them both off.

  I ran as quickly as I was able, the sound of my feet echoing around me. I turned the corner at the end of the hallway, and just like I had seen through the doorway of the left side, this hallway was nearly empty. Grace and Jacob would have to run around crates and statues and sheets, but I could run straight through.

  I reached the room at the end of the hall and didn’t stop until I was standing right in front of the doorway behind the bookcase. I turned around and covered the door with my arms, just in time to see Grace and Jacob in the room as well and running toward me. The two of them turned around, about to head back in the other direction, when George and Bess entered the room. Bess had her arm held up in front of her.

  “Don’t even think about it,” she said, standing with her feet shoulder-width apart and pointing her pepper spray directly at Grace and Jacob.

  CHAPTER ELEVEN

  Missing the Picture

  BESS MANAGED TO KEEP GRACE and Jacob from running off while George found a phone and called the police. As we waited for the police to arrive, I tried asking Grace and Jacob what they were doing back here, and why they had pretended to disappear into the DeSantos photographs. I still couldn’t figure out what their motives had been, and why they were willing to hide out in a museum for days just to ruin the exhibit.

  I attempted to ask them about their supposed kidnapping, and it seemed as though Jacob might have wanted to explain what was happening. He opened his mouth and was about to say something when Grace elbowed him in the ribs and shook her head. Jacob stopped talking immediately and didn’t look at me or try speaking again until the police arrived.

  I recognized the police officer as the same one I had seen that first morning in Shady Oaks, the one who had taken Susan and Emily in for questioning. He and his partner entered the room behind the bookcase and pointed their flashlights in our direction.

  The officers brought all five of us in for questioning. Even after we had explained to them everything we knew, Bess, George, and I stuck around the station. I wanted to hear what Grace and Jacob had to say, and what the police officers thought of their story. This mystery just didn’t feel solved yet.

  The three of us were sitting in the waiting room of the police station. George was leaning into her palm with her eyes shut and her mouth open. Every once in a while she would wake up with a jump and then slowly fall back into an uneasy sleep. Bess had so far been managing to stay awake, but I noticed her eyelids were fluttering and growing heavy.

  Eventually the police officer I recognized walked past where we were sitting in the waiting room. His name was pinned to his uniform and it read OFFICER JAMES PATTY.

  “Officer Patty!” I called out to him. My sudden shout startled both Bess and George. They jumped in their seats and stared blearily in Officer Patty’s direction. “We were wondering what happened with Grace and Jacob.”

  Officer Patty looked a little annoyed that we had stuck around. He took a deep breath and reluctantly took a seat in front of us.

  “If I tell you three, will you all go home?” he asked us.

  I nodded quickly.

  “Your friends keep changing their story,” Office Patty began. “First they told me they were trying to destroy the DeSantos exhibit, and then they told me they were trying to help the exhibit and that they were pulling this stunt to get the museum more publicity. They said they were acting alone, and then they said they had an accomplice. They even tried to tell me they were actually kidnapped, but they took that one back pretty quickly.”

  “Grace and Jacob aren’t our friends,” I said. “And also, I don’t think they were acting alone.”

  Officer Patty frowned at me. “Why would you say that?”

  “There’s a picture of me in one of the DeSantos photographs too,” I said. “I’m sure it was put there as a warning because I was trying to solve this case. But Grace and Jacob have been hiding in the museum the entire time I’ve been in town. So how would they know I was investigating at all?”

  Officer Patty shrugged. “They could’ve figured it out,” he said. “They could have… overheard something at the museum.”

  “True,” I said, even though I didn’t think that sounded very likely. “But you also said that they keep changing their story. I bet it’s because someone else has been telling them what to do up until this point. Now that that person isn’t around, they aren’t sure how to act.”

  “Or they’re just trying to figure out the best thing to say in order to get in the least amount of trouble,” said Officer Patty. He leaned forward and placed his hands on his knees as he stood up.

  “But—” I began. Officer Patty didn’t give me the chance to say anything else, though.

  “I don’t know why you girls thought it was okay to try and solve this case yourselves,” he said. “But the real detectives are taking over now, and we’ve already caught the people behind it. So I’m going to ask you three to go home and not interfere again.”

  Officer Patty gave us a stern look before walking away, farther into the police station. I looked toward Bess and George, and they seemed just as bothered by this interaction as I was. Hadn’t we been the ones to catch Grace and Jacob? Really, though, there was nothing else for us to do. We eventually gathered up our things and headed outside.

  I hadn’t been paying attention to the time. So when we walked outside and saw that the sun was rising, I was caught by surprise.

  “It’s morning?” I said to Bess and George. “We stayed up all night?”

  My two friends, it seemed, were very aware of how long we had been awake. Bess tried to give me a disbelieving look, but it was interrupted when she let out a large yawn. George rolled her eyes at me and said, “Yeah, Nancy. Aren’t you tired?”

&nb
sp; I was a little tired, but I also felt right on the verge of solving this mystery. I supposed the adrenaline was keeping me awake.

  “So,” said George. “We solved it, right? It was Grace and Jacob?”

  I shook my head. “We have to be missing something,” I said. “What was their motive? How did they get their own pictures into the photographs in the exhibit? And how did they know I was investigating them? I meant what I said to Officer Patty. I think there’s someone else working with them, someone who was telling Grace and Jacob what to do. We just have to figure out who they are.”

  “How do we do that?” asked Bess. She was rubbing one of her eyes, and I could see how tired she was. I couldn’t help but feel a rush of gratitude that both of my friends were still trying to solve this mystery with me, even as they were half-asleep.

  I shook my head. “I don’t know,” I admitted.

  “Maybe if you slept on it,” said Bess.

  “Yeah,” said George. “Let’s go back to the hotel. We’ll get some sleep and pick this back up again in a few hours.”

  I looked at George quickly. “Wait!” I said. The mention of the Elder Root Inn had given me an idea, had reminded me of someone else who must have been involved in all this. “We should go back to the hotel. But not to sleep.”

  I took off down the sidewalk, and after a moment I could hear Bess and George behind me, jogging to catch up. George let out a groan.

  “Nancy?” asked Bess. She didn’t sound any happier about suddenly having to run. “What are you talking about?”

  “We have one more person to question,” I said. “Jacob’s girlfriend, Emily.”

  * * *

  Bess, George, and I made it back to the hotel as quickly as we could, considering it was a fairly long walk and we were all running on such small amounts of sleep. Eventually we made it up to the second floor, and I remembered which room had been Emily’s: room 212.