Into the Gauntlet

by Margaret Peterson Haddix

  But Dan wasn't done talking.

  "So without any serum --how'd Shakespeare get to be the greatest writer ever?" he asked. "Better than all those Janus writers who did have the miracle serum in their DNA?"

  "I don't know," Amy admitted. "Do you think he just tried really, really hard?"

  She felt dazed, like she did any time she thought about the serum. It just seemed so much like cheating. Not that Cahills were above cheating: She'd seen enough in the Clue hunt to know that cheating was practically a family trait. But the serum -- that was like drugs. Something really, really dangerous.

  Secretly, when she'd learned the truth about the Madrigals' place in the family, she'd actually felt a little relieved that there wasn't any serum in her DNA. But before she'd understood anything, she'd struggled to get that vial of the Lucian serum back in Paris. She'd gone all the way to the top of Mount Everest hoping to find the Janus serum.

  And it sounds like the master serum is the final prize in the clue hunt, Amy thought. Somehow.

  Anxiety stabbed in her gut. This was something she'd been trying not to think about. She remembered Dan's argument back in the hotel room, about how

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  winning would mean that they'd get enough power to knock everyone else into shape, to achieve all their goals. But was that really the Madrigal way to solve things? Had Grace really set the entire Clue hunt in motion, just so Amy and Dan could get access to something that might change them completely?

  Didn't she think we were good enough just the way we are? Amy wondered.

  She realized she'd begun to whimper.

  "Amy," Dan said. "Are you freaking out again?"

  "Everything's so complicated," Amy complained. "I was feeling good that we could decode the Shakespeare leads, and that Hamilton called us 'worthy competitors'--things really have changed since the clue hunt started. So maybe there is hope. But there are still so many things I don't understand. How did the Starlings catch up with us so easily? How did all the other teams know to be at the Globe the same time as us? What are we really supposed to do to win? What do the Madrigals expect from us? And then--"

  "Amy," Dan said very solemnly. "I know exactly what you need."

  "What?" Amy asked.

  "A snack break," Dan said. "And -- even if it doesn't help you, it will help me. Nellie, can you please pull over? I'm starving!"

  "I wouldn't mind getting off the road for a little bit," Nellie said. She veered around two Volvos and a BMW. All three of them honked at her.

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  When they stopped at a service station, Dan ran through the aisles, marveling at all the great British snack foods.

  "They have something called Mega Monster Munch?" he cried. "I've got to have some of that! And BBQ Beef Hula Hoops! And ..." He began grabbing bags off the shelves.

  "Dan, you've had junk food on practically every continent now," Nellie said. "Why is this so exciting?"

  "Because just about everywhere else, it's been the same old stuff we have at home, or labeled in some language I don't understand," Dan said. "This"--he picked up a bag of Crispy Bacon Frazzles -- "it's like something I've always dreamed of. Wouldn't it be sad if I'd never come here? This is why people should travel!"

  Amy wandered away from Dan and Nellie. This was so typical. Dan refusing to worry, her worrying enough for both of them.

  She heard a voice say, "Globe Theatre." She turned quickly.

  The voice came from a TV set near the cash register.

  "It appears that a riot broke out in the famous theater this afternoon," the BBC announcer was saying.

  Amy stepped closer and angled so she could see the screen. But there was no video rolling, just a woman talking.

  "International hip-hop and reality TV star Jonah

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  Wizard was detained for questioning about his part in the riot, which caused hundreds of pounds worth of damages," the announcer continued. "Performances at the Globe have been suspended indefinitely. Police are considering whether to charge Wizard --and possibly others --with willful destruction of property."

  Amy threw a wad of pound notes down on the counter.

  "That's for everything," she said, pointing at the bags Dan and Nellie were carrying. She knew she'd overpaid, but she didn't care.

  She pulled Dan and Nellie outside.

  "Whoa, whoa, what's going on?" Nellie demanded as they hustled into the car.

  Quickly, Amy told the other two what she'd heard on the TV.

  "What?" Dan said. "That doesn't make sense. During this clue hunt, Cahills have destroyed historic sites all over the planet, and it's never made the news!"

  "It gets hushed up," Nellie agreed. "Each branch pays for its own. The Madrigals have always paid for the damages you two caused."

  Amy hadn't known that.

  "Well, we didn't hurt anything except in Venice," she said. "And, okay, Vienna, too ..."

  "Jonah's family has tons of money to hush things up," Dan protested. "He broke all those terra-cotta statues back in China --well, to rescue me, after he set me up. But I know his dad paid off the Chinese

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  officials, and nobody else ever heard anything about it. All Jonah did at the Globe was break a barrel, and it's all over the news?"

  "Something else has changed," Amy said slowly. "Something big ..."

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  CHAPTER 9

  Jonah Wizard stood very, very still. He was posing at Madame Tussauds, where everyone who'd been anyone for the past two hundred years had been immortalized as a wax statue. Actually, Jonah was impersonating a wax statue, since the one they were making of him wasn't quite finished yet. Madame Tussauds had just opened for the day, and the room was beginning to fill up with people exclaiming, "They look so real!"

  In a few minutes, Jonah would move. He'd start with something small, maybe a raised eyebrow. Then he'd segue into some sweet dance move. Music would fill the room, and he'd start singing. Everyone would scream with delight and crowd around. Maybe some of the girls would even faint.

  Normally, this was the kind of thing Jonah loved. The music, the adoring fans--it was what he lived for. But today... today, he hated it.

  Today, he wasn't doing this just to thrill his fans or to promote his music, TV show, energy drinks,

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  pop-up books, or clothing line. Or anything else in the vast, sprawling Jonah Wizard entertainment empire. Today he was just a distraction --a sideshow. While he was singing and dancing and sucking up all the attention in the entire building, his mother planned to pluck out a hint she believed was hidden in the shoe of the William Shakespeare wax statue only a few rooms away. And, just in case that didn't work, she had canisters of poison gas with her. She had grenades. She had a gun.

  Someone could get hurt, Jonah thought. Someone could be killed. Maybe even some of my fans, because of me.

  And there was nothing Jonah could do about it.

  Jonah's mother was blackmailing him. Blackmailing him to stay in the Clue hunt--and do it her way.

  She'd been livid that he hadn't emerged from the Globe with any leads.

  "Apparently, you don't care enough about winning the biggest prize in history," she'd said, glaring at him. "Apparently, you need more incentive."

  "No, Mom, I tried at the Globe," he'd protested. "It's just --we're not Lucians. I thought of a better way to win, a more Janus way--I could tell you--"

  "It didn't work, did it? I don't want to hear anything about plans like that," Cora said. She favored him with a thin, heartless smile. "I know what will work."

  And then she'd called the police herself. She'd driven Jonah to the police station to stand in a lineup and be picked out by witnesses from the Globe.

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  "You see your choices now, don't you?" she'd asked. "You do what I want. Or you go to prison."

  Thinking about it now, Jonah had to work very hard to keep still.

  He couldn't really imagine being sent to prison. But Jonah's dad h
ad spelled out exactly what a little bad PR, uncorrected, could do to Jonah's life:

  TV show--canceled.

  Concert dates --canceled.

  Recording contract--canceled.

  Trademark T-shirts --put on the 75 percent off sale racks. Maybe even yanked off the shelves and burned because nobody wanted them.

  Jonah couldn't bear the thought of nobody wanting his T-shirts, his music, his TV show ... not wanting him.

  But if Jonah did what his mother said, his parents would fix everything. Prevent all those possible disasters.

  Across the room, Jonah's mother winked at him -- his cue.

  Jonah raised an eyebrow, and a girl staring him right in the face jumped back and shrieked. Jonah started dancing and singing, and everything went exactly as he expected: the screams, the fans' delight, the instant enormous crowd, even the fainting girls.

  So bizarre. It all felt wrong. Even without Mom having to resort to the poison gas, the grenades, the gun.

  Afterward, Jonah slid into the limo waiting outside

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  Madame Tussauds. For perhaps the first time in his life, he didn't even glance out at the crowd as the car pulled away from the curb.

  "I know Mom called you. Did you take care of everything?" he asked his dad.

  Broderick kept his head bent over his BlackBerry.

  "Little problem," he said. "One witness won't recant. Won't change her story at all."

  "Pay her off," Jonah said.

  Finally, Broderick looked at his son.

  "She says she doesn't want our money," he said.

  "Everybody wants money," Jonah replied, a bit of his old confidence returning. "Offer her more."

  For a moment, he almost felt close to his father because he knew they would be thinking the same thing: Neither of them had ever met anybody who didn't want money.

  But Broderick was shaking his head. "She won't take anything," he said. "But--she said she would meet with you if we wanted. To talk about it."

  "Oh --one of those," Jonah said. He laughed, and he didn't even have to try to make it sound normal. "Yo, why didn't you say so?" It was just another fan, someone who thought the chance to meet him was worth more than any amount of money.

  He could respect that. Right now, that was exactly what he needed.

  Half an hour later, they pulled up in front of a drab hotel.

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  "You might wont to really turn on the charm," Broderick said, with a look Jonah couldn't quite identify.

  "I know," Jonah said coldly. "It'll be off the chain. Like always."

  He strode out of the car, up the cracked sidewalk. At the front desk, Broderick said, "My son is supposed to be meeting one of your guests in, ah, your sitting room?"

  The worker pointed to a broken-down collection of chairs.

  Jonah whirled around.

  "Yo, yo, yo, my homie--"

  And then he stopped.

  The woman sitting before him was old.

  She had white hair.

  She had wrinkles all over her face --like she'd never heard of plastic surgery.

  She was clutching a handbag in her lap -- a really, really cheap knockoff, maybe, of the one Queen Elizabeth had been carrying that time Jonah had met her.

  And she was wearing a brown polyester ... what would you call it? A pantsuit?

  "Jonah, um, this is Gertrude Pluderbottom," Broderick said.

  The old lady pursed her lips.

  "You may call me Miss Pluderbottom," she said in a strict, scratchy old-lady voice.

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  Her eyes seemed to bore into Jonah and his dad, both at once. How did she do that?

  "I believe we agreed that I would be meeting with Jonah alone?" she said to Broderick.

  "Um, er, yes, uh--Jonah, I'll be waiting out in the car," Broderick said, and escaped.

  Jonah sagged into one of the chairs opposite Miss Pluderbottom.

  "Yo," he said, rather feebly. "Wassup?"

  Miss Pluderbottom narrowed her eyes at him. It made her look even scarier.

  "In the interest of carrying on a cordial conversation," she said, "I will interpret that slurred collection of syllables to mean that you are pleased to make my acquaintance, and that you wish to inquire about my thoughts and concerns. Is that correct?"

  Jonah heard his own voice say, weakly, "Yes, ma'am."

  Jonah was certain that he had never before in his life called anyone "ma'am."

  He hadn't even realized he knew the word. Miss Pluderbottom sniffed.

  "That's better," she said. "Now, I did try to speak with you yesterday at the Globe."

  "You did?" Jonah said.

  "You don't remember anything I said?" Miss Pluderbottom said.

  Jonah barely managed to stop himself from saying, I don't pay attention to people like you. Had some old lady

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  talked to him there? Miss Pluderbottom wasn't young and fly. She wasn't A-list. She couldn't do anything to help his career or the Clue hunt.

  Today she can, he reminded himself.

  "I'm sorry," Jonah apologized, pumping a full level of sincerity into his words.

  Miss Pluderbottom didn't look like she believed him. She picked a tiny piece of lint off her brown polyester vest.

  Jonah found himself feeling sorry for the lint.

  "Why were you at the play yesterday, Jonah?" Miss Pluderbottom asked, her eyes still narrowed and suspicious.

  "Oh, I am such a fan of Shakespeare," Jonah said. "He's my homie, Billy S.!"

  "Hmm," Miss Pluderbottom said. She waited.

  Jonah's mouth went dry.

  "And --it was for my mom," he added.

  "Of course," Miss Pluderbottom said. She leaned forward slightly. "But I'm inclined to believe that your mother wanted you to absorb some culture, not destroy it."

  Jonah's brain swam with panic.

  "Most mothers, yeah," he said. "But mine ... see, there's kind of a treasure hunt in my family."

  Why had he said that? Jonah knew the unspoken rule: You didn't tell outsiders about the Clue hunt.

  And yet Jonah kept talking.

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  "There's a big prize at the end," he said. "My parents -- well, my mom --it's all she cares about. Winning."

  "Indeed," Miss Pluderbottom said. She was still watching him.

  Jonah was used to people watching him. Practically his whole life had been recorded and broadcast worldwide. Everybody watched him. But he wasn't used to being watched like this. It was like Miss Pluderbottom could see right through him, like she could read his mind, like she knew about every single bad thing he'd ever done.

  Did she know he'd abandoned Dan and Amy on a crocodile-infested island in Egypt?

  That he'd set up Dan to be murdered in China?

  I knew nothing would really happen in Egypt! he wanted to tell Miss Pluderbottom. And I changed my mind in China! I risked my own life to go back and rescue Dan! See, I'm not so bad!

  "And this big prize," Miss Pluderbottom said slowly. "Was it worth ruining the play for hundreds of other people? Worth ruining your reputation? Worth lying about?"

  Jonah squirmed in his seat.

  "My mother thinks so," he said. "It's, like, some huge family treasure."

  "A family legacy, then," Miss Pluderbottom said. "Don't you know that 'No legacy is so rich as honesty'?"

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  "Um," Jonah said.

  "That's Shakespeare. Your 'homie' Billy S.," she said. "From All's Well That Ends Well"

  It should have been really funny to watch Miss Pluderbottom's pruny lips say "homie" and "Billy S." But Jonah couldn't laugh.

  "Let me tell you why I was at the play yesterday," Miss Pluderbottom said.

  Jonah listened.

  "I'm a teacher," Miss Pluderbottom said. "I've been teaching Shakespeare to high school students in Cedar Grove, Iowa, for the past forty-nine years. And I've been saving money for this trip the whole time. I packed my lunch every day--even when the school
cafeteria was serving Meatloaf Surprise. And I do love their Meatloaf Surprise. I clipped coupons. I stopped buying new clothes."

  Jonah guessed that must have happened about 1972.

  "All I wanted to do was see where the Bard was born, walk where he walked," Miss Pluderbottom was saying. "Then the Globe opened, and I realized I could also see Shakespeare performed the way it would have been in his lifetime, when all his plays were new...."

  "So come back the next time the Globe does Romeo and Juliet," Jonah said.

  "Look at me. Do you think I have another forty-nine years left to save up for another trip?" Miss Pluderbottom asked.

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  Jonah realized his father was an idiot. This was about money.

  "I'll pay for your next trip," Jonah said. "Change your story, and I'll even pay the Globe to reopen as fast as they can. You help me, I help you--everyone wins."

  "No," Miss Pluderbottom said. "Everybody loses. I would be selling out my integrity. You would start thinking you could get away with anything." , Was she nuts? He could get away with anything.

  Or --he'd always been able to before.

  "No, no, it'd be like you were schooling me," Jonah argued frantically. "Your trip might cost a lot of money." He flicked his eyes toward the gaping hole in his chair where the stuffing was coming out. "I'd put you up in a real hotel. Five star."

  "Even if my trip cost a million dollars, you wouldn't even notice it was gone," Miss Pluderbottom said, and somehow her eyes seemed to get steelier. "And if I wanted to 'school' you --not that I would ever use that word as a verb --I'd want you to do something that made an impression. Promise to read all of Shakespeare's plays, maybe. Send me a report on each one of them."

  "I could do that," Jonah said softly.

  He waited for her to argue that he could easily get someone else to do that for him. They could draw up papers working out those details. That's what lawyers were for.