One False Note - 39 Clues 02 (9 page)

The au pair squinted at the document. "Italian, I think. Not one of my languages." The Cahills regarded her blankly. This was the first time Nellie had been unable to act as their translator.

"So how do you know it's Italian?" asked Dan.

"Spanish and Italian aren't too different. And this word --Venezia.

I'm pretty sure that's Venice, which is in Italy."

Amy indicated the date -- 1770. "Mozart would have been fourteen years old. Don't you remember the museum exhibits? He performed all across

Italy around then. His father took him on tour."

"So this is" -- Dan frowned -- "an eighteenth-century concert poster, starring Mozart?" "In Venice," Amy finished. "That's where the next clue must be hidden." Nellie grinned. "I always wanted to go to Venice. It's supposed to be the romance capital of the world."

"Sweet," put in Dan. "Too bad your date is an Egyptian Mau on a hunger strike." The au pair sighed. "Better than an eleven-year-old with a big mouth." The drive to Venice took more than five hours. Sharing the backseat with Saladin, Dan nearly went out of his mind. He wasn't a fan of long car rides to begin with. And the frustration of begging the cat to eat was infuriating and worrisome at the same time. They had so little left of their grandmother. They owed it to Grace to take proper care of her beloved pet.

To add to his discomfort, there was also a long, severe lecture from his sister, reminding him of the grave importance of their quest and how much was at stake. "The wisecracks aren't helping, Dan! You have to grow up and take this more seriously!" "Seriously?" he echoed. "We're already up to our ears in serious! What we need is to lighten up a little! The next clue could be right in front of your nose, but you don't see it because you're too busy being serious!"

"Cut it out!" Nellie bellowed. "You're going to put us in the ditch! They drive the speed of light on these autostradas!"

"You
drive the speed of light backing out of the driveway," Dan countered.

"I'm not kidding! As long as I'm babysitting" -- she glowered at Dan -- "au pairing

-- you two are going to have to get along. I can handle the craziness; I can handle your nut-job relatives; I can even handle you disappearing for hours on end. But not the fighting. Understand? You're on the same team. Act like it."

Silence fell, and the argument was over as abruptly as it had begun. With the peace came a release of the tension of their Salzburg adventure. Nellie could almost feel the siblings rebooting, steeling themselves for the dangers that might lie ahead. They were Cahills, all right. Probably the only two decent human beings in the whole brood. Finally, they approached Venice and the coast. But before they'd even reached the city limits, traffic on the autostrada slowed to a crawl.

"Aw!" Dan glared at the back of his sister's head in the passenger seat. Amy barely even noticed the slowdown. She was studying the Mozart concert announcement and had been since Austria. "What are you doing? Learning Italian by osmosis?"

She ignored the joke. "There's a name on here I can't figure out. Who's Fidelio Racco?"

"Another musician?" Nellie suggested.

Amy shook her head. "Mozart and his sister were a package deal. I never read anything about a third performer on their tours."

"Well, if it really is a concert poster," Dan mused, "maybe this Racco guy is like a promoter."

His sister thought it over. "It makes sense. Not a promoter like they have today. But back then, visiting musicians gave private shows at rich people's mansions. Maybe Fidelio Racco hosted Mozart and Nannerl. I wonder if we can find out where he lived." "No problem," Dan said sarcastically. "Just look him up in the 1770 phone book. Piece of cake."

"This is Italy," Nellie reminded him. "It's 'piece of tiramisu' here. Mmm, gotta get some. Our exit," she added, roaring off t
he highway, past a sign marked V
enezia, onto a wide boulevard. They pulled up behind a television mobile unit with familiar markings.

Dan pointed. "Check it out -- Eurotainment TV. Those are the guys who threw that bash for Jonah Wizard in Vienna."

Suddenly, the Eurotainment van squealed left across two busy lanes and made a sharp turn, tailing a silver stretch limo. Nellie leaned on the horn and barked, "Maniac!" "Follow him!" Amy said urgently.

"Why?"

"Do it!" she insisted.

The wheel just a blur in her hands, the au pair managed to weave in and out of moving traffic, falling in behind the mobile unit. "Rock on!" cheered Dan. "Paparazzi chase!"

He was right. The limo was trying to get away from Eurotainment TV. But the van driver refused to be shaken. Behind this high-speed game of cat and mouse rattled the Fiat, passing cars, running lights, and swerving around hapless pedestrians.

"When I talked about seeing Venice, this was so
not what I had in mind!" complained Nellie, hunched over the dashboard. "I wonder who's in the car -- Brad and Angelina? Prince William?"

"Keep going!" urged Amy. "I have a sneaking suspicion I know
exactly
who it is."

It happened in the blink of an eye. The limo was speeding toward a bridge, with the mobile unit in hot pursuit. The car turned on a dime, bounced across the ramp, and accelerated down a side street. The van driver tried to follow, but he was hemmed in by traffic. Eurotainment TV disappeared over the bridge.

"Who do I follow?" Nellie demanded.

"The limo!" chorused Amy and Dan.

The Fiat veered away from the bridge and turned the corner. The stretch was traveling at regular speed now. Its passengers believed the chase was finished. Nellie kept well back.

They continued to tail the limo until it veered onto a ramp, climbing a long causeway that led out over a sunlit lagoon. "Now what?" asked Nellie.

"Don't lose him!" Amy ordered.

"Wait," said Dan. "I thought we were going to Venice
. The sign says" -- he squinted
--"Tronchetto. Smooth move, Amy. Now we're driving to the wrong town."

"I don't think so," put in Nellie. "Look!"

Before them stretched a magnificent sight. A gleaming skyline of domes and spires rose

from the sparkling water.

"Venice," breathed Amy. "fust like in pictures."

Even Dan was impressed. "Pretty cool place," he conceded. "Too bad that's not where we're going."

Nellie piloted them across the long bridge, making sure to keep a couple of cars
between the limo and the Fiat at all times. At last, they began to descend toward
Tronchetto. But instead of a town, they were approaching a low sprawling island,
almost entirely covered with thousands of vehicles.

Dan was mystified. "A parking lot?"

"More like the great-granddaddy of them," Nellie amended.

"But who takes a limo to a parking lot?"

A large billboard loomed up on their right. Amy scanned the many languages, zooming in on the English at last. "I get it -- there are no cars allowed
in Venice! You have to park here and take a ferry to the city."

Her brother frowned. "Then how do people get around?"

"By boat," Nellie supplied. "Venice is crisscrossed by dozens of canals."

Just before the parking entrance, the limo came to a stop. A uniformed chauffeur
emerged and opened the rear door. Out stepped two figures, one slender, the other
taller and stocky. They wore baseball caps, pulled low over dark glasses. But there was
no mistaking the teenager's hip-hop swagger.

Jonah Wizard -- with his father, as always.

"That
bonehead?" exclaimed Nelly in dismay.

Dan was also confused. "If we've got the paper that says Venice, how did Jonah know to come here?"

Amy could only shake her head.

They watched as the Wizards walked over to join a crowd of people waiting to board a ferry to the city. The chauffeur got back in the limo and drove away. Nellie's brow furrowed. "The great Mr. Hip-Hop Mogul standing in line with the common peasants? How do you figure that?"

Dan grinned. "I'm starting to dig this 'no cars' thing. It's a great equalizer." Amy wasn't convinced. "Jonah can afford to buy that ferry and kick everybody else off. If he's taking a public boat, it's because he's trying to slip into town unnoticed. Quick, park the car.
Let's see where he's going."

The Tronchetto complex was enormous, so they were half a mile away before they managed to locate an open spot. By then, the ferry had moored at the landing, and the passengers were already starting to board.

"Come on!" Dan scooped up Saladin in his arms and began to run for the terminal. "If we have to grab the next boat, we'll lose Jonah for good!"

"Mrrp!"
complained the Egyptian Mau, displeased with the rough ride.

The deep-throated bass of a horn rattled Tronchetto, setting off several car alarms. The ferry was ready to set sail.

The three sprinted across the lot, backpacks flailing wildly. Luckily, the passenger queue was long, delaying the departure. Dan flung Saladin onto the gangway just as a uniformed sailor was closing the chain behind the last customer. The cat scampered onto the deck, and the exasperated crewman had no choice but to allow the Cahills and their au pair to board with their pet.

The trip to Venice took barely ten minutes. Amy, Dan, and Nellie kept well away from the Wizards, making themselves small behind a bulkhead. They needn't have worried. Jonah and his father seemed just as determined to keep a low profile. They spent the short ride at the rail, faces downcast at the water. And when the ferry docked in Venice, they were the first passengers off, pushing purposefully through the bustling cobblestone streets.

The Cahills and Nellie followed at a distance.

"Taking public transit and
walking -- both in the same day," Dan marveled. "If Jonah gets any more human, the Pez people are going to stop selling his dispenser."

It was easy to remain unnoticed by the Wizards on the busy main roads. But after a
few twists and turns, Jonah and his father started down a deserted alley, lined with tiny shops. Amy pulled Dan and Nellie into the cover of a recessed doorway. Halfway down the block, the Wizards entered a store. The Cahills and Nellie waited. Ten minutes. Then twenty. "What are they doing in there?" Amy wondered.

Dan shrugged. "Maybe when you're rich, shopping takes longer, since you get to buy more stuff."

"Let's take a closer look," Amy decided.

Dan handed Saladin to Nellie, and brother and sister approached the store cautiously. disco volante
blazoned a neon sign with the dancing image of a CD morphing into a flying saucer.

Dan made a face. "A music store? Jonah's the Mr. Wonderful of the record business. Anything he wants to hear they'll beam digitally to the home theater in his mansion. Why would he buy his own CDs?"

Amy edged in front of the glass and peered into Disco Volante. It looked like any music shop back in the US -- racks of CDs and
old-fashioned vinyl records,

posters of artists and album covers, a young, slightly scruffy-looking clerk behind the cash register. And --

She blinked. That was it. The cashier was alone. She checked again, venturing farther out in front of the window until she was right in the middle of it. She searched up and down the aisles and into the soundproof listening booth in the back. Nobody. Dan noticed the expression of befuddlement on Amy's face. "What is it? Can you see Jonah and his dad?" "They're not there."

He joined his sister at the window. "We just saw them walk in!" Amy shrugged. "I can't explain it, either."

Back at the doorway, they brought Nellie up-to-date on their findings. The au pair was practical. "His name may be Wizard, but he isn't one. He can't teleport himself out of a CD shop."

"Exactly," Amy agreed. "Either Jonah and his dad are still in there, or they left through a secret door. We have to search that store."

"Yeah, duh," her brother put in. "But how do we do that with a guy at the cash register?"

Amy turned to Nellie. "Can you create a diversion to draw the clerk outside?" The au pair was wary. "What kind of diversion?"

"You could pretend to be lost," Dan proposed. "The guy comes out to give you directions, and we slip inside."

"That's the most sexist idea I've ever heard," Nellie said harshly. "I'm female, so I have to be clueless. He's male, so he's got a great sense of direction."

"Maybe you're from out of town," Dan suggested. "Wait -- you are
from out of town."

Nellie stashed their bags under a bench and set Saladin on the seat with a stern "You're the watch-cat. Anybody touches those bags, unleash your inner tiger."

The Egyptian Mau surveyed the street uncertainly.

"Mrrp."

Nellie sighed. "Lucky for us there's no one around. Okay, I'm going in there. Be ready."

The clerk said something to her -- probably May I help you?

She smiled apologetically. "I don't speak Italian."

"Ah -- you are American." His accent was heavy, but he seemed eager to please. "I will assist you." He took in her black nail polish and nose ring. "Punk, perhaps, is your enjoyment?"

"More like punk/reggae fusion," Nellie replied thoughtfully. "With a country feel. And operatic vocals." The clerk stared in perplexity.

Nellie began to tour the aisles, pulling out CDs left and right. "Ah -- Arctic Monkeys --that's what I'm talking about. And some Bad Brains -- from the eighties. Foo Fighters --