A Castle in the Clouds

by Kerstin Gier

  I only had Amy’s account of what happened next, although I didn’t doubt the truth of it for a second. At first, the five of them had gone down to the Fabergé Suite as planned, but there was nobody there. So Amy had the smart idea of going down to the lobby and asking Monsieur Rocher if he knew where Faye’s parents might be. Monsieur Rocher happened to know that Faye’s mother was currently having a back, neck, and shoulder massage with Mr. Heffelfinger. At this point, Amy realized it wasn’t going to be easy to take Faye to see her mother, but Faye was not to be deterred—she wanted her mummy, and she wanted her now—so Amy had no choice but to take everyone down to the spa. I’d probably have done exactly the same in her shoes.

  Remembering Mr. Heffelfinger’s aversion to children, she told Gracie, Don, and Dasha to wait outside the door with the forbidding sign until she’d taken Faye to her mother. Which took longer than expected because during the day Mr. Heffelfinger was assisted by a beautician who’d clearly been given the task of guarding the massage-room door like Cerberus. And the fact that Cerberus spoke no English didn’t help matters. Amy said it had taken all her diplomatic skill to persuade the beautician that it would be best for all concerned if she let her take the snotty, quietly whimpering child into the massage room to see her mom. At long last, however, Amy had managed to deliver Faye (under Mr. Heffelfinger’s scandalized gaze) into her mother’s arms, where she cheered up immediately. Amy was feeling pretty pleased with herself, but the feeling evaporated instantly when she left the spa to find that the other children were gone.

  Gracie, Don, and Dasha were simply nowhere to be seen. She called their names and searched the corridor that led from the spa to the elevators, but there was no sign of them. By this time, of course, Carolyn and I were starting to wonder what had become of them all, but it wasn’t until Amy returned to the playroom and asked whether the three children were back already that we started to worry. Not seriously, but a bit: Dasha’s dad was bound to pop in any minute to see how Dasha was getting on. The idea of having to tell him we weren’t entirely sure of his daughter’s whereabouts was not a very appealing one.

  “Don’s probably showing them around the hotel,” I said, but at the same time I remembered, with a sinking feeling, his bad mood earlier that day. What if he’d come up with a better trick than the stink bomb? “I’m sure he just wants to show off to Dasha, introduce her to his contacts in the kitchen. Someone down there keeps giving him ice cream.”

  “Quite right—I’m sure they’ll be back any minute,” Carolyn agreed. “But perhaps you two should go back out there and have a look for them. I’ll stay with the other children and make sure we don’t lose any of them.” She gave a little laugh, but it didn’t sound as carefree as usual.

  Amy and I had only just left the room when Gracie came trotting up.

  “There, you see,” said Carolyn, relieved, but unfortunately there wasn’t much cause for relief. Gracie was alone. And she was very surprised to hear that Don and Dasha weren’t back yet. Gracie had last seen them down in the basement. They’d gotten bored waiting for Amy, so they’d decided to go back upstairs without her. Because Ella and Gretchen had happened to come out of the spa just then, along with Tristan, Aiden, and Claus, Gracie had followed them upstairs and spied on them for a bit while Don and Dasha had gotten into the elevator. Gracie had tailed Ella and Gretchen for a few minutes (they’d gone to play darts in the billiards room), then, after a detour to the toilet, she’d come back to the playroom.

  “We’ve got one child back already, and the other two will turn up soon.” Carolyn stroked Gracie’s head and attempted a breezy smile. “But it can’t hurt to speed things up a little. Perhaps just go and have a quick look in the elevators.”

  Amy, Gracie, and I searched all the elevators. But there was no trace of Don and Dasha.

  “I should never have left them alone,” Amy lamented. “If they don’t turn up soon, Carolyn’s going to get into trouble, and it’ll be all my fault. And Mr. Montfort is going to be furious.”

  She was right there. Ben’s dad was going to flip his lid when he found out about this.

  “I’m sure they’re just playing hide-and-seek again,” said Gracie.

  I wasn’t so sure. Don, as we knew, had been in a foul mood. And bored. Not a good combination.

  “Did Don say anything else?” I asked Gracie, but of course that was a completely pointless question because even if he had said something, she wouldn’t have understood it.

  Gracie shrugged helplessly. Then she remembered that Dasha and Don hadn’t been alone in the elevator—there’d been a nice white-haired lady there, too, who’d spoken German.

  “That must have been Mrs. Ludwig,” I said, relieved. At least this gave us something to go on. “Perhaps she might know where they were headed.”

  But unfortunately Mrs. Ludwig couldn’t help us, either. We found her in the corridor on her way down to the restaurant, where she was due to meet Mr. Ludwig for a cup of coffee and a slice of Havana cake. She confirmed that she had seen the children in the basement earlier. “I did wonder what they were doing just standing around in the corridor like that,” she said. “Then the boy and that darling little Russian girl got into the elevator with me. I don’t really trust those rickety old things, but I just can’t manage the stairs anymore with my old bones. And I was in my bathrobe.” She lowered her voice. “Which, by the way, is the softest, most comfortable bathrobe I’ve ever come across. What do you think, my dear, do you suppose I might be able to purchase one before we leave?”

  “Yes, I’m sure you can,” I said impatiently. “But back to Don and Dasha. You don’t happen to know where they might have gone next?”

  Mrs. Ludwig shook her head slowly. “I got out here on the first floor, and the children were going up to the third floor. They’d pressed the button for the third floor, anyway. Have the little scamps gone missing?”

  I nodded. “But please don’t tell anyone.” Especially not Dasha’s parents. “I’m sure they’re just playing hide-and-seek somewhere.”

  “Of course,” said Mrs. Ludwig with an encouraging smile. “As soon as they get hungry they’ll come out from wherever they’re hiding, you mark my words. I’ve seen it often enough with my own children and grandchildren.”

  I was sure she was right. And yet …

  “Do you have a weird feeling about this?” Amy whispered to me.

  I nodded. Yes, damn it, I did. The hotel was a vast maze of corridors and staircases. Who knew what dangers it held for a sheltered four-year-old? There were probably all kinds of hazards I hadn’t even thought of yet. Dasha was so small that she’d fit through pretty much any gap. I could see Don now, helping her climb inside a ventilation shaft. And at that moment, I couldn’t help thinking of what Old Stucky had said on Christmas Eve. That something bad was about to happen. That evil creatures were going to walk abroad and people would fall prey to their devilish schemes. And Don didn’t need any help in that department—he came up with plenty of devilish schemes all by himself.

  I decided the only sensible course of action was to tell Monsieur Rocher. And since Ben was standing nearby at Reception, we filled him in, too. I felt better as soon as we’d told them. They did a wonderful job of calming me down and assured me it was quite common for children to disappear for a little while, especially on departure day. Monsieur Rocher inquired casually as to how long the children had been missing, and Ben said it would be a good idea to check with the parents. The kids had probably just gone back to their respective rooms.

  Naturally we’d wanted to avoid asking their parents, but I could see it was the right thing to do. Ben rang the Burkhardts on the hotel phone, while Monsieur Rocher dialed the number for the Panorama Suite.

  Amy, Gracie, and I held our breath and hoped against hope, but unfortunately neither Don nor Dasha had turned up at their rooms. Don’s parents weren’t particularly alarmed to hear Don was missing (which wasn’t surprising given that their son knew “his” hotel like
the back of his hand and was allowed to go roaming the hallways and poking about wherever he liked at any hour of the day or night). Burkhardt Sr. and his wife didn’t even bother coming downstairs.

  The Yegorovs, on the other hand, appeared speedily in the lobby. Stella Yegorov was practically hysterical.

  My heart grew heavy. I could imagine how worried she must be. After all, her little girl was only four years old, and she’d probably never been allowed to go off on her own before. Any minute now, Mrs. Yegorov would demand we call the police and a team of sniffer dogs and say she was going to sue the hotel.

  But in fact she had something else on her mind, as I realized when she started wringing her hands and wailing at Monsieur Rocher in broken English. She was inconsolable. Because of the weather, nobody had been able to drive her to Geneva to go shopping and get her hair cut, and now she was demanding to be taken there by helicopter to make up for lost time. She refused to accept that there was no way a helicopter would be able to fly through the snowstorm. Her daughter’s disappearance, on the other hand, didn’t seem to bother her much at all.

  But her husband was clearly finding it hard to stay calm. “Nothing bad will have happened to her, will it?” he said to Monsieur Rocher. “Nothing bad ever happens here at Castle in the Clouds, does it? And she’s got Don with her…”

  “Exactly.” Monsieur Rocher smiled optimistically at us. “We’ll soon find the little runaways. As long as they haven’t gone out in the snow, there’s nothing to worry about. I’ve never known anyone to go missing inside the hotel for long.”

  Carolyn, of course, had been the first to suggest checking whether the children had put on their snowshoes and parkas. But none of their clothes were missing, and nobody had seen them go outside, so they must still be somewhere in the building. We were bound to find them eventually, as I assured Viktor Yegorov over and over again so emphatically that he clearly felt he had to calm me down and not the other way around.

  As his wife tottered away in a huff because nobody would order her a helicopter, he told me Dasha loved playing hide-and-seek. She’d often given them a scare at home, especially the time she’d fallen fast asleep in the laundry basket under a pile of towels.

  “This is a special place,” he said with complete conviction. “Children can feel safe here.”

  Yes. Certainly they could. Unless they were lost in the company of a nine-year-old psychopath.

  Monsieur Rocher brought Viktor Yegorov a cup of tea and looked after him while we continued the search. Luckily, Gordon Montfort wasn’t at work today. I dreaded to think how many of us he would have yelled at and fired on the spot if he’d been here. He’d have been only too happy to serve Carolyn’s head on a plate to the Yegorovs and the Burkhardts.

  Half an hour later, there was still no sign of the two children, even after Gracie, Amy, Ben, and I had turned all the chambermaids’ cleaning carts inside out and searched the cupboards in all the linen rooms. Don certainly wouldn’t have had any qualms about going through a door marked PRIVATE.

  Meanwhile, Carolyn was holding down the fort in the playroom in case the children came back of their own accord, and Pavel and Pierre were systematically trawling the basement. It wasn’t as easy as I’d thought, thank goodness, to climb into the ventilation shafts because the grilles in front of them were all firmly screwed on. But I still called “Hello?” down a few of the shafts as I passed, just in case.

  Perhaps Mrs. Ludwig had been gossiping, or perhaps people had simply noticed what was going on and were glad of a bit of excitement, because several of the guests now came and joined in the search effort. Almost all of them had some anecdote about how, as a child, they’d once found such a good hiding place where nobody could track them down. And Viktor Yegorov was bearing up well, which might have had something to do with the fact that Monsieur Rocher had slipped some rum into his tea. It was obviously having a calming effect.

  But just as I was starting to be infected by the general optimism and had almost stopped feeling anxious (I knew Don, after all, and I knew that to him all this fuss and attention must be like all his Christmases coming at once), along came the thriller writer with his kidnapping theory.

  He caught up with me and Ben on the second floor and grabbed the sleeve of Ben’s jacket. This was the first time I’d had a proper look at the thriller writer. Despite already having several bestsellers under his belt, he only looked to be in his midthirties: a short, slim man with neatly trimmed dark hair, a little snub nose, an impish smile and rather wild eyes, as I now noticed.

  He didn’t want to panic anyone, he said, and he was sure the children would turn up soon, but he’d never forgive himself if he didn’t at least mention it.

  “Mention what?” asked Ben, and the thriller writer’s eyes flicked from Ben’s face to mine as he whispered, “The grand hotel kidnapper.”

  And that was all it took. The panic he didn’t want to cause had already gripped me.

  Ben looked distinctly unimpressed. “The grand hotel kidnapper?” he echoed drily.

  “Some people call him the luxury hotel abductor,” said the thriller writer. “But that’s never caught on—too unwieldy. I came across him while I was doing some research for my last book. Over the past thirty years, he’s abducted six children. And he’s still at large.”

  “Six children in thirty years?” Ben frowned skeptically.

  The thriller writer nodded gravely. “Two in Germany, one in Austria, one in France, and two in Italy,” he murmured. “And always from luxury hotels.”

  “Six children kidnapped from hotels in four different countries over the course of thirty years?” Ben sounded like a publisher the thriller writer was trying (and failing) to interest in a new book. “That seems a bit far-fetched to me. How do they know it was the same kidnapper every time, if he’s never been caught?”

  The thriller writer was momentarily flummoxed. “It’s—er—detectives have never been in any doubt—every case had his fingerprints all over it.”

  “They found fingerprints?” asked Ben. “Well in that case, why didn’t they—”

  “No!” The writer clicked his tongue in annoyance. Ben was being so obtuse that I almost did the same. “I was speaking metaphorically. The crimes bore all the hallmarks of the same perpetrator. The child would disappear, then five or six hours later there’d be a ransom demand by telephone, tailored very precisely to the parents’ circumstances and not limited to cash, either. When the child of a world-famous conductor was taken, for instance, the kidnapper didn’t just ask for money—he also wanted the Stradivarius that happened to be in the family’s possession. Another time he demanded a Van Gogh painting that nobody else could possibly have known about.”

  “That’s terrible,” I whispered, breaking out in goose bumps.

  Ben looked at me, shaking his head.

  But the writer was pleased to have at least one attentive listener. “The ransom was always handed over via a middleman or middlewoman,” he went on. “And as long as the police didn’t intervene, there’d be a phone call afterward to say where the child was being held. There was only one time when it all went wrong. The son of an Italian businessman was abducted, and as soon as the police got involved…” He let out a deep sigh. “Well, you’re too young to remember it—but the little boy was never seen again.”

  “Oh my God!” I exclaimed. “Ben, we have to tell Yeg … Smirnov to call in his bodyguard right away.” I wondered why he hadn’t shown up already.

  Ben groaned. “Seriously, this kidnapping thing is ridiculous. How stupid would a kidnapper have to be to abduct someone on a day like today? There’s a blizzard raging outside, no cars have been able to get in or out for hours, and the only road out of here goes on for four and a half miles without anywhere to turn off—it’s hardly ideal for making a quick getaway with a kidnapped child. And anyway, why did the kidnapper suddenly decide to abduct two children at once? Did he get greedy? Or have his fingerprints changed?”

  The
thriller writer pressed his lips together, offended.

  “I don’t think you should just dismiss the idea out of hand, Ben,” I said, earning myself a grateful look from the writer. “Don and Dasha are both prime targets for abduction. Just think of the sui—” I just managed to stop myself from saying “suitcase of dirty money.” “Of the S.O.D.M,” I went on in a lower voice. “And what about the D. that Y. bought for his W. at C.? Hmm?”

  “Huh?” Ben stared at me and furrowed his brow, then grinned. “Oh, I see. I suppose both families might be targets for a ransom demand. But the D. that Y. bought for his W. at C. isn’t even in the H. yet. And who is this kidnapper supposed to be? We know everyone here.”

  “That’s not true,” said the thriller writer quickly. “Allow me to point out that with the number of temps you’ve taken on over Christmas, it’s impossible to keep track of everybody. And according to my sources you haven’t performed any background checks … So actually, every one of those temps is a possible suspect.”

  “And you know all this because…?” Ben crossed his arms.

  “I’ve been speaking to some of your employees,” said the thriller writer, “while doing research for my next book, provisionally titled The Bleeding Room. It’s about a serial killer who boards up his victims in the walls of hotels and lets them bleed to death.”

  I had to look away at this point because the gleam in his eyes was genuinely scary. And he also had a bit of a squint.