The Mystery of the Mosaic

by Harper Paris

  TABLE OF CONTENTS

  Chapter 1 The Floating City

  Chapter 2 The Two Hawks

  Chapter 3 A Mysterious E-mail

  Chapter 4 A Gondola Thief?

  Chapter 5 Calle Farnese

  Chapter 6 Pumpkin in Trouble

  Chapter 7 Which Way?

  Chapter 8 One More Mystery

  Chapter 9 The Mosaic

  Chapter 10 Venezia, Ti Amo

  Glossary

  About Harper Paris and Marcos Calo

  CHAPTER 1

  The Floating City

  Ella Briar and her twin brother, Ethan, had never been to Venice, Italy, before. They’d never been to a floating city, either!

  Venice was made up of a bunch of tiny islands connected by canals and bridges. The canals were like streets, except filled with water. So some people were using boats to get around, and others were walking over the bridges from one little street to another!

  The Briar family had traveled by water taxi from the airport. The sleek motorboat pulled up to a cream-colored building with lots of balconies.

  “Here’s our hotel!” the twins’ mother, Josephine Briar, said brightly.

  Their dad, Andrew, pushed his glasses up on his nose and pointed to his guidebook. “It says here that the Pensione Mistero is one of the oldest hotels in Venice.”

  “Is it older than you guys?” Ella asked with a sneaky smile.

  Mr. Briar laughed. “I should hope so. It was built more than eight hundred years ago.”

  The four of them stepped out of the boat with their suitcases. Pink, yellow, and pale green buildings lined both sides of the canal. Pretty flowers and vines filled the window boxes. There were no cars or bicycles on the cobblestone streets, only people walking.

  For a moment, Ella and Ethan were so awed by their surroundings that they forgot they were supposed to be sad. Or mad. Or sad and mad.

  Just yesterday, they had said good-bye to everything and everyone they loved: their house in Brookeston, their friends, their school, and most of all, their Grandpa Harry. Their mom was starting her new job as a travel writer. That meant she had to travel to different foreign cities and write about them for her newspaper column, Journeys with Jo!

  It also meant the rest of the family had to travel with her. Ella and Ethan had not been happy about that. While Mrs. Briar was out researching and writing, Mr. Briar would be homeschooling the twins.

  When the Briars entered the hotel, a woman greeted them from the front desk.

  “Buon giorno! Hello! I am Sofia,” she said cheerfully. She handed the Briars a large gold key and told them their rooms were on the fourth floor.

  There was no elevator, so the family climbed up the narrow, twisting staircase. When they got to their door, they found an orange cat in the hallway! It wore a leather collar with a silver bell on it.

  “Hi. Who are you?” Ella smiled and bent down to look at it. It purred and rubbed against her leg.

  “It probably doesn’t understand English,” Ethan said. “You should speak Italian.”

  “I’m sure this kitty doesn’t care what language you speak as long as you pet it,” Mrs. Briar joked.

  “I’m going to call you ‘Pumpkin’ because you look like a cute little pumpkin,” Ella told the cat.

  Pumpkin meowed.

  The Briars went inside using the gold key, and Pumpkin followed. The living room had tall ceilings, antique furniture, and a view of the canal. There were two bedrooms and a small kitchen too.

  Ella thought about her room back in Brookeston. She thought about her seashell and shark tooth collections. She thought about Grandma Lucy’s old desk, where she wrote her poems and short stories. She thought about the tree house in the backyard.

  Then she tried to push all those thoughts out of her mind. This was their new home now—well, at least for the next few weeks it was. She and Ethan would just have to make the most of it.

  CHAPTER 2

  The Two Hawks

  “I think our restaurant is right around the next corner,” Mr. Briar said, squinting at a map of Venice.

  It was dinnertime, and the Briars were headed to a place called the Marco Polo Ristorante. Grandpa Harry had recommended it to them.

  Ethan and Ella followed their dad along a crowded street lined with shops and cafés. Their mom trailed after them in her high-heeled shoes. She was talking to someone on her cell phone about the Doge’s Palace.

  “Hey, Dad? What is the Doge’s Palace?” Ella asked.

  “A long time ago, Venice was ruled by someone called a ‘doge.’ A doge was elected by the people of Venice to lead the city for his entire lifetime. Now the palace is a sight for visitors like us.” Mr. Briar was a history professor and knew interesting stuff like that.

  A few minutes later, they reached the Marco Polo Ristorante. Inside, the air smelled yummy, like garlic and tomato sauce. Black-and-white photographs and flickering candles lined the brick walls.

  “Why are lots of places in Venice named Marco Polo something?” Ethan wondered out loud. He remembered that the airport was called the Marco Polo Airport. He also remembered seeing a sign for the Hotel Marco Polo. Marco Polo was his absolute favorite swimming pool game, too!

  “Marco Polo was a famous explorer. He was born in Venice,” Mr. Briar explained.

  A tall man in a tuxedo came up to them. “Buona sera! Good evening! Do you have a reservation?”

  “We do!” Mrs. Briar said, closing her cell phone. “Briar, table for four. My father, Harry Robinson, used to come to your restaurant a long time ago,” she told the man.

  “Of course! Signor Robinson is a dear friend,” the man said affectionately. “My name is Luigi. Please, come right this way.”

  Luigi led them to a table overlooking the canal. Ella thought the water looked beautiful at night. Ethan peered out the window. Outside, there was an old stone bridge with a dock underneath. There was a long black and green boat tied to the dock. Ethan admired it through the glass. He noticed a small gold ornament on the front of it, but from his angle, he couldn’t quite make out what it was.

  Luigi saw Ethan looking at the boat. “That boat is called a gondola. It belongs to my son, Antonio,” he explained. “It has been in our family for many generations. Antonio!”

  A young man with curly dark hair rushed over to their table with menus.

  “Antonio, this is the family of my friend Harry Robinson—the one from America,” Luigi told his son.

  Antonio’s eyes widened. “Oh! This is a very great honor!”

  Ella leaned toward Ethan. “They must really like Grandpa Harry,” she whispered.

  Ethan nodded. Grandpa Harry was a famous archaeologist. Archaeologists studied people from the ancient past by looking at the things they left behind, such as artwork and old buildings. Like Marco Polo, Grandpa Harry once traveled around the world exploring for his work.

  Grandpa Harry must have met Luigi and Antonio on one of his trips, Ethan thought.

  Antonio started to hand the Briars their menus. But his father grabbed them and clutched them to his chest. “No menus! I will prepare a special meal just for you,” Luigi announced to the Briars. “A little mozzarella, maybe some pasta à la carbonara . . .” He turned and rushed off to the kitchen.

  “Mr. Antonio? What’s that gold thing on the front of your boat?” Ethan asked curiously.

  “Every gondola has an ornament. Mine is a . . . well, I believe the word is ‘hawk’ in English,” Antonio replied.

  “Really?” Ethan reached into his pocket and pulled out his prized gold coin from Grandpa Harry. It had a globe on one side . . . and a hawk on the other!

  Huh, Ethan thought. But before he could say anything, Antonio spoke.


  “Perhaps I could take you all for a ride in my gondola during your stay,” he suggested. “It is hundreds of years old and used to belong to one of the doges of Venice.”

  “Yes, please!” Ethan and Ella said eagerly.

  Maybe Venice wouldn’t be such a bad place to spend a little time, after all!

  CHAPTER 3

  A Mysterious E-mail

  The next day Ella and Ethan slept way past their usual wake-up time.

  “It’s late!” Ethan announced from his bed across the room. “We missed breakfast!”

  Ella opened her eyes and sat up in her bed. Bright sunlight streamed through the large window. A warm breeze rustled the lace curtains. Next to her, Pumpkin stirred on the velvety green quilt, purring. The Briars had learned from Sofia that Pumpkin used to be a stray but lived at the hotel now.

  Someone knocked on the door. Mr. Briar stuck his head inside. He wore jeans and a T-shirt with the red, white, and green flag of Italy on it.

  “Good morning! I wanted to let you guys sleep in a bit,” he said cheerfully.

  “Where’s Mom?” Ethan asked.

  “She’s at the library doing research for her column. I thought the three of us could go out for some gelato.” Mr. Briar added, “That’s the Italians’ ice cream!”

  Ella and Ethan laughed. Their dad loved trying foreign foods.

  “Can I check some e-mail first?” Ella asked. She really missed her friends back home. Maybe one of them had sent her a message.

  “Yeah, me too!” Ethan said. The twins shared an e-mail address.

  “Of course! My computer is on the desk,” Mr. Briar replied.

  Ella and Ethan hurried to the living room. Their dad’s laptop sat on a fancy wooden desk with cool designs carved into it. They raced to the leather chair and scrunched onto it together.

  Ethan opened their e-mail account. There were three messages waiting for them.

  The first was from Ethan’s best friend, Theo, telling him about the Brookeston Boomers’ soccer game against the Trumansburg Titans. The second was a message from Ella’s best friend, Hannah, with a new poem she had written for their poetry club.

  The third and final message was from Grandpa Harry. The subject line of his e-mail was: TWO CLUES.

  “What does that mean? Two clues to what?” Ethan asked.

  “I don’t know,” Ella replied. “Let’s find out!”

  Ethan clicked to open the e-mail from Grandpa Harry.

  To: ethanella@eemail.com

  From: gpaharry@eemail.com

  Subject: TWO CLUES

  Hello, my dears. Benvenuti a Venezia! (That means “Welcome to Venice!”)

  Venice is one of my favorite cities in the world. Your Grandma Lucy and I visited it many times when she was alive.

  She and I loved the churches and the museums there. We also loved the many bridges over the canals, like the Rialto Bridge and the Bridge of Sighs. But perhaps our absolute favorite thing in Venice was a five-hundred-year-old mosaic. (A mosaic is a type of artwork made up of lots of little pieces of glass in different colors.)

  You should try to find this very special mosaic. However, it will not be easy!

  I can offer you two clues to get you started:

  1) Calle Farnese

  2) Look up!

  I know from your last mystery that you are very good at finding things. Good luck!

  Lots of love,

  Grandpa Harry

  PS Say hello to my old friend Luigi and his son, Antonio, for me! I hope Antonio will show you his beautiful gondola, which used to belong to a doge of Venice.

  Ethan glanced up from the screen. “We have to find the mosaic!” he told Ella excitedly.

  “I know. But how? And who’s this Calle Farnese person?” Ella said, puzzled.

  “I’m not sure. Why don’t you write down those clues in the notebook Grandpa Harry gave you?” Ethan suggested.

  The day before their trip, Grandpa Harry had given both of the twins going-away presents. Ethan’s was the gold coin with the hawk on it. Ella’s was a purple notebook. Grandpa Harry had told her that it might come in handy for solving mysteries . . . like the one they had encountered right before they left.

  Ethan’s coin had disappeared just hours before the Briars had to get to the airport. The twins had used Ella’s notebook to keep track of clues and other information. At the last minute, they’d found the coin in quite an unexpected place.

  Now it seemed they had a new mystery to solve!

  CHAPTER 4

  A Gondola Thief?

  “Mmm. This is the best ice cream—I mean gelato—I’ve ever had!” Ethan said, licking his spoon.

  Ella finished up the last of her pesca gelato. Pesca was Italian for “peach.” “Me too!”

  The twins were strolling through the crowded Piazza San Marco with their father. The piazza was an enormous square with beautiful old buildings along the sides of it. One of the buildings was the Doge’s Palace, which Mrs. Briar planned to write about.

  “See that church? That’s the Basilica San Marco, or St. Mark’s Cathedral,” Mr. Briar said, pointing. “That tall tower over there is called the Campanile di San Marco. Campanile means ‘clock tower.’ Or is it ‘bell tower’? Wait. Let me check.”

  While Mr. Briar flipped through his guidebook, Ella scanned the crowded square. Nearby, an old man tossed bread crumbs to pigeons. With his kind face and bushy gray hair, he reminded Ella of Grandpa Harry.

  Ella pulled her purple notebook out of her pocket. She glanced at the page on which she’d written Grandpa Harry’s clues about Calle Farnese and looking up. What did they mean?

  “Bell tower!” Mr. Briar announced suddenly. “The clock tower is that building, to the north. And speaking of clocks, it’s almost two thirty. Let’s get back to our hotel so we can dig into the wonderful world of multiplication.”

  Ella and Ethan groaned. With homeschooling to do, when would they find time to solve their new mystery?

  Mr. Briar led the way across the piazza and onto a side street. They went over a short stone bridge.

  As their dad stopped to research the name of the bridge, Ella and Ethan peered over the side. Just up the canal, a red-haired man stood on a dock next to a black and green gondola. He peered around as if to see if anyone was watching him.

  Then the man jumped into the gondola and untied it from the dock. He paddled quickly away.

  “What just happened?” Ethan asked Ella, puzzled.

  “I don’t know. Do you think he stole that gondola?” Ella said worriedly.

  Ethan frowned. “It sure looked suspicious to me. . . .”

  CHAPTER 5

  Calle Farnese

  When they got back to their hotel room, Mr. Briar had an important message waiting for him. He made a quick call on his cell phone, then turned to Ethan and Ella.

  “Bad news,” he announced. “That was the passport office. I have to go over there to straighten out a problem with our passports. I’m afraid the wonderful world of multiplication will have to wait until later. I should be back in a few hours. Can you two find something to keep you busy while I’m gone?”

  “Sure, Dad,” Ella said.

  “Yeah, no problem,” Ethan added, trying not to smile.

  Mr. Briar threw some things into a bag and left. As soon as he was gone, Ethan went over to the desk and started looking through the messy pile of books and papers.

  “What are you looking for?” Ella asked him.

  “A map of Venice I saw earlier,” Ethan replied.

  Ella put her hands on her hips. “But why?”

  “Because this is our chance to sneak out and look for Grandpa Harry’s mosaic!” Ethan declared. “We should go back to that bridge, too. Where the gondola was.”

  Ella frowned. “Are you sure it’s okay for us to go out without telling Mom and Dad anything?”

  “Just trust me,” Ethan assured her.

  “Okay, but if we get in trouble, I’m telling them it w
as your idea,” Ella insisted. While Ethan searched for the map, Ella glanced around the room. “Where’s Pumpkin?”

  “She’s probably downstairs,” Ethan replied without looking up.

  A few minutes later, Ethan found the map. It was sandwiched between two books on Italian history. He spread it out on the desk and found the Pensione Mistero on it. He marked it with a big X so they would be able to trace their way back.

  Then he noticed something else. “Ella, look! Check this out!”

  Ella leaned over the map. Ethan pointed to a bunch of different streets.

  They were all called Calle something. Calle de Mezo, Calle Vinanti, Calle Farnese . . .

  Calle Farnese was one of the clues in Grandpa Harry’s e-mail!

  “Calle Farnese isn’t a person. It’s a street!” Ella exclaimed.

  CHAPTER 6

  Pumpkin in Trouble

  “I think it’s this way,” Ella said, pointing to the right.

  She and Ethan followed the sidewalk along the canal. Their plan was to retrace their steps back to the stone bridge, then go to Calle Farnese after that. According to the map, Calle Farnese was on the other side of Piazza San Marco. The route there looked complicated, with lots of tiny, winding streets.

  They soon reached the stone bridge. Two dark-haired men were standing at the dock where the black and green gondola had been. They seemed to be arguing.

  One of the men looked familiar. “That’s Antonio!” Ethan said, surprised.

  The building just beyond the dock suddenly looked familiar, too. “That’s the Marco Polo Ristorante!” Ella added. She hadn’t recognized the restaurant before.