“You hid inside our luggage?”
“You act like you’re the one that’s been injured in this whole deal? Do you have any idea how awful it is to ride inside of a tiny luggage compartment on a flight to Russia?”
“I never asked you to come,” Curial growled. “In fact, I told you I didn’t want you to come.”
Maurice dipped his finger into a bowl on the bed and licked it. “And that, Curial Diggs, is the difference between you and me. You think you know what you need, but I, being a master of the streets, know what you need.”
“Oh really.” Curial rolled his eyes. “And what is it that I need?”
“Simple,” said Maurice. “You need me. Look, I’ll prove it to you. You were in Russia all day but without my help. Did you find those dolls? I’ll take it by your expression that you did not. Eggo, you need me.”
“It’s Ergo,” said Curial.
“No, I’m quite sure those deliciously perfect waffles I eat every morning are called Eggos.”
“Right,” said Curial, “but the word you mean is Ergo: it means therefore.”
“Now you’re just being silly, I eat those golden waffles every day and I think I would know if they were called Ergos. It’s not Lergo my Ergo for God sakes.”
Curial bit his lip. This was useless.
“Awkward silences are usually good times to turn the TV back on and play video games till our eyes fall out…or should we make a plan for getting those dolls back?”
“What we need to do is call Matthew and let him know you haven’t been kidnapped or killed.”
“Do we have to? Usually when I sneak off to foreign countries he ends up yelling at me a lot. I don’t like it when he yells.”
Curial started dialing. “We talk to Matthew now.”
He put the phone on speaker, explained what was going on and then listened. Maurice was right about the yelling.
Lots of yelling.
But when Matthew finally calmed down, he said, “Well Curial, as long as Maurice is there, he might as well help you.”
Curial’s eyes got big. “Help me? Matthew, you can’t be serious.”
“Curial, we know finding those dolls is a shot in the dark. Maurice might be a pain, but he’s right, he knows the streets.”
“Thanks Unc for the vote of encouragement,” said Maurice.
“I really just don’t want to pay for a ticket to get your lazy bones home Maurice. Curial, you follow the clues you planned to follow, I’ll send Maurice to a contact I know on the streets in St. Petes. Let him sniff around, see what he can drum up, what can it hurt?”
Curial scanned the hotel room, the completely destroyed hotel room. He let out a long breath.
“Fine, he can stay.”
Chapter Fourteen – Not About The Money
Curial and Maurice left the hotel together.
“So, you heard Matthew,” said Curial, “I’ll do my thing, and you do your thing.”
“I have ears, genius. I heard the same thing.”
“Yeah, I just wanted to make sure you understood.”
Maurice rolled his eyes. “Listen Curial, by the end of today, I should pretty much have this mystery solved and wrapped up. Don’t you worry a bit.”
Maurice winked, then pulled his collar up, threw a pair of dark sunglasses on, and hustled away.
Curial shook his head and had the distinct feeling that this was a terrible idea. He looked around and found Mike leaning against the blue Volvo, shoulders slumped, food map nowhere to be seen. “Mike?”
Curial’s driver popped his head up and offered a weak smile.
“Something wrong?”
Mike whimpered.
“Are there no more food stands to try in Russia?” asked Curial.
Mike let out a long sigh. “I had a conversation with my wife this morning. She asked if I’ve been keeping to my diet.”
“And like usual, you lied?”
“I couldn’t. She said she expected me to come back from Russia thinner than I’d left—or else.”
“Or else what?”
Mike got real quiet. Whatever this was, it was serious.
“She wouldn’t leave you, would she?”
Mike shook his head. “Worse. She said she’d be forced to stop buying Fruity Pebbles. Curial, even on the strictest diets, my wife has always at least afforded me that one small pleasure in life.”
“You’re joking, right?”
“I wish I was… but I could tell, she wasn’t kidding around.”
“So you’re just going to starve the rest of the trip?”
Mike was getting choked up. “I’m afraid so. And I hadn’t even begun to unlock St. Pete’s culinary treasures.”
This was a problem. Curial had only a few days left to find the Romanov Dolls and he needed Mike at his best.
“I’ll make you a deal, Mike. You promise to explore every food stand on your Russian bucket list and I’ll make sure Mabel starts buying Fruity Pebbles for the Diggs kitchen.”
Mike looked like a drowning man who’d just been tossed a life preserver. “You’d really do that for me, sir?”
“Trust me, Mike, you do a lot for me. It would be my pleasure.”
The color in Mike’s cheeks returned, and he looked like he grew six inches. He stepped toward Curial, arms opened. Dear Lord, he’s going to hug me, Curial thought. Then suddenly, Mike stopped, fake-coughed into his hand, and nodded his head sharply. Curial turned to see what he was looking at.
Standing on the sidewalk, just a few feet away, was Dina.
“You’re back?” Curial asked.
“What can I say, I feel sorry for you. The thought of you all by yourself on the streets of St. Petersburg, with people constantly staring at you.”
“Again with the black thing?”
She shook her head. “More about the ugly thing.”
“You’re a real charmer, Dina Ardankin.”
“And you weren’t honest with me.”
“I should have told you.”
“And?”
“I’m… sorry?”
“Good.” She took out a piece of paper and handed it to Mike. “You want to eat good Russian food? You visit these spots. Tell them Dina sent you.”
Curial swore Mike’s eyes got a little moist.
“I don’t know what to say, Miss.”
Dina smiled. “Curial, we’ve got to assume our friend knows where you’re staying. Which means we could use Mike’s help before we get started this morning.”
Mike shot Curial a confused look.
“It’s okay, Mike, not a big deal,” Curial said, then turned back to Dina. “What do you have in mind?”
“Misdirection.” Dina flipped open her cell phone and made a call in Russian. A minute later she held up her finger. “Okay, there’s a taxi waiting for us a few blocks that way.” She pointed toward the back of the hotel.
Now it was Curial’s turn to be confused. “I don’t understand.”
“You will. Come on.”
Dina and Curial climbed into the back of the Volvo and Mike pulled out, following Dina’s directions. They drove in a twisty route for about eight blocks, then stopped in front of a food truck. Dina and Curial got out, ordered a large breakfast, put it in a large white bag, and climbed back into the car. Mike returned them to the hotel, and they went inside with their large white bag.
Once inside, the two kids threw the bag in the trash, walked straight through the hotel to the back, exited into a back alley, and jogged for two blocks to a yellow taxi that was waiting patiently at the curb.
Dina said something in Russian to the driver as Curial climbed in after her.
“You know what, Dina Ardankin, you’re some kind of evil genius, you know that?”
Fifteen minutes later, the taxi driver dropped them off in front of an enormous red stone structure. There was a large iron gate in the middle, and old cannons and guns flanked both sides.
“The Historical Museum of Artillery,” Dina said
as they walked through the gate. “I figured an American would be interested in a place with a lot of guns.”
Curial learned that what was now the Artillery Museum had once been part of the military fortress that Peter the Great had built on the banks of the Neva River in order to defend Russia against Swedish attacks.
When they left the museum they walked along the banks of the Kronverksky Strait until they came to an old wooden bridge. “The Ioannovsky Bridge,” Dina said as they walked across toward Zayachy Island, a small island in the middle of the Neva River.
Dina left Curial in the courtyard as she went to get tickets for the different sites. He looked around, taking in the grandeur and beauty of the place. But as old and beautiful and interesting as all of this was, it wasn’t getting him any closer to finding the dolls.
“Ouch!” Curial yelped when Dina’s fist connected with his shoulder.
“I was talking to you and you didn’t even hear me.”
“So you punched me?”
She smiled and handed him his ticket. “The Peter and Paul Cathedral is up ahead. Come on.”
As he walked toward the impossibly tall church spire, Curial still couldn’t get his mind off of those dolls and Claude. The reopening of the MAC was in only three days.
“That spire reaches over four hundred feet,” Dina was saying. “Tallest thing in St. Petersburg, easily.”
Curial’s eyes traveled up the spire all the way to the angel on the very top. For a moment, his heart caught in his throat as he imagined the workers installing that sculpture at that height. Get a grip, he told himself.
“Can I ask you a question?” Dina said as they stood under the spire and waited in line. “Other than the fact that these dolls are worth a lot of money, why else are they so important to you? I mean, don’t you already have enough money?”
Curial hesitated to answer. Telling Professor Ardankin about his mother was one thing; telling this cute girl was something else. He finally let out a long breath. “My mom died six months ago and the dolls were her favorite thing in the world. She left me a note. She wanted me to find those dolls.”
Dina took all this in. “So it’s not about the money?”
Curial shook his head. “It’s about my mom.”
Chapter Fifteen – The Romanovs
As they walked into the cathedral, Curial gasped. The outside of the structure just didn’t do justice to how magnificent and beautiful the church was on the inside. Giant marble pillars held up the vaulted ceiling; greens, yellows, and golds adorned everything; fantastic chandeliers hung from above. He thought about how much his mom would have loved to have been there with him at this moment. “This is awesome,” he finally said.
“No,” Dina said, looking up with him, her mouth in the biggest smile he’d seen on her face. “This is heaven.”
They walked in silence down the length of the magnificent church. Finally Curial stopped. “Okay, I told you something; now you tell me something.”
She folded her arms and twisted her mouth. “Okay.”
“Why were you really so mad yesterday? I can’t imagine hanging out with your grandfather is that much fun.”
“Why do you want to know?” she said.
“You just seemed more than disappointed, that’s all. I figured it must be important.”
She looked around and tapped her feet. “My grandfather was going to take me to the St. Petersburg Ballet Theatre, okay?”
“You like ballet?” he asked.
“I love ballet.”
“Hmmm.”
“What’s that supposed to mean?”
“I don’t know, I just didn’t figure you for someone who likes ballet.”
Dina’s jaw tensed up. “I don’t just ‘like’ ballet. I am a ballerina.”
Curial laughed out loud, and some tourists turned around and gave him a nasty look. Dina’s face was red. “And now you’re laughing at me?”
“I’m sorry, the way you make fun of me and hit me, you just don’t seem like the ballerina type. You seem… too tough.”
“And ballet’s not tough?”
“Well, it’s just so girly, that’s all.”
Dina growled and grabbed his arm, then dragged him out of the church and into the courtyard. “You think ballet is girly?” She fixed her ponytail, threw her coat on the ground, stood up on her tiptoes, and put her arms in fixed position.
Curial just watched as Dina started spinning on one toe. Then she hopped straight into the air and kicked her legs out into a full split—and then landed right back down on her tiptoes again. She ran and jumped and spun and kicked, and generally moved the human body in ways Curial hadn’t thought possible. Finally she spun one last time, then jumped and landed right in front of Curial.
“Now please, American boy who plays with dolls, I’d love to see you do all those very girly moves.”
Curial was speechless. “I’m… sorry?”
Dina slipped her jacket back on. “I’ve studied ballet all my life. Grandfather has connections and was going to introduce me to the director of the ballet theatre so that hopefully I could get a tryout.”
“Oh. Well then I am sorry.”
“Grandfather said we will do it another time, and we will—but I’m tired of waiting. I’ve waited for too long.”
“What do you mean?”
“My mother wants me to be an academic like her and Grandfather, but all I’ve ever wanted to be is a ballerina.”
“And your mom won’t let you?”
“Grandfather and I had a plan. Get a tryout with the theatre. And if I was good enough, then I would tell Mother. That would show her that I wasn’t wasting my time.”
“But why don’t you just tell her now?’
Dina chewed on her lip. “You don’t understand. My mother, she’s a very difficult woman.”
Actually, Curial did understand.
“Enough about me,” Dina said. “Two things left to see in the Cathedral.” She pointed toward the entrance. “First thing we do is climb the bell tower.”
Curial stopped dead in his tracks. “What did you say?”
“We can’t get to the top, but we can go about halfway up. It’s really cool.”
“I… I can’t do that.”
“It won’t take long, I promise.”
“You don’t understand.” Curial peered nervously up at the spire.
Dina’s eyes grew with recognition. “I see, you’re scared.”
“I’m not—well, yeah… I am.”
“So how about you never call ballet girly again, okay?’
“Okay. Then what else is there to see?”
Dina smiled. “The Romanovs, of course.”
They walked to St. Catherine’s Chapel, and Dina pointed to the tombs set into the walls. Curial stepped up to the first one and ran his hands along it. Supposedly, the Romanovs were buried just a few inches from his fingers. And then something clicked. Could it be that easy?
He spun around. “So they’re really buried behind these walls?”
Dina shrugged. “What’s left of them. The remains weren’t always buried here. In fact, no one had the slightest idea where they were buried until 1991, when someone discovered the bodies in a grave near Yekaterinburg. After scientists used DNA testing to identify them as the Romanovs, they re-buried them here in 1998.”
Running his fingers over the ornate plaques, Curial walked from Nicholas all the way through the rest of the family, puzzling through his idea. Dina read the Russian attached to each plaque as he went.
“And there is Anastasia,” Dina said, as Curial reached the last one. “She was always my favorite.”
“She’s everybody’s favorite. But where are the others? I only count five members of the family. That leaves Maria and Alexei.”
Dina shrugged. “Why does it matter?”
“Why does it matter?” Curial asked, his voice cracking. “Because these—these are the Romanovs, and they’re not all here. Plus, I have a theory.”
>
“A theory?”
“An idea. Nobody has ever had a good explanation for how or why the Romanov Dolls were taken, but I think… just maybe.”
“And would you like to share your brilliant theory with me?”
“If you promise not to make fun of me.”
Dina remained stone-faced.
“I’ll take that as yes, you will absolutely make fun of me.”
She nodded.
“I’ve read a lot about ancient civilizations. And when someone died in those civilizations, especially someone important, it was pretty common for them to be buried with objects that were special to that person. I have a hunch that royal families function similarly. But when it comes to the Romanovs, things are different, because they were murdered—and whoever murdered them certainly wouldn’t have shown them great care in burying them.”
Dina’s face was flooded with confusion. “Not sure I see where you’re going.”
“Well, the Romanov Dolls were spectacular, and they belonged to Alexei—given to him on his fifth birthday. That would be exactly the kind of object someone would want to send with the boy on his journey to the great beyond.”
“The great beyond?”
Curial started pacing and hitting his hand with his other fist. “Yeah, think about it. For over seventy years, from 1918 to 1991, nobody knew where the Romanovs’ bodies had been buried. Maybe someone had the dolls, and wanted to bury the dolls with Alexei, but couldn’t—and so they hid the dolls until Alexei’s body could be found.”
“If that’s the case, then why were the dolls given to your museum?”
Curial scrunched his face. “I don’t know. Maybe whoever had the dolls got anxious, figured the bodies would never be found, and wanted to share the treasure with the world?”
“Okay, then why were they stolen again years later?”
“I don’t know that either. Maybe whoever gave them to the museum changed their mind? Or maybe somebody else wanted to save the dolls for when the bodies were found.”
Dina blew out a big breath and shook her head like she had a shiver. “So what you’re saying is, you think someone stole the Romanov Dolls from the museum in order to bury them with Alexei’s body—to help him on his journey through the afterlife?”
Teenage Treasure Hunter Page 8