Bonfire Masquerade Page 11

  “I think this is an antenna,” said George excitedly.

  “Totally,” agreed Frank. “That’s probably what he’s using to blow them remotely. I wonder what frequency it’s broadcasting on.”

  Antennas reminded me of our last case—and of the surveillance help George had given Frank and Joe earlier.

  An idea began forming in my head.

  “Frank, do you have that remote camera you used when you broke into Andrew’s house?” I asked.

  “It might be in my pocket. I think Joe gave it back to me.”

  “Do you think you and George could use it to deactivate the detonators?”

  “It’s worth a shot,” said George.

  “It could work. We’d just have to figure out how he’s broadcasting, and find a way to block the signal. It wouldn’t get rid of the bombs, but it should make it impossible to set them off.”

  Frank hurried into the next room, and came back holding his jeans in one hand and a small camera, the size of a button, in the other.

  “Got it,” he said. He and George ran over to Aaron’s desk. George began tapping away at his computer.

  “I know a lot about radio transmitters and wireless networks,” said George, “but zero about bombs.”

  “Thankfully, ATAC considers bombs a critical part of a good spy’s education. Go to this Web page.” Frank rattled off a long web address.

  Bess sat down heavily on the couch.

  “I can’t believe I trusted him!” she said.

  “We all did,” I told her. “He rescued me, remember? This isn’t your fault.”

  “Oh, Nancy, I feel terrible!”

  “It’s going to be all right. I’m going to go check on the party. Stay here.”

  I walked out into the hallway. It wasn’t hard to find my way to the main ballroom—I just followed the sounds of music, and laughter, and dancing. At the center of the house was a huge room, which extended all the way to the roof of the building, making the entire ceiling one giant skylight. I found myself on a balcony two floors up, looking down on a crowd of a hundred costumed partyers. They were dancing, chatting, and admiring the decor. Not one of them was aware just how much danger they were in. I tried to pick out Aaron, but everyone looked the same. It was useless.

  A spiral staircase led from the balcony down to the party below. I walked down, hoping that up close something might tip me off to Aaron’s presence. But it was even more impossible to tell people apart than from a distance. It was just a sea of sparkling black robes and silver masks. I wandered into the crowd, and as I did, a disturbance began in the party. A few people were looking around quizzically, tapping at the sides of their masks. I sucked in a quick, fear-filled breath, but thankfully no one tried to remove their masks. Aaron must have given them instructions to keep them on.

  “If we move the BZZZZZ … and attach…”

  Out of nowhere, I heard George’s voice in my ear. I spun around, but she was nowhere to be found. Then I realized the voice was coming from all around me.

  The antenna! They might not have been able to deactivate the bombs, but they had definitely hacked into the system. As I listened, George’s and Frank’s voices began broadcasting from every mask in the room. It gave me hope. I decided to head back upstairs and see if they were any closer to a solution.

  I slipped among the confused, masked revelers and headed back toward the spiral staircase. As I did, a small masked figure stomped past me. Wherever the person was going, he or she was headed there in a hurry. The figure nearly knocked into me.

  It was only as the crowd swallowed the figure up behind me that I realized something: I couldn’t hear George and Frank coming from that person’s mask! Which meant they didn’t have an antenna. Which meant they weren’t wired to explode. Which meant it was one of Aaron’s gang!

  I turned back to find the person, but he or she was already gone. But still, now we had a way to tell people apart. If George and Frank could neutralize these booby-trapped masks, we might have a chance.

  I hiked up my robe and ran up the stairs, taking them two at a time. When I burst through Aaron’s office door, everyone froze.

  “It’s me!” I said. “Whatever you’re doing, it’s working—I can hear you guys broadcasting over all the antennas in all the masks.”

  “Yes!” said masked-Frank, giving masked-George a high five.

  “It gets better,” I said. “One person’s mask wasn’t broadcasting. If they don’t have an antenna, they don’t have a bomb, and they must be part of Aaron’s gang. So if we can hijack the antennas, we can keep the bombs from going off and use them to tell people apart.”

  “We’re on it,” said George.

  “You better hurry, though. The guy who passed me without an antenna seemed upset. They may be realizing that something is going on.”

  “Got it!” said Frank. “The motion sensors and the remote access on the detonators should be deactivated.”

  “So it’s safe?” I asked.

  “Yes,” said Frank. “Well, probably. We’re working on the fly with a system I’ve never used before. I think we’ve hacked it, but there’s no way to know without trying.”

  We all stood still, four identically dressed figures in a crazy glass house. I knew what I had to do.

  I grabbed my mask with both hands and yanked it off. I heard a sudden loud noise. Bess screamed.

  CHAPTER 18

  JOE CRASHING THE PARTY

  “Yo, Frank, what’s the situation?”

  I could hear Bess screaming in the background. Things didn’t sound good.

  “You just nearly gave Bess a heart attack,” Frank responded. “We were pretty sure we managed to deactivate the bombs, and just as Nancy tested the theory by removing her mask, my cell phone rang. We thought she was dead.”

  “My bad,” I said. “But hey! No one’s dead, right? Me and the Krewe de Crude are a block away from Aaron’s house. What’s up?”

  “We’ve shut the bombs off, so we should be safe. But we don’t want Aaron and his crew to know it until we’re in place to take them all down. So we’re staying robed up. We need half of you to surround the house and make sure no one gets away. Once they’re in place, send everyone else in.”

  In the distance, the lit-up glass box of Aaron’s house grew nearer and brighter.

  “Can do,” I said. “But how are we going to tell everyone apart?”

  “That’s the great part. Aaron’s bombs are run by remote antennas. We’ve hijacked the system. Let us know when you’re ready, and we’ll start broadcasting. Anyone whose mask doesn’t make noise? Take them down.”

  “Got it!”

  I relayed to Sybil what Frank had told me. She took her hands off the handlebars (scaring the pants off me), put her pinkies in her mouth, and emitted the loudest whistle I’d ever heard. As one, the Krewe pulled their bikes in tight around her. Sybil explained the situation. As we approached the building, she started giving orders.

  “Everyone on my right,” she said. “Your job is to surround the building. If they’re not broadcasting, don’t let anyone get away. If you’re on my left, you’re going in with us.”

  The air was split by the sound of yips and howls, as the bikes, blades, and boards of the Krewe de Crude began to circle the house. We waited until everyone was in place, then I called Frank again.

  “We’re ready,” I said.

  “Welcome to the party,” he said.

  Sybil and I hopped off our bike. Lenni fell in right next to us. Behind us were fifteen or so costumed Krewe members. We threw open the door and walked right past the startled butler, who tried to stop us with cries of “Wait. Stop! Where are your invitations?”

  One of the Krewe stopped, turned, and farted at him. “There’s my invitation, man,” he said. I guess they weren’t called the Krewe de Crude for nothing.

  We ran into the main ballroom, and I could finally see what Frank had been explaining. Everyone looked exactly the same. Tall or short, they were all we
aring these weird, black, glowing robes. They looked like some really freaked-out cult. The few nearest the entrance stared at us, confused by our sudden appearance and our different costumes.

  Right on cue, as we stepped into the main hall, the music changed. Aaron had been pumping some pop dance music in through hidden speakers, but that was suddenly replaced by the “Ode to Joy” broadcasting out of tiny, tinny speakers in each person’s mask.

  “What’s this?” asked Lenni, when the music started.

  “Beethoven,” I replied. “It’s Frank’s ring tone on his phone.”

  Suddenly I noticed someone trying to slip deeper into the crowd. It was hard to be sure, but I didn’t think there was any sound coming from the person’s mask. I headed toward him, and he started running.

  I tackled him in a flying leap. He went down, taking some other guests with him. But I was right! There was no music coming from his mask. He tried to get up, but Sybil knocked him on the head with a platter of food from one of the tables.

  “Get ’em, boys!” she yelled. The Krewe exploded into the crowd. I expected people to take off running in fear, but I’d forgotten: This was New Orleans, a rough-and-tumble city that loved fighting as much as it did partying. In just a few seconds, the crowd had become a giant free-for-all, ten times worse than what we had gone through at the Krewe de Crude warehouse.

  I saw Lenni get jumped by two robed figures and go down in a heap. Another Krewe de Crude member leaped in on top of the pile. One of the skateboarders was on his board, chasing someone down a staircase. Somewhere in this mess were Frank, Nancy, Bess, and George, but since I had no way of telling who they were, I concentrated on looking for someone else I knew was in here—Aaron.

  Some guests were making for the exit at the back of the ballroom. One caught my eye. He was noticeably taller than most of the other people around him. I wormed my way past groups of fighting people. Someone grabbed my ankle, and I nearly went down, but I managed to shake him off. I caught up with the tall masked figure right before the exit.

  He wasn’t broadcasting. I grabbed him by the sleeve—and he turned around and punched me in the face!

  I heard a crack as he hit my nose. That was going to hurt in the morning, I was sure. But with all the adrenaline of the brawl rushing through my system, I barely felt it. I kicked him in the knee, and he fell. But as he did, he grabbed the top of my Mohawk, pulling me down with him.

  We grappled on the floor, rolling this way and that, knocking into guests and tables full of food. Someone stomped on the masked man’s hand, and he howled. While he was distracted, I yanked his mask off. It was Aaron!

  He shoved me off him and tried to run, but his robe had gotten tangled around his feet while we wrestled. He tripped, and slammed headfirst into the wall. He went down in a half-conscious heap.

  I turned and looked at the raging party/fight behind me. I’d never considered how I was going to get the Krewe de Crude to stop… .

  “And then one guy came up behind me, and I thought for sure I was going down,” I said. “But Bess jumped on his back! He ran around trying to get her off him, like a chicken with its head cut off!”

  We were all safely back at the hotel, catching up on what had happened. After I caught Aaron, the fight slowly died down. One by one, his gang of thieves was captured. From what I heard, his guests thought it was the “most epic party ever.” Even though Aaron was going to jail, it would be a long time before anyone threw a party as unique as that one.

  I’d had to go to the hospital to have my nose looked at, but apparently, it wasn’t broken. It just hurt a lot, and looked like I’d tried to open a door with it. I was icing it now, as we sat up on our private roof patio and watched the parade below.

  “How many were there in the end?” asked George.

  “The police said they arrested sixteen people in connection with the fires,” I said. “And get this—they were all rich kids from good families! Aaron convinced them that they could get even richer if they went along with his plan. By burning down those buildings, they could buy them for a song, and then have Aaron redevelop them.”

  “Right,” said Nancy. “So when Aaron finally had the money to buy one of them on his own, and Daniel refused to sell it to him, he went crazy and strangled him to death.”

  “Ugh.” Bess shivered. “And to think I went on a date with him!”

  “Two dates,” teased George. Bess threw a set of Mardi Gras beads at her, and George laughed. “He was charming, though. It’s not all your fault.”

  I laughed, but it made my nose hurt. “Apparently, he had a private helicopter waiting for him at the levee,” I added. “He was going to ditch the rest of his gang at the party. No honor among thieves …”

  “So what happened with Nicole?” Nancy asked. “I hope she’s all right.”

  “ATAC called me while we were at the hospital. They found her in Chicago. She’d gone home. When she had a meeting with Aaron, she saw that map and figured out the same thing you did—I guess it’s that photographic memory she has. She put together that folder we found, just to make sure she was right. Then she fled town. When you mentioned that she was dropping her bid on the building, Aaron figured she’d found him out, and sent those two guys to kill her!”

  It had been a crazy few days. But we still had two more nights left in our hotel room. And Nancy’s dad was staying down to help Yvette settle her brother’s estate. Which meant one thing.

  “We have one more mystery to solve, guys,” I said.

  Everyone stopped dead.

  After a moment of silence, Nancy asked, “What?”

  “Where to get the best gumbo!”

  “Yes!” yelled George. “That’s a case I like the sound of.”