“Now, Miss Paradizo, you listen to me,” he began. Then his expression changed completely as the security system went ballistic.
“Yes, Chief, I’m listening.”
The chief held on to his radio with one hand, with the other he flicked numerous switches on his security console, praying for malfunction. “There seems to be a full squad of COS converging on the chateau. My God, there are some in the house. Helicopters, the rooftop cameras are picking up helicopters.” Transmissions suddenly squawked through the band monitor. “And we have chatter. They’re after you, Miss Paradizo, and your prisoner. My God, the alarms have all been tripped. Every sector. We’re surrounded! We need to evacuate. I can see them in the tree line. They have a tank. How did they get a tank up here?”
Outside, Artemis and Butler watched the chaos Foaly had created. Sirens ripped through the Alpine air, and security men sprinted to ordained spots.
Butler lobbed a few smoke grenades onto the grounds to add to the effect.
“A tank,” said Artemis wryly into his fairy phone. “You sent them a tank?”
“You’ve hacked into the audio feed?” said Foaly sharply. “Just what else can that phone of yours do?”
“It can play solitaire and minesweeper,” replied Artemis innocently.
Foaly grunted doubtfully. “We’ll talk about this later, Mud Boy. For now, let’s concentrate on the plan.”
“Excellent suggestion. Do you have any phantom guided missiles?”
* * *
The security chief nearly fainted. The radar had picked up two tracks spiraling from the belly of a helicopter.
“Mon Dieu! Missiles. They’re firing smart bombs at us. We must evacuate now.”
He flicked open a Perspex panel, revealing an orange switch below. With only a moment’s hesitation, he pressed the orange switch. The various alarms were immediately cut off and replaced by a single continuous whine. The evac alarm.
The moment this was sounded, the guards changed course and headed for their assigned vehicles or principals, and the nonsecurity residents of the chateau began gathering data or whatever was most precious to them.
On the eastern side of the house, a series of garage doors opened, and six black BMW four-wheel drives sprang into the courtyard like cougars. One had blacked-out windows.
Artemis studied the situation through binoculars.
“Watch the girl,” he said into the tiny phone in his palm. “The girl is the key. I’m guessing hers is the vehicle with the tinted windows.”
The girl, Minerva, appeared through patio doors, speaking calmly into a walkie-talkie. Her father trailed beside her, dragging a protesting Beau Paradizo by the hand. Billy Kong came last, bending slightly under the weight of a large golf bag.
“Here we go, Holly. Are you ready?”
“Artemis! I’m the field agent here,” came the irritated reply. “Stay off my band unless you have something to contribute.”
“I was just thinking—”
“I was just thinking that you should change your middle name to Control Freak.”
Artemis glanced across at Butler, who was lying beside him and couldn’t help overhearing the entire exchange.
“Control freak? Can you believe that?”
“The nerve of some people,” replied the bodyguard without taking his eyes off the chateau.
To their left, a small patch of earth began to vibrate. Mud grass and insects were thrust upward in a sudden gush, followed by two heads. One dwarf and one pixie.
Doodah climbed over Mulch’s shoulders and collapsed onto the ground.
“You people are crazy,” he panted, plucking a beetle from his shirt pocket. “I should be getting more than amnesty for this. I should be getting a pension.”
“Quiet, little man,” said Butler calmly. “Phase two of the plan is about to start, and I wouldn’t want to miss it because of you.”
Doodah blanched. “Neither would I. Want you to miss it, that is. Because of me.”
Outside the chateau’s garage, Billy Kong popped one of the BMW’s trunks and hefted the golf bag inside. It was the car with the tinted windows.
Artemis opened his mouth to issue an order, then closed it again. Holly probably knew what to do.
She did. The driver’s door clunked open a fraction, apparently all on its own, then closed again. Before Minerva or Billy Kong could do more than blink in surprise, the 4x4 started up and laid down a twenty foot layer of rubber, skidding toward the main gate.
“Perfect,” said Artemis under his breath. “Now, Miss Minerva Paradizo, would-be criminal mastermind, let us see exactly how smart you are. I know what I would do in this situation.”
Minerva Paradizo’s reaction was a bit less dramatic than one might expect from a child who has just had her prize possession stolen. There were no tantrums or foot stamping. Billy Kong defied expectations also. He did not so much as draw a weapon. Instead he squatted on his hunkers, ran his fingers through his manga hair, and lit a cigarette, which Minerva promptly plucked from his lips and squashed underfoot.
Meanwhile, the 4x4 was getting away, barreling toward the main gates. Perhaps Minerva was confident that the reinforced steel barrier would be sufficient to halt the BMW in its tracks. She was wrong. Holly had already weakened the bolts with her Neutrino.
One tap from the vehicle’s grille would be more than sufficient to barge the gates out of the way.
If it got that far. Which it did not. After she had crushed Kong’s cigarette, Minerva took a remote control from her pocket, tapped in a short code, then hit the SEND button. In the BMW’s cab, a tiny charge detonated in the airflow system, releasing a cloud of sevofluorane, a potent sleeping gas. In seconds, the vehicle began to weave, ramping the driveway bushes and cutting a swath through the manicured lawn.
“Problems,” said Butler.
“Hmm,” said Artemis. “A gas device, I would guess. Fast acting. Possibly cyclopropane or sevofluorane.”
Butler knelt, drawing his pistol. “Should I stroll in there and get them?”
“No. You shouldn’t.”
The BMW was careering wildly now, following the dips and slopes of the grounds’ topography. It destroyed a mini-golf green, pulverized a gazebo, and decapitated a centaur statue.
Hundreds of miles belowground, Foaly winced.
The vehicle finally came to rest in a lavender bed, nose down, rear wheels spinning, spitting out hunks of clay and uprooted long-stemmed purple flowers like missiles.
Nice action, thought Mulch, but he kept the notion to himself, fully aware that this might not be the time to stretch Butler’s patience.
Butler was raring to go. His gun was out, and the tendons in his neck were stretched, but Artemis held him back with a touch to the forearm.
“No,” he said. “Not now. I know your impulse is to help, but now is not the time.”
The bodyguard jammed his Sig Sauer handgun back into its holster, scowling. “Are you sure, Artemis?”
“Trust me, old friend.”
And of course, Butler did, even though his instincts were not so sure.
Inside the grounds, a dozen security guards were warily approaching the vehicle, led by Billy Kong. The man moved like a cat, on the balls of his feet.
On his signal, the men rushed the car, reclaiming the golf bag and hauling an unconscious Holly from the front seat. The elf was cuffed with plastic ties and hauled across the garden to where Minerva Paradizo and her father stood waiting.
Minerva removed Holly’s helmet and knelt to examine her pointed ears. Through his binocular lenses, Artemis could clearly see that Minerva was smiling.
It had been a trap. All a trap.
Minerva tucked the helmet under her arm, then walked briskly back toward the house. Halfway there, she stopped and turned. Shielding her eyes from the sun’s glare, she scanned the shadows and peaks of the surrounding hillsides.
“What’s she looking for?” Butler speculated aloud.
Artemis did not wonder. He knew exactly what this surprising girl was after.
“She’s looking for us, old friend. If that were your chateau, perhaps you might wonder where a spy would conceal himself.”
“Of course. And that’s why I picked this spot. The ideal location would have been farther up the hill, in that cluster of rocks, but that would also have been the first spot any security expert would booby-trap. This would be my second choice, and so, my first choice.”