The Investigators, Inc. The Museum Case. Chapter 4. Rides and Traps.

I had been on the phone with Cristy and she had given me more, and very important, information about the present museum directors. What was puzzling is why they hired us. They must have known we would find out about them and what happened to the previous directors. Also, why hire us and then warn us to quit and go home or we would be killed. This did not make sense to me.

Anyway, after talking with Cristy I decided to talk with Jennifer and I told her what had happened. “Steve, this could be serious,” she said, “I want you to talk with Samantha. However, I will ask her not to call you back right now. I will get her to call you right away.” “Okay, I will do that,” I said. Samantha called back in about 15 minutes and we talked a bit. I told her exactly what had happened, including hitting Aasta.

“Hmm, to me that doesn’t sound like the “Nowhere” coming back,” she said, “especially since you feel fine now. Perhaps it was another type of laser weapon that was used on you. I will talk it over with Carolyn, Melissa and Hannah and see what they think. But please keep to your new schedule and don’t overdo it. I will talk with Aasta too, she may have noticed something without realizing it was important.”

“Good idea,” I said, “and thank you, I feel better already.” After this it was time for me to go back to the museum again. Angel and I got in the car and off we went. As we traveled along the road we came to a steep drop off on my side of the road. “That’s a long way down,” I said to Angel. Right then there was an explosion at the front of the car and we were heading over the edge.

I called Sky immediately as we went over, tumbling and crashing all the way to the bottom! Then the car exploded in a big fireball! “Woooeeee! What a ride that was!” exclaimed Sky. She was kneeling on the ground and I was lying with my head on her lap. Angel was standing next to us and looking up that steep hill. “We will have to carry you Steve,” she said, smiling.

“Actually, I’m quite comfortable right here,” I said. “Ha! I’m going to tell Jennifer that,” said Angel. “Jealousy,” said Sky, “it would be different if our places were changed.” “Hey, watch that,” said Angel, blushing. “Stop it you two,” I said, “we should call for someone to come and pick us up.” “That would take too long,” said Sky, “hold my hands you two.”

We did so and were suddenly in the parking lot of the museum. In we went and Kat asked what happened. She knew there was a problem since Sky disappeared. “Hmm, Mandar might not be happy,” said Kat, “that was a rented car.” “It also means we have to check our vehicles every time we want to use them,” I said, “now, did you check the offices?”

“All but one,” said Kat, “and that must be the one with the secret door into that room. However, the director that uses that office came by and has stayed in it, telling us that we can’t search his office or he will call the police.” “Too bad for him,” I said, “let him call the police, our contract says we can search anywhere we like.” So, Kat led the way to his office and he had the door locked.

I knocked and told him to open the door. There was no answer. “Catalina, open the door please,” I said. She put a small amount of explosive around the door handle and after a slight explosion, the door handle blew right off the door. We opened the door and the director was sitting on his chair at his desk. I thought he was just ignoring us, until I turned his chair around. He had been stabbed and was dead.

The oddest part was that he was one of the four who had opposed our coming here. He was not one of the men that Carine had seen in that secret room though. The man and woman directors that Carine had seen in that room were quite ‘friendly’ with each other. Both were married, but not to each other, so I asked Cristy to look into that for us. It was easy to see where the small door was located, right behind the desk.

The desk moved aside easily, revealing the door. Kat went in first, then Carine, then Sky and I went in followed by a couple of the girls. It was a fairly large room and it had a desk, chair, table, a small bed and several boxes. Those boxes contained guns and lots of ammunition. There were two large boxes full of cash, both Euros and US dollars. In another corner of the room were more boxes, full of drugs.

I asked Melanie to look at those boxes. “There is a lot of money wrapped up in those drugs,” she said, “I mean, we’re talking millions of dollars worth. They must be ready to send it out to dealers over quite a wide area.” From inside that room it was easy to find the door leading into that tunnel. Plus, there was another door which lead into a narrow passageway, so we decided to follow it.

Well, I didn’t go along this time but two of our ghosts and four other girls went along, plus 2 cats. I went back out into the museum and decided to check some of the other display rooms, even though the girls had checked every room already. But sometimes it’s good to go over things anyway. “Where did Steve go?” asked Sky. “He went off to check through some of the smaller rooms,” said Aasta.

“By himself?” she asked. “No, Dawn, Katresa, Amerie, Suzette and Alizea went with him. Plus Azura, Moonbeam and Ginger.” “Oh, that’s okay then,” said Sky. After a little while Aasta went looking for me and the girls, since we were spending a long time in one particular room. When she got there she immediately sent out an alarm. Sky and Angel were the first to arrive.

Katresa, Suzette and Alizea were lying on the floor, as were the cats, but Dawn, Amerie and I were gone. Sky was about to ask why I didn’t call for her, but she stopped herself, realizing that someone might be listening to them. She then brought a scrambler out of her backpack and turned it on. “Okay, safe to talk now,” she said, “some kind of gas was used to knock them out.”

“Someone wants Steve out of the picture,” said Angel. “I would say this is the third attempt,” said Kat, “and this one succeeded unfortunately.” “Yes, and something is preventing Steve from calling me,” said Sky, “likely the gas still has him knocked out too, so hopefully once he’s awake, he will call.”

“Yes, and I think they are still in this castle,” said Kat, “there is obviously another tunnel from this room, we need to check for it.” Meowr.= Door here. “That was quick,” said Kat, “now to open it.” Then they heard a voice from the main room so they went out to listen. “If you want your leader and his girlfriends back alive, then we want our friends out of prison and we will make a trade.

If you try to rescue those 3, then we will kill them. Give it some thought, you will hear from us again in 30 minutes.” The four ghosts got together to talk, so they could do it privately. “We will have to wait for Steve, or one of the girls to call my name,” said Sky, “then I can rescue them.” “Yes, for now it is all we can do,” agreed Kat…

To Be Continued.

©2025 Steve McLeod.