Chapter 1

THE BLACK CIRCLE PATRICK CARMEN

黑圈帕特里克·卡门

CHAPTER 1 Amy Cahill liked to be the first one up in the morning. But not if it was because someone was screaming outside her hotel-room door. "Telegram for Mr. Cahill!" The words were accompanied by a thunderous knocking. Amy bolted upright in a panic, a terrifying thought racing through her mind. Madrigals! The yell came again. "Message for you!" Amy, her brother, Dan, and their au pair, Nellie, had fled to a different Cairo hotel in the night, afraid they might be attacked by the mysterious sect they knew so little about. The Madrigals couldn't know where we are, could they? Dan rolled off the fuzzy gold couch he was sleeping on and landed on the floor with a thud.

第一章艾米·卡希尔喜欢早上第一个起床。 但如果是因为有人在她的酒店房间门外尖叫，那就不是了。 “卡希尔先生的电报！”这句话伴随着雷鸣般的敲门声。 艾美惊恐地跳了起来，一个可怕的想法在她的脑海里闪过。 牧歌的!喊声又来了。 “给你的消息！”艾米、她的哥哥丹（Dan）和他们的互惠生内莉（Nellie）在晚上逃到了开罗的另一家酒店，担心他们可能会受到他们知之甚少的神秘教派的袭击。 牧歌不可能知道我们在哪里，对吧？ 丹从他睡的毛茸茸的金色沙发上滚下来，砰的一声落在地板上。

"No, Irina! Not the Catfish Hunter!" he yelled. Amy sighed. Once again, her brother was locked in a dream in which their cousin Irina Spasky was shredding a beloved baseball card with her fingernails. "Wake up, Dan. You're dreaming." Amy had never felt so tired in her life, and her brother was, as usual, acting like an idiot. "Telegram!" The knock at the door came again. "Dan! Get… the… door!" Amy stuffed her face in a pillow and screamed. She was awake for good and she knew it. Peering past her pillow, she saw that Nellie was still totally dead to the world. "Coming!" cried Amy. "Hold your horses!" When she reached the door, she hesitated, a familiar fear gripping her insides. What if she let someone dangerous in? Come on, Amy, get a grip. Amy opened the door, her eyes settling on an Egyptian bellboy standing in the hall. He was shorter than she was by a mile, wearing a spiffy red uniform with gold buttons up the front that

“不,伊丽娜!不是捕鲶鱼的人！”他喊道。 艾米叹了口气。她的哥哥又一次被困在梦中，梦见他们的表妹伊琳娜·斯帕斯基正在用指甲撕碎一张心爱的棒球卡。 “醒醒，丹。你是在做梦。” 艾米一生中从未感到如此疲惫，而她的哥哥像往常一样，表现得像个白痴。 “电报!”敲门声又来了。 “丹!去……开门！”艾米把脸塞进枕头里尖叫起来。 她永远清醒了，她知道这一点。 她隔着枕头往外看，发现内莉对这个世界仍然完全失去了知觉。 “来了！”艾米叫道。“别着急！”走到门口时，她犹豫了一下，一种熟悉的恐惧攫住了她的内心。 万一她让危险人物进来了呢？ 来吧，艾米，冷静点。艾米打开门，她的目光落在一个站在大厅里的埃及侍者身上。 他比她矮一英里，穿着一件漂亮的红色制服，前面有金纽扣

was at least two sizes too big. In his hands was a sealed envelope. "For you, madam, from the desk. Someone has leaved it." Amy took the envelope, and the bellboy stepped a tiny bit closer, beaming at her expectantly. "I bring message from the desk," said the bellboy. "For you, madam." His feet were halfway in and halfway out of the room, which made Amy nervous. "Is there something else you have for me?" asked Amy. "Someone has leaved it for you," he said, pointing at the envelope with a happy grin. "Give him this," said Dan. "Then I can go back to sleep." Dan's voice was muffled, and when Amy turned around, she saw that he was talking into the carpeted floor, too lazy to lift his head. He was holding up a five-pound Egyptian note, worth about one dollar. Amy shut the door. Curiosity had killed any hope of going back to bed. The envelope had been

至少大了两码。 他手里拿着一个密封的信封。 “给你的，夫人，从桌子上拿过来。 有人把它落下了。”艾米接过信封，服务员朝她走近了一点，微笑着期待着她。 “我从服务台带来口信，”侍者说。 “给您的，夫人。”他的脚在房间里半进半出，这让艾米很紧张。 “你还有别的东西要给我吗？”艾米问。 “有人给你留下了，”他指着信封说，露出快乐的笑容。 “给他这个，”丹说。 “然后我就可以回去睡觉了。” 丹的声音低沉，当艾米转过身来，她看到他正对着铺着地毯的地板说话，懒得抬头。 他手里拿着一张5英镑的埃及钞票，价值约1美元。 艾米关上了门。好奇心打消了我回去睡觉的任何希望。 信封已经被

addressed on an old-style typewriter that appeared to be missing the capital A. The underline was also randomly stuck on some of the letters. She tore it open and sat on the couch, her face whitening as she scanned the note. Saladin meowed hungrily and raised his back, claws bared on the gold bedspread. "Dan, you better get up here." Dan didn't move, so she yelled. "TELEGRAM FOR DAN!" Dan lifted his head as if mustering the energy for a comeback, but Amy could tell her brother was still clawing his way out of dreamland. He stood up from the floor and dropped heavily onto the couch. Nellie was still curled up under the covers on one of the two beds in the room, the thin white cord of her iPod ear-buds snaking out from under a pile of seven pillows covering her

这封信是在一台老式打字机上写的，似乎缺了大写字母A。 下划线也随机地贴在一些字母上。 她把信拆开，坐在沙发上，看着字条，脸都白了。 萨拉丁饥饿地喵了一声，抬起背，爪子露在金色床罩上。 “丹，你最好上来。” 丹没有动，于是她大叫起来。 “给丹的电报！”丹抬起头，好像在蓄势反击，但艾米可以看出，她的哥哥仍在从梦境中挣扎。 他从地板上站起来，重重地倒在沙发上。 内莉仍然蜷缩在房间里两张床中的一张床的被窝里，她的iPod耳塞的细细的白色线从盖在她身上的七个枕头下面蜿蜒而出

head. "That girl could sleep through a demolition derby," said Dan. "Dan! Listen!" Amy said, holding the telegram as she began to read. "'Cairo International Airport, locker number 328. 56-12-19. NRR.'" "Sounds like a lame trap set by one of our competitors. Let's order room service and go back to bed." "I don't think so," said Amy. She held out the message so Dan could examine it. What he found on the paper took his breath away. Lazy Dan left the building and was replaced by Alarmed Dan. "No one knows about this, not even Nellie." "Grace knew," said Amy. "You, me, and Grace.

头。“那个女孩可以在一场爆破德比比赛中睡觉，”丹说。 “丹!听!”艾米说，手里拿着电报开始看。 “开罗国际机场，328号储物柜。 56-12-19。NRR。’”“听起来像是我们的竞争对手设的蹩脚陷阱。 我们叫客房服务，回去睡觉吧。” “我不这么认为，”艾米说。 她把信递过来，让丹看一看。 他在纸上发现的东西使他大吃一惊。 懒惰的丹离开了大楼，取而代之的是警觉的丹。 “没人知道这件事，连内莉也不知道。” “格蕾丝知道，”艾米说。“你，我，还有格蕾丝。