Chapter 1

THE BLACK CIRCLE PATRICK CARMEN

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.

"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

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

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

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.