Composed by Yuki Neco
Li told the members that the attacker should have left some marks in their temporary office during his intrusion. Why did the attacker have to break the glass on the bookshelves? Li didn’t feel it consistent. When breaking in, the attacker unlocked the door with lock picking, without damaging the lock or breaking the window. Why did a careful crimal like that have to break the glass inside?
Madison reported her finding on the way, “Talking about Ted FitzGerald, he wears glasses today.”
“Yes, Margaret O’Reilly said he lost his contact lens today someplace,” Lumina added.
“When I talked to him,” Madison continued, “he looked like he didn’t want to tell us he lost it.”
Li thought for a while with his arms crossed without a word, until he shouted:
“On the floor! Everybody look for his track on the floor!”
Ken asked, “His track? You mean...”
“Yes, contact lens!” Li replied confidently.
“But... I don’t know when we’ll ever find a small thing like a contact lens,” Lumina whined.
“Lumina, if you still have work on your laptop, you do that job,” Li said, “Rest of us look for the contact lens left on the floor.”
“But...” Lumina murmured.
“Li is right. You’re doing the special job only you can do,” Ken gently said to her.
“Trust me, we’ll find it in a few minutes,” Li said.
In a few minutes?! Everybody in the room except Li thought it impossible. But they began working their jobs as Li told.
Lumina was working with her laptop on the desk, and the rest of the members were crowling on the floor to look for the contact lens. When he made sure that they are doing their own work, Li secretly took out his incantation card, concentrating on creating in mind an image of the contact lens dropping out of FitzGerald’s eye. “Force know my plight release the light. Find it,” he whispered. Next moment, something glittered in front of Ken.
“I found something,” Ken exclaimed.
“Don’t pick it up with your hand! Use tweezers!” Li said, handing him a pair of tweezers.
Picking it up onto a handkerchief, they checked what Ken just found. It was a contact lens!
“Li, could that be your magic?” Madison whispered in Li’s ear.
“Yeah, for finding missing articles,” Li secretly answered with a smile.
At this moment, Sakura found someone walking 200 feet away. That’s FitzGerald! She hid behind a building not to be found by him. He isn’t escorting Margaret O’Reilly. What in the world is he doing?
Sakura decided to follow him to check what he was up to. First she thought he would walk to the paranormal studies club; however, he seemed to watch the office of L&S Detective Agency from a distance, as if he was waiting for the timing of something.
Whether he reconsidered something or not, he started walking off. Sakura followed him behind buildings and trees. Where’s he going? He walked around the building to the back, and began stepping up the fire escape. Secretly following him, Sakura was the foot of the fire escape. At this moment there was a thud behind her. What?!
“Hi, girl, what do you want from me?”
Shoot! It was Ted FitzGerald. He just jumped off the second flight to get the back of Sakura.
She opened her mouth without sound in astonishment.
“You are the one who’s been tagging around Lumina,” he said walking around her.
“Although I want to ask Lumina out,” he continued, “the bodyguards escorting her just prevent me from getting closer to her.”
Sakura could use the Windy Card bind him motionless, but she decided to take another choice.
If I get captured by him, he could use me as a hostage to get her. In other words, he could take another silly move as long as I’m with him. Ha, it’s rather a funny story that a Cardcaptor was captured.
“Well, was it you that resolved the password—the nine-digit number—last night?” Sakura asked Ted.
“I don’t know what you’re talking about?” Ted replied.
“Hmm, another question. Did you find anything important in Dr. Matthews’ seminar room last night?”
Ted kept quiet.
“I know you want to have Lumina Allison, but not me. What do you want from her? You want to confess your feeling of romance toward her, or for another purpose?”
“Do you know where they’re going?” Li asked Margaret.
“How should I know?” Margaret looked the other way with her arms crossed.
Li just saw a shadow of something for a moment; then he gasped to know what it was.
“Oh, the Shadow Card she must be using! I can track the shadow.”
Li walked up to and talked to Margaret, “I somehow know where they’re going. Drive us to follow them by your car.”
“Are you sure? But there’re too many people to fit in my Maserati,” Margaret said.
“Don’t worry, we have one more car,” Li said.
In Margaret’s Maserati, Marget sat in the driver’s seat, Lumina in the passenger’s seat, and Li in the backseat. In Madison’s Mercedes, Madison and Ken sat in the backseat, and the two bodyguards in the driver’s and passenger’s seats.
“You guys, make sure you fastened your seatbelt,” Margaret directed arrogantly when she turned on the engine.
“Ummm, are you going to burn up the road? I’d love it if you drive safely,” Lumina said with a nervous laugh.
“Shut up, Lumina Allison. I know you don’t have much time, do you.”
Li checked out of the window if he could see Sakura’s shadow. The shadow was blinking in Li’s eyes. Probably it was invisible to the people without magic, or to muggles in Harry Potter terminology.
Thank God, it’s sunny today and the Shadow Card works actively, Li thought.
“We’re ready,” Li motioned Margaret to start the car.
“Okay, hang in there,” Margaret said, as the car growled before starting off with a steep acceleration with a skid.
“Hey, drive your car a little milder,” Li said to Margaret, “in case the Mercedes behind us lost the sight of us.”
“Okay, okay, but it’s not thrilling, though,” Margaret mumbled a complaint.
“I guess they are going to the paranormal studies lab in the outskirts of town. Do you know where it is?” Li asked the driver.
“I don’t know its place,” she answered. “I know Ted visits a fishy researching lab from time to time. Actually, I’ve been investigating him with a suspicion that he spends money to keep in touch with those crazy freaks.”
“I’m glad to hear that at least today you’re my co-worker investigating the same subject,” Li said to the amber-haired girl. “Uh, please turn left at the next intersection.”
“Next intersection, alright,” Margaret replied.
The car was running in the rural district.
“So how come you’re working for him?” Sakura asked the driver.
“He approves the paranormal studies as a branch of science, not just the occult,” Ted replied.
Li was regretful that he let Lumina get in the Maserati. These two girls are fighting as long as they see each other. I wonder if Sakura is in their hide-out by now.
Five minutes later, they saw a big house in the middle of farm land.
“That house over there,” Ted pointed the big house in front of them. “Dr. Emerson remodeled the house into his private researching facilities.”
Ted turned on the direction indicator to the right, as the car driven by Ted entered the garden path in a mansion. They could see another car—a green Jaguar—parked near beside the house. When Ted and Sakura got out of the car, someone also got out of the Jaguar. It was a man around 60 with gray hair and thick beard and mustache, wearing glasses dressed in a butler’s suit.
“A little later than I thought,” he said. “Oh, it isn’t Lumina Allison... so you must be the one of the student detectives that’s been investigating her case.”
“Yeah, I’m Sakura Avalon from L&S Detective Agency,” Sakura said to the man.
“All right, Miss, please come on in,” the man in the butler’s suit motioned her to come with him. “Dr. Dwight Emerson is waiting. Let me guide you there.”
“What in the world... I didn’t even expect we would be welcomed this way,” Li feels as if his tension was wrenched, laughing nervously.
Lumina looked sheepish and kind of laughed nervously like Li, when he took a glimpse at her.
“I hope Sakura is all right,” Li said to Lumina.
“At this rate, she’s safe and sound,” she replied.
They walked in the corrider made of oak, dimly lit with antique lamps. The wall was covered with plaster. It was hard to believe that house was used as the scientific researching laboratory. The man in a butler’s suit guided the group to the living room in the house. He knocked on the oak door and opened it, as he said, “I brought Lumina Allison and her company.”
“How should I be Lumina Allison’s company, pah!” Margaret mumbled a complaint.
There was a huge mahogany table in the middle of the room. A tall young man around the age of 35 was seated at the back. He must be Dwight Emerson, Li thought. Hey, Sakura is seated. Thank God, she looks safe, Li sighed with a relief.
The man in the back stood up and said, “Welcome, Lumina Allison and student detectives. I’m happy to see you here. Well, let’s get down to the business.”