No Escape by Julie Moffett

 

Chapter Fifty-One

 

Lexi Carmichael

 

“What does that mean?” Alessa said, reading over my shoulder. “It sounds like an address.”

“Arrrgh,” Mia complained. “Why won’t this game ever end? Why can’t it just say, ‘The End, Go Eat’ already?”

“It looks like an address, or at least part of an address,” Tito said.

“There’s no city or country listed, but the address is in Italian,” Slash said. “And translated into English, it means ‘the street of the colosseum.’”

“As in the Roman coliseum?” Dad asked.

“I would assume so. If we had our phones or a laptop, we could confirm there’s a street in Rome named the Via del Colosseo.”

“What if we had a map?” my mom asked.

“That would work,” said Slash. “Does anyone know where we can find a map of Rome?”

Gio grinned and slapped his brother on the back. “I sure do. The map room. Follow me.”

We followed Gio to the library and got a quick demonstration of how his team had found the hidden room. When we entered the map room, I looked in awe at the giant statue of a wolf suckling two human babies, as well as lots of shelves, drawers, and tables with maps, tubes, and cartography equipment. Gio bypassed all that and led us straight to a wall where two giant side-by-side maps of Rome hung. The map on the left was of old Rome and on the right was modern Rome.

“This is super cool,” I said, checking it out. “Where’s the Colosseum?”

“Here,” Father Armando said, tapping the map of new Rome. “It’s located in the center and oldest part of Rome.”

“Score,” Stefan exclaimed, peering at the map of ancient Rome. “I’ve found Via del Colosseo. It’s right next to Colle Palatino and il Forum.”

“What’s Colle Palatino?” Mom asked.

“Palatine Hill is the oldest of the seven hills of Rome,” Slash explained. “Legend has it that Rome was founded on Palatine Hill, and it’s where many of the subsequent Roman emperors lived and built some of their greatest buildings.”

“Via del Colosseo is a street running along the base of the hill toward the Colosseum,” Stefan said, running his finger along the street. He switched over to the modern map of Rome, locating the same street. “Lexi, what’s the street number again?”

“Twenty-six,” I confirmed.

Stefan ran his finger along the street, his nose practically touching the map. His finger stopped on a small building northwest of the Colosseum. “This is it,” he said. “On the map the address is identified as La Fine, R&R 753.

“What does that mean?” Dad asked.

Father Armando smiled. “La fine means the end. I suspect, or at least hope, we are close to the end.”

“Oh, thank God,” Oscar said. “I don’t think my brain can take much more.”

“Or my feet,” Vittoria groaned. “I’m going to go sit on the couch in the library and take a rest.”

Mom looked at Vittoria’s swollen ankles and lifted an eyebrow at me, almost as if she was asking if it was okay to take Vittoria out of the equation before the problem was solved. How had I never noticed the subtle and kind ways my mom took care of people?

I gave Mom an imperceptible nod, and she smiled.

“I’m with you,” Mom said in a loud voice, linking arms with Vittoria. “I’ll come keep you company. Let’s permit the rest of them to take it from here. You and I can relax and talk about all the wonderful Italian wine and dessert we’ve earned.”

“Perfetto.”

Mom and Vittoria left, and the rest of us stood looking at each other, not sure how to proceed.

“So, team, what do we think the two names are?” Tito asked. “Wasn’t that what the gamemaster said? We had to give him two names to win the challenge.”

“It was a really cryptic statement,” I said. “Honestly, I’ve got nothing on that front. How about you, Slash?”

Slash pushed off the wall against which he’d been leaning. “Not a thing.”

“Well, how about we focus on interpreting what R&R 753 means?” Stefan suggested. “Maybe something will come to us. What do you think it means?”

“Maybe it’s a reference to another address, or perhaps a location in Rome?” Juliette asked.

“R and R could mean rest and recreation, or rest and relaxation,” Dad said. “Just throwing it out there.”

“My guess is that it’s a person or persons,” Father Armando said. “Maybe R and R are the names we have to give the gamemaster. Or maybe it’s the name of a business.”

“What about the 753?” I asked. “Is there any significance to that number?”

Alessa smacked her head. “Yes, of course. Why didn’t I think of it before? Seven fifty-three is the year Rome was founded. I saw it etched somewhere during one of the challenges.”

“Yes, I remember it,” Gio said. “We were here, in this room, looking at—”

“This statue,” Juliette interjected. She pointed at the base of the statue with the wolf suckling the two babies. “The number is etched here in Roman numerals—DCCLIII, or 753.”

“Si, when we first saw this statue, Vittoria reminded me this is a replica of the famous statue the Lupa Capitolina,” Gio said.

“Who are those babies?” I asked.

“Romulus and Remus,” Juliette replied. “The founders of Rome. Could that be the R and R we’re looking for? The two names we need?”

For a moment we all stared at Juliette, openmouthed. Then Slash swept his mother off the floor and gave her two kisses on the cheek. “Si, that’s it, Mama, the two names. It was in front of us the entire the time.”

“Yes,” I said, everything clicking into place. “Those are the names we need to give the gamemaster. After all, he said it was possible to solve this escape room without having solved any of the other challenges, and he was right. He gave us major clues with every challenge. The twins in the fountain in the garden maze, the identical pair of fishes painted on the side in the pool, and this statue of the twins in the map room.”

“Don’t forget the identical columns at the entrance to the garden maze,” Dad added. “Your mom noticed that right at the beginning of the challenge.”

“Yes, and the twin Atlas statues holding up the table in the game room, as well as the twin men holding up the table in the planetarium,” Alessa said. “Could it have been a red herring to get us to think the twins might have been Castor and Pollux?”

“I don’t think so,” Father Armando replied. “Castor and Pollux were Greek. I expect we were supposed to recognize that, although we didn’t. The twins were the point the gamemaster was making. Everything else about the castle and the challenges focused exclusively on Italy and Rome.”

“If we’d recognized the macro picture of the challenges and recognized the emphasis on Roman history, sculpture, and twins, I suspect we might have come to the conclusion it was Romulus and Remus without having to solve a single puzzle,” Slash said. “The gamemaster was right in his assertion. Impressive.”

“So, you mean, the answer has been hiding in plain sight?” Gio asked. “Right in front of us, and we just didn’t put the pieces together?”

“If we’d solved it too early, Gio, we would have missed out on all the fun,” my dad said, clapping him on the shoulder. “And what an adventure it’s been.”

“It certainly has.” Slash grinned and put an arm around me, kissing the top of my head. “Come on, everyone. Let’s go get dressed and give the gamemaster our final answer. I think our work is done here.”