Page 89 of No Escape

“We’re out of clues,” Vittoria said, joining Winston on the couch and cradling her stomach. “What are we going to do?”

Clarissa stood alone at the table with the scale, not touching anything, but staring at the setup. “Why are the weights color-coded?” she finally asked.

Winston shook his head. “I don’t know. I hadn’t really thought about it.” He glanced over at me. “Gio, have any thoughts on that?”

“Not a one.”

“Well, perhaps we can use the colors to predict what color of weight we should be looking for,” Clarissa said.

“That’s an interesting idea,” Alessa said, standing next to Clarissa. “And what if we stack the weights the way they were originally? Heaviest to lightest on the left. Then we can stack the ones on the right similarly.”

“That’s not going to even the scale,” Stefan warned.

“Not yet,” Alessa corrected him. “We won’t know until we try.”

“Alessa is right. It’s worth a try,” Clarissa said, stacking them by weight. “The one thing I noticed is that when we stack the weights by color, it follows the pattern of the color wheel, going from red to green to blue to dark purple. Perhaps that’s significant.”

“We haven’t adequately addressed this riddle, either,” Father Armando said, holding up the paper with the short riddle we’d found in the Pompeii map tube.

Not in the shade, but under the light

Balance the scale to come out right.

“That’s right,” Alessa said, rubbing her temples. “‘Not in the shade, but under the light.’ Which light?”

“Maybe there’s a light switch we need to turn on to allow the scale to make a small adjustment,” Father Armando said, looking around the room.

“Everyone look for a light switch,” I ordered. “And fast.”

Vittoria found the switch on the wall just inside the door where we’d come into the room. It was currently on. “Turn it off,” I said. “Let’s see what happens.”

Vittoria flipped the switch, and the room darkened except for the lights in the map room, the table lamp on the small end table in the back of the room, and a pole lamp near the couch.

“I need someone on each light. Vittoria, stay on the room light. Stefan, take charge of the lights in the map room. Father Armando, stand next to the pole lamp. Winston, Alessa, and Clarissa, you watch the scale. Let’s try different combinations of turning the lights on and off to see what happens.”

We tried a variety of light combinations, but nothing changed in terms of the scale. “Nothing is happening and we’re running out of time.” Alessa’s voice was heavy with disappointment, echoing what we were all feeling.

After several minutes of trying various light switches, I called it quits. “Turn all the lights on for now. Perhaps there’s a hidden light or lamp we’re missing. Let’s see if we can find anything.”

Clarissa returned to the paper with the riddle and studied it. Then with a laugh, she set the paper down. “No need to do that. I’ve solved the riddle.”

I glanced up in surprise. “You did?”

“I did. It’s not in theshade.” She wagged the paper with the riddle on it at me. “Remember I told you about the wordplay? The riddle isn’t talking about the shade as in darkness, but thelampshade. The clue says it’s not in the lampshade. That’s because it’sunderthe light. Check beneath all the lamps.”

“Do it!” I ordered as everyone scattered, heading for a light. I sincerely wanted to plant a huge kiss on Clarissa’s lips, but instead, I ran to help Father Armando with the heavy pole light. The priest was already tipping it up to look underneath. Alessa had lifted the lamp on the end table, peering below it, while Winston ran toward the map room to check beneath the lamps in there.

“It’s here,” I shouted as soon as I saw the bottom of the pole lamp. “The base of the lamp is the final weight. It says ‘thirty’ on it. Someone, help me unscrew this thing from the pole while Father Armando holds it.”

Stefan knelt beside me, and we quickly unscrewed the bolt attaching the base to the pole. I hefted the weight and carried it to the scale. “Take off all the weights on the right side,” I said. Alessa and Clarissa quickly removed them, and I put the base on the right side of the scale by itself.

The scale leaned heavily in that direction.

“We need at least four weights on the left side to balance it,” Stefan said. “If we presume that all the weights are proportional to their numbers, then we need at least four weights equaling thirty on the left side to balance it.”

“Already ahead of you,” Alessa said, efficiently loading the weights onto the scale. “If we use the nine- and seven-pound weights from the original set, and the eight- and six-pound weights from the new batch, that equals thirty.” She put the last weight on, and the scale wavered back and forth…before it balanced perfectly.

“We did it!” Vittoria whooped, hugging Alessa, Clarissa, and then me. Everyone shouted and congratulated each other while I walked over to the red button on the wall and punched it. A glance at the clock indicated we’d finished the puzzle with less than four minutes to spare.

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