A Birth day

Jessie followed Keiran inside to the office when he handed out the keys he took one and nodded where his was. Now listening to Keiran he looked to Angus and Marcus. " so three kids all from diferent raids all with diferent backgrounds except they see each other when they go to bed, can we see where they sleep?" he asked knowing it might help in finding them. " couldn't harm in seing how they spent their nights, you and I know kids don't just sleep at night." he said and chuckled.

He picked up Angus and Marcus's bag and headed up to where he had been told their rooms were, placing each bag into the rooms he placed his own in and returned down stairs passing rooms with kids in. Smiling he waved at the younger ones.

"Yes, of course. You can certainly see where they sleep, but could we do that, please, in an hour or so from now? You must remember that it isn't even five am here, and the rest of the kids are still asleep in those bunk houses. I'd like to not have to uproot them unless we absolutley have to. If you can do your search and not make any noise, then so be it. But, their lives have been turned upside down quite enough as it is. I'd like to not alarm them if we can help it. While the old west village is still under construction, the kids sleep in a number of wards we've constructed. We took some of the ranch bunk houses and enchanted them to hold more kids. That sort of thing. It's certainly not ideal, but we do have staff membrs assigned to those bunk houses as well. We've not ever required the staff to be awake all night because the place has never been breeched. So. once the staff member has their bunk house secure for the night, they're permitted to go to bed too. The staff members sleep in the bunk house office, but their doors are open at night so that if anything happens with the kids, the staff will hear. We've never had an issue til now."

"And how many do you have in each bunk house right now?" Angus asked.

"There are a dozen in each one. We have one for younger boys, one for younger girls, one for older boys and one for younger girls. Charlie is in the bunk house for the little boys, Sarah is in the one for little girls, and Holly is in the one for older girls. None of the bunk hosue staff heard or saw anything," Fiona said. "We have two additional bunk houses, overflow bunk houses, one for girls and one for boys, but they aren't being used right now. Most of those bunk houses will return to being used for staff once the village is completed.

"The kids get up at six so they can be dressed, with their beds made and bunk house chores done by seven, when breakfast is served in the dining room here," Kieran said. "That's temporary too, because when the village is complete, they'll typically eat at their houses in the village. At this point, each house will hold anywheere from four to six kids, and two live-in house parents who will take on the role that parents would. Feeding, clothing, supervising, that sort of thing. The idea is to give them as close to a normal family life as possible.

"School is back in session here now, so their school day will start, in the bunk house dining rooms, at 8. They have a recess at 9:45 til 10 am, lunch at 11:30 til 12:30. That gives them thirty minutes to eat and a longer, 30 minute recess. Then they're back in school til 1:45, til their afternoon recess. School is back in session, then til 3. They have a snack in the bunk houses at 3, followed by homework time or play time at 3:30 til dinner time at 6. Every kid pitches in either with fixing dinner or with clean up. After that, it's time for showers and more play time until 9. Then, the kids need to be in their bunks for quiet time before lights out at 9:30. We strongly encourage either reading for the older kids or the adults will host a story time for the younger ones. The schedule is still structured but is considerably looser on the weekends or when school isn't in session," Kieran explained.

"Where's the village being constructed at?"

"On the west side of the property."

"Near the lake?"

"South of it," Kieran said. "The north edge of the village is maybe 400 or 500 feet from the lake. We wanted not only room for expansion but also considerable distance to deter the kids from fiddling around in the water because very precious few of them swim until they take swimming lessons here. You're welcome, of course, to go see the progress on it. I'd suggest you go take some horses and see it on horseback because it can be a long walk to get there, go through it, see the lake and walk back. If you like, I'll have some horses ready for you by daylight. The day staff will be clocking in and will be reporting to their assignments by 5:30 am so they can be ready to get the kids up and going. A good portion of them are here in the dining room for a good ranch style breakfast before they report for work. So if you want to talk to the staff, that's where I'd start."

"I'd like to read the kids' files," Angus said.

"And I'd really like to take a close look at the grounds around the bunk houses before the kids are up and trampling all over it, in case any clues were accidently missed," Marcus said. "Maybe we can search the bunk houses then while the kids are at breakfast in this building."

"Certainly," Kieran said.

Jessie listened and nodded "Sorry, I forgot about time differences" he said "It can wait till they're all awake" he said and listened again making a note to check the new village just in case they got into one of the buildings but could not get back out. "On hearing Marcus talk about reading the files, Jessie spoke again "While you're doing that I'll check their sleeping places." he said " but first I'll take the bags to the rooms.. quietly so as not to wake them," he said and chuckled as he moved with all three bags.

Finding each room he unlocked the dors and placed each bag at the foot of the bed. He unpacked his toiletries and opened a side door to find a shower in the bathroom. " I'll be using you later" he said smiling as he placed down his small bag and turned off the light returning to where Marcus and Angus were.

Angus read the files about the kids, and Fiona brought Angus a cup of coffee while he was reading. It seemed to Angus like the kids were excelling academically. Their grades had come up dramatically for all three of them. Holly had numerous remarks from her teachers and from the staff about her kindness towards the smaller kids, and how helpful she was in the kitchen and in the greenhouse with the plants. Sarah seemed to shine with anything that had to do with animals. She seemed to have a gift, particularly with dogs and cats. And Charlie was a rock hound. He loved all sorts of different rocks. He liked working with his hands, and he could often be found with the ranch hands or with the maintenance men, learning how to make something or fix something. He had had numerous little foibles and scrapes. A lot of skinned elbows and scraped knees. He liked playing ball with the other boys--baseball and basketball, in particular. Charlie had found a young stray dog and he had desperately wanted to adopt it. It was a little, wirehaired Jack Russell terrier that seemed to be maybe a mix of the Jack Russell and a wire fox terrier that Charlie had named Jack. The staff had not wanted a dog to have to take care of, but in the end, Kieran and Fiona had let Jack stay. The ranch hands had taught the dog not to harrass the cattle and the horses, and the dog largely stayed with the younger kids because that was where Charlie was.

"Fi, where's the dog? Has it been seen since Charlie came up missing?"

"He has indeed. He lays next to Charlie's bed, moping. He won't eat or drink, won't leave the bunk house. He's waiting on Charlie to come home."

"If Charlie ran away," Angus began.

"Nah. He'd never do that. Charlie loves it here, and if even if he had, he'd have taken Jack with him," she said firmly. "He would have never left him behind."

"I somehow knew you were going to say that," Angus sighed.

Marcus came back in just as Angus was finished reading the files.

"I think I found something," Marcus said. "Not a big clue, but its something. I found some footprints outside one of the bunk houses, near some of the windows. Men's footprints, and they're unusual, at least for a Colorado cattle ranch. These footprints have distinctive brand markings on the soles, and they're made by some of the most exclusive muggle shoe companies in England. And, guess what? They only make dress shoes. They don't make boots or trainers. No cowboy was peering in the windows. It was two different men, in two different shoe sizes, wearing dress oxfords."

"Well, that is indeed something," Angus said. "It's a start. Maybe we should take a plaster cast of them and try to get an idea of make and size. That maybe would help us to get an idea of height and size of our British spies. What do you think?"

Jessie stod and listened to them talking when Marcus walked in he listened more " I could track them from their cologne if there wearing any but if there muggles, and from what you said about their foot ware they might be" he said his arms cross his chest as he waited he wanted to find those kids before anything bad happened to them, especialy the girls. He thought about things then spoke again " what about the dog? arn't jacks a natrual tracker , give him their scent and let him hunt for him, dogs can track even if the persons not on the ground." he sugested , "Then we can follow him." he didn't know what else to sugest, he could track them the same way but he wasn't as prfishiont as Jack would be.

While they were talking he moved to the window Marcus had said th foot prints were at , he made casts and let them dry before returning with them " tell you something some one is wearing some stinky colouge hard to stop my self from coughing out there, its so strong" he said "even now."

"They are a breed that can easily learn to track, but Jack is a really young dog. We're not even sure he's quite a year. That might normally be a plus but he's not been taught to track. Now, if we had someone who spoke canine, they could have a word with him, and then maybe the dog would help. At this point, I don't know if he'd know what we wanted," Kieran said.

"Maybe we need to ask Jack to come join us at least long enough to have a word with the dog. What do you think?" Angus asked. "I hesitate to say it, but I can't overlook what I think Jessie and Marcus and I are probably thinking, Kieran."

"What's that?"

"Well, obviously somehow we've been breeched, and I really am thinking that we're looking for Gelding's thugs. If that's the case, none of the kids are safe here. We might have to move them all temporarily."

"You have no idea what you're suggesting," Kieran groaned.

"Yes, I do know, but neither do I want us to have any more missing kids," Angus said.

"Nice work, Jessie. If the scent is strong enough, maybe I can identify it. I bet you its a cheap, mass produced muggle scent," Marcus said. He went over and examined the plaster casts more closely. "Hm...well, this isn't an exact science that I know of, but, generally speaking, the smaller shoe would be from a man that stands about 5' 10" and is maybe about a stone overweight. The larger shoe is unusually narrow. I figure he's probably 6'3 to 6'5" and he's probably very thin."

"Good work," Angus said, "both of you. You know who that taller man describes, don't you? That's a pretty good start of a description of Elliot Gelding."

"Related to Tom Gelding?"

"He is indeed. He's Tom's 20 year old son, heir to Tom's operations. The other man sounds to me like one of Tom's top thug men. I don't know much about him. I just know he's a man that likes to break bones and cause all sorts of injury. He goes by Mickey."

"Ah. Now, that's a name I know. Mickey Farrell. Age 54. Experienced muscle man for all sorts of dark arts practitioners. He generally gets paid exceptionally well for fulfilling various contracts, if you get my drift."

"He's a hit man, like Ruby's father was."

"He is. The difference between him and Reginald is that Mickey is far more ruthless and aggressive," Marcus said.

Jessie kept his cool but inside he wanted to hunt down this man and rip him to shreds, if he was as bad as his father had been. When Angus mentioned the cologune he nodded then turned his hed and sneesed " sorry that foul cologne" he said then listened more to them talking " if hes that bad we need to get those kids back quickly" he said now some what pacing back and forth in the room.

It was now he heard porting and heavy foot steps as the door opened as Jack walked in to the room " okay, what happened and whose angry enough that Jess asked me to intervene?" he asked then looked at Jessie and sniffed once then twice then wrinkle his nose. " shesh Yu need to change his cologne, it stinks" he said then loked at Angus and Marcus. Dont worry caught the tale end , bad guy realy bad guy possible has three kids and no sense of a good cologne." he added.

"The kids have a pup that they've befriended, and it happens to be a Jack Russell mix, apparently, mixed with maybe a wire haired terrier and, well who knows," Angus told Jack. "The dog is named Jack, Jack. He's a little buggar, but if there's a chance that the Jack Russell part of him would let him track where these thugs got in and, presumably out at, we might be able to get a lead on the kids and maybe patch any leaks in the protection grid at the same time.You up for going with Jessie to talk to this little dog and seeing if can track anything at all for us? We're thinking the criminals are working for Tom. If that's the case, then these kids have been taken to Paris and will be going back up on the block at the next auction, so we need to get to them and get them back."

"The kids are up now and most of them are probably on their way to breakfast in the dining room here," Fiona said.

"Well, then, let's go start searching those kids' bunks," Marcus said.

"I can take one of you to Charlie's, and Fi can take you to both of the girls' bunks," Kieran said.

Jack listened to Angus and nodded " I'll ask him I'm sure if his owners missing he'll want to help as much as he can, even being so young" he said, he headed to some stairs and gave a low whistle and growl. from no where a liver and white jack ran over to him and he knelt to it.

After a moment he stood up and with Jack beside him he walked to where Angus and Marcus were " he agreed, he was a bit excitable but is wanting Charlie back since he missed bacon treats the boy gives him." he said and chuckled this even made Jessie chuckle.

"Well, let's see where he goes, then," Angus said, but as he spoke, an angry voice shouted at Angus from the floo.

"What the hell are you thinking, Angus?" the voice was Evan's. Angus turned to look at Evan's face in the fireplace. "You lot go ahead. See where the dog takes you. I'll catch up with yhou or I'll start in the bunk houses." He went over to the floo. "What's the matter, Ev?"

"I'm the one that was blown up in that explosion. I realize there's more going on there now, but I know damned well this all ties in to the training accident. And you thought you could go there and not include me? Have you lot your mind? I'm on my way, you git..."

"Ev..." Angus began.

"No. I'm on my way. The girls are going to Edward's to stay with Rosaria and Carlo, and Tara is going to your place to help Ruby with cooking for that army that's living there. So just make up your mind." The floo closed with a pop and a snap. Angus opened the floo to Ruby.

"Hey, Ru," Angus called. He got Edward.

"She'll be here in a moment," Edward said.

"It doesn't merit a big conversation. Just tell her that Tara's on her way to give her a hand with cooking and taking care of folks. I'm sure she'll be there any time now."

"Tara? Oh. Okay," Edward said. "Any leads yet?"

"Maybe. We're working on it. I think it's going to take us to Paris."

"Oh no. I was hoping you weren't going to tell us that," Edward said.

"Yea, it's looking that way," Angus said.