After dinner they all settled in around the fire in the drawing room and kept trying to decipher to letter than had been delivered that afternoon. They were about to give up when Jisoo called out "I got it!" They all clustered around so they could see Jisoo's paper. 

"Mission failed," Irene read aloud. "Need extraction. Preferably tonight while the ambassador is at the opera. Standard procedure."

"Which ambassador?" Solar asked. "There are dozens of them!"

"Obviously Madame Young would have known that," Jennie said.

"Do any of the ambassadors live in Gangnam?" Jisoo asked.

"We'll know in a minute. I'll be right back." And with that, Yeri rushed out of the room.

"While we're waiting for Yeri to return from wherever she's going, we need to dispose of these," Irene said, gathering up everyone's copy of the cipher and throwing them all in the fire.

They sat in silence as they waited for Yeri to return. When she returned, she was carrying the city directory and was already looking through it. "It looks like the only embassy in Gangnam is the Italian embassy."

"So Madame Park is in the Italian embassy and Madame Young is to extract her tonight during the opera," Hwasa said. 

"Except you're forgetting one very important fact," Irene said.

"What's that?" Hwasa asked.

"Madame Young won't know to extract her, because this letter was delivered after she left," Irene said. "It's up to us."

"No way," Hwasa said. "I was okay with helping you play girl detectives here in the house, but I'm not about to go running all over the city and breaking into foreign embassies."

"You don't need to," Irene said. "We can't bring everyone anyway."

"So who's going?" Jennie asked.

"I was thinking you, me, Jisoo, and Lisa," Irene said.

"And me," Solar said.

Irene looked at Jennie, who nodded quickly.

"Okay, and Solar," Irene said. "The rest of you are to stay here and be sufficiently active that the staff thinks we're all here. Seulgi's in charge while I'm gone."

Jisoo couldn't believe how quickly all of this happened. Lisa went to fetch her lockpicks, Jennie went to get some parasols in the combat room that had swords hidden in their handles, and Irene went to get some other supplies she thought they might need.

"Should we try dressing like maids, to blend in with the ambassador's servants?" Jisoo asked.

Solar shook her head. "We don't know what kind of uniforms the ambassador's servants wear. Besides, they'd all know each other and would recognize us as strangers. Our best bet is to sneak in, hide in shadows, hope we don't run into anyone."

"Exactly," Irene said.

They sneaked out of the house and down the street a couple of blocks. 

"Now we need transportation," Irene said, "we can't walk all the way to Gangnam."

"I think I see what we need," Jennie said, indicating the carts parked behind a carters' bar.

"I'm on it," Solar said, heading for the nearest cart.

"Is it a good idea to let her go?" Irene asked.

Jennie nodded. "Solar has a way with horses. She's the best for this."

Within a few minutes, Solar was pulling up next to them in a cart pulled by four sturdy draft horses. "My ladies, your carriage awaits."

Irene climbed into the front seat next to Solar in order to navigate their way to Gangnam, while the others all piled into the back. 

"Okay, here we go," Solar said.

Jisoo was sure there were methods of transportation more uncomfortable than squatting in the back of a cart that had previously been used to haul turnips, but she hoped never to experience them. It took them the better part of an hour to get to Gangnam, during which they planned how they were going to get into the embassy.

"So everyone knows their parts?" Irene confirmed. They all assured her that they did. 

Solar stopped the cart around the corner from the embassy. "I'll stay here with the horses, so we'll be ready to go at a moment's notice," Solar said.

"Okay," Irene said, "I"m sure you all know your roles, but Jisoo, why don't you sum it up for me?"

Jisoo took a deep breath. "Jennie will knock on the front door and occupy the porter while the rest of us sneak into the house. We'll split up and search the house for Madame Park. In about 15 minutes, the clock will strike nine. At that point we leave the house, whether we've found Madame Park or not."

"That's it," Irene said. "Let's go."

The others faded into the hedges while Jennie marched up to the front door and rang the bell.

The porter, apparently an Italian, answered the door within a minute.

"What can I do for you, miss?" he asked. Jennie had difficulty making out his Korean because of his accent, but she managed.

"Oh, please, sir, I've got an urgent message to deliver to Lady Whittington," Jennie said, doing her best to impart an air of urgency to this.

The porter looked confused. "I'm sorry miss," he said, "I'm afraid you have the wrong house."

Jennie confirmed with him that she had the address right, but he reaffirmed that there was no Lady Whittington there.

"What I am to do?" Jennie asked, starting to cry. "My mistress told me to deliver