Grace Cahill, the elderly matriarch of the powerful Cahill family, lies on her deathbed. She asks her trusted estate lawyer, William McIntyre, to trade her current will for the alternate will she keeps hidden in a manila envelope. McIntyre wonders if the young descendants of the family are up to the mysterious task, but Grace insists that they must finish what their parents could not. Grace communicates the stakes of the quest to McIntyre: The world will collapse if the Cahill family does not solve the mystery, and “five hundred years of work will have been for nothing” (2). Grace feels her strength fading and wishes she could survive for one last picnic with the children. Soon after, she dies. McIntyre speaks to a mysterious man in a dark suit and asks him to make sure that none of the family members suspect anything.

Eleven-year-old Dan and his 14-year-old sister Amy attend Grace’s funeral. Dan finds Amy annoying, especially when she doesn’t speak up for them. Dan is secretly excited to add a new tombstone rubbing to his collection. Dan collects many things, like baseball cards, autographs, Civil War weapons, rare coins, and his own casts.