They were married as children to solidify a business arrangement between their parents who had started a soup company.

He shouts a message to his wife which is partially obscured by his going underwater: "Noel (glub) see (blub) all...

I (glub) new..." When she recovers in the hospital and learns that her husband has checked out with no further news, Mrs. Carillon is convinced the answer to his whereabouts are contained in the mysterious message.

She spends years trying to interpret the "glub-blubs", eventually enlisting her adopted twin children, Tony and Tina, and childhood friend, Augie Kunkel.

[3][4] The Horn Book Magazine described it as a "story crammed with baffling word puzzles, a dozen zany characters, uproariously funny situations, and unmitigated slapstick.