“Somebody could come looking for you.”
“Not as long as I’m home by ten.”
Adam could see he was getting nowhere. He crouched down to her eye-level. “I know you mean well, Mandy. And you know we do, too. Right?”
She nodded, wary.
“Well, somebody else might not know that. It would really be better if you stayed out here. Please?”
Her face fell when she realized Adam meant it. “’Kay.” Her voice was almost inaudible as she finally agreed.
Adam stood back up. “Thank you, Mandy. I promise we’ll show you if we find anything.”
Mandy gave an I-don’t-really-care shrug and sat with her back against the wall, staring sullenly across the street.
Adam didn’t know what else to say so he motioned for Lance to follow him inside. They walked through the dark hallway and entered the office. Going over to the locker, Adam handed Lance the combination out of his pocket. “Okay, I’ll hold the light, Lance. You do the honors.”
Lance accepted the paper without feeling the need to tell Adam he already had the number memorized. He gave the lock a couple of twists to clear it. As the fifth number was hit, they could hear the old tumbler fall into place. Lance slid the lock up, pulling the door open. With a brush of a movement, Adam felt Mandy sneak in beside him. He knew her agreement to stay outside was too good to last. Adam aimed the weak beam of light inside the locker that had been closed since 1960.
Mandy crowded in closer, obviously overcoming her objections to Lance in her curiosity to see what was inside. There was one shelf inside the locker, toward the top. It was on that shelf, rolled in the back, that the taller Lance could see their next capsule. There were a few items on the bottom of the locker. They could see a hat sitting on some orange material that proved to be another flag like the one across the room. As Adam and Mandy looked over the floppy hat, Lance reached back, grabbed the capsule and pocketed it. “What kind of hat is that?” He shined the light over the blue and white striped, billed cap.
“It’s kind of hard to tell in the dark. We’ll have to examine it later.”
They heard a soft gasp from Mandy who was pointing into the locker. “Look back there!”
Lance aimed the light inside again. Upright in the back, protected by a sheet of clear plastic, was a tall porcelain doll. “Go ahead and grab her, Mandy.”
Surprised, she looked up at Lance. “I can touch her?”
He gave her a kind smile. “See who she is.”
The old Mandy returned. “Gosh, anyone can tell that’s Snow White.” But that didn’t keep her from reaching in and carefully bringing out the doll. The Little Princess had eyes that opened and closed and rosy cheeks and lips painted on a delicate porcelain face. On her head was a tiny crown that sparkled like diamonds even in their insignificant light. She was wearing her blue and yellow princess dress with crystals sewn over the blue bodice of the dress. The blue cape was wrapped tightly in the back, but they could see the shining red lining where a corner bent back. “She’s beautiful” Mandy didn’t see the look exchanged over her head by the two men.
“She looks like part of the mural in the other room.”
Mandy still hadn’t looked up from the doll and worked a finger under the plastic to feel the silky black hair under the crown. She just nodded at whatever Adam had just said.
Lance smiled at her reaction and turned the light back inside the locker. He found some papers that turned out to be twelve passes to Disneyland signed by Walt. He showed them to Adam. “Think we should leave these?”
“What for!?” The collector Adam momentarily warred with the fair-play Adam. Original passes to Disneyland would be worth a fortune. The fair-play Adam won out and he finally nodded. But as Lance was putting them back on the shelf, he wavered. “How about if I take one?”
“Adam, it would look weird to have eleven passes. That number wouldn’t make sense. Besides, you don’t need it.”
Adam knew he was being selfish and sighed. “Put them all back.”
“That’s a good boy,” Lance crooned. “If somebody does figure out the combination later, there’ll be something inside to reward them.”
“I know. I know. Come on, Mandy, we need to get out of here. And you need to get home.”
Her head snapped up from Snow White. She looked crushed but tried to cover it. “Oh, right.” She gave a last, lingering look at the delicate face and handed the doll to Adam.
“My hands are full with the flag. Why don’t you carry her?”
She nodded and led the way to the side door. Adam removed his jacket and covered up the bright orange flag and the hat. That orange material would stand out like a beacon. If anybody spotted them walking back to their car, he didn’t want them to think he was stealing the school flag. At the door Mandy was torn between having to release the doll and locking up the school. After a careful look to see if anyone was around, Lance held out his hand for the key. She misunderstood what he wanted and glumly handed him Snow White. He shook his head and asked for the key. Confused, she did as he asked. When he returned the key to her, she tried to give him the doll. He just told her it was nice meeting her and walked off in the direction of their car. She turned to Adam who was smiling at her.
“Thanks for all your help, Mandy. I hope you’re good at keeping secrets.”
Still thinking about her precious doll, she didn’t know what he meant. Then it sank in. “Oh, don’t worry. I won’t tell. Besides, I wanted to know what was in the locker. Here.” She held out the doll to him with a deep sigh.
Adam looked at Snow White and the miserable face of Mandy holding it out to him. “Hey, I still have my hands full. Why don’t you hang on to her and give her a good home. Okay?”
“But she’s yours.”
“Oh, I’m too old to play with dolls. We’d rather you have her. You be good now and get on home. Okay?”
With a happy shriek and a ‘Thank you!,’ Mandy jumped up and down and raced off towards home. She looked back once and waved before Adam got to the car.
“You did a nice thing.” Lance started the car and headed out of town. It would be midnight before they got to their suite in Kansas City.
“The passes or the doll?”
“Yes.”
Adam smiled in the darkness of the car. “Yeah, I know. It felt good, too.”
“I wonder.”
Adam glanced over at Lance, his face softly lit by the instrument panel. “You wonder what?”
“I wonder if that’s how Walt felt setting all this up. Donating the Autopia ride to the kids. Helping the school. All of it.”
Thinking about their benefactor, Adam had to agree. “I’ll bet he did.”
“Yeah, me too.”
“Wow. This flag is in pristine condition.” Adam had gone over the orange material very carefully.
Lance was pulling the end cap off their latest capsule. “It’s probably been in that locker since Walt put it there. What did we figure? 1960? There!” He finally got the seals to release. Four small chrome screws fell out onto the table and scattered. Three stayed on the table and he had to dig one of them out of the carpet. “That’s odd.” He looked inside the container and pulled out another diary sheet. It had only two words written on it: Lilly Belle.
Adam brought over the hat from the locker when he saw the container was open. Looking over one of the screws, he proclaimed it a machine screw and set it back on the table. He put on the pale blue and white striped hat to show Lance. It had a small, stiff bill in front, and a stiff band going around the head. The top of the hat was full, standing up a little, with pintuck pleats shaping it into the bill. The pintucks caused the sides of the hat to stand up from the bill instead of falling over the side. “What do you think?” He should have known better.
“You look very cute.”
“That’s not what I mean. Do you know what kind of hat this is?”
“Well, I didn’t see one like it at Barney’s, so no.”
/> Adam took the hat off his head and mentally counted to ten. When he got to fifteen, he told Lance what he thought. “I think this is an engineer’s cap. Do you think it could be Walt’s personal hat?”
Lance looked at the hat with more interest now. “That might explain the clue then.” He handed the ripped page to Adam to read.
Adam looked up from the note. “Lilly Belle? That’s one of the trains, isn’t it?”
Lance nodded. “Yeah, that or his wife.” He tried the cap on but it was too small for his head. Handing it back to Adam, he gave a sniff. “Here. This fits your pinhead. Obviously I have too big of a brain.”
“Uh huh.” Eyes shining, Adam gladly accepted the hat back. He could make a special display case.… Maybe mount it next to the brass nametag.… He missed what Lance just said. “Sorry. What did you say?”
“I noticed you were too busy drooling over the hat to hear me. I asked: If the clue was referring to a train, do you know where it would be?”
Adam set the cap on top of the flag and glanced at the clock. It was close to 1 a.m. Good thing their flight didn’t leave until 12:45 tomorrow. He could sleep later than usual. “Not sure. I don’t know the names of all the engines at Disneyland. And, there are some trains at Disney World in Florida, too. Not sure if those fit our timeframe, though.”
Lance grunted. “I’d rather concentrate on California. I don’t relish a trip to Florida right now. Fresh start in the morning?” He rubbed a hand over his tired eyes.
Adam agreed. He was tired and ready for bed, looking forward to returning home tomorrow. Well, it was already tomorrow, Adam realized, looking back at the clock, stifling a yawn in the process. Later today, he amended. “Yeah. See you in the morning. Late morning,” he stressed as he shut the door to his bedroom.
Lance sat alone in the front room of their suite, too wound up to sleep right now. The situation with his father bothered him—as it always did. He didn’t know why he should have to account for every dime he spent. It was his money. Theoretically. Just because he didn’t want to sit behind a desk like his father did doesn’t mean Grandfather’s trust was invalid. Theoretically.
He decided he would just have to live quietly for a while until his father calmed down. No more trips. It should placate his father if the Gold Card showed no unusual activity for a reasonable amount of time.
However, reasonable to Lance and reasonable to his father were two vastly different things.
No more trips. He would have to remember that. No more trips.
Unless, of course, it was absolutely necessary.
The two men had a late, quiet breakfast. Neither had slept well or long enough. At the rental office at the airport, Lance ran a lingering hand over the burlwood dash of the black Jaguar XJS before returning it. Lance always appreciated a thing of beauty. And this was indeed a beautiful car.
They had an uneventful flight to Denver; their hour layover there allowed Lance time for lunch in the food court. Returning to LAX at 3:50 that afternoon put them in bumper-to-bumper traffic on the 405 Freeway all the way back to Orange County. What should have been a forty-five minute drive took two hours. Both of them were tired. Adam just grabbed his bag out of the trunk and waved good-bye as the Mercedes pulled away. They would meet up some time on Saturday to see what they needed to do next.
It wasn’t until early Sunday afternoon that they were able to get together again. Adam had been busy with the Anderson job, and he figured Lance was off being Lance. He knew better than to question him.
Since they both had come up with information on Lilly Belle, Adam went first. Shuffling through the mounds of notes on his coffee table, he handed a stack to Lance. Glancing at the papers, he pushed them back. “Can’t read your writing. Just tell me.” Lance then leaned back and put his feet up on the table.
With a frown, Adam looked at his carefully written notes. “There’s nothing wrong with my handwriting.” Lance was giving him the same look Mandy had used right after she said ‘duh.’ “Fine,” he sighed. “I’ll read them to you, Your Highness. I’m sure you know that the first Lilly Belle was the name of the engine Walt built for his backyard railroad on Carolwood Drive. He had commissioned Roger Broggie to build the engine back in 1949 and it made its first run sometime in 1950. It was quite a layout with over 2600 feet of track, a 46-foot trestle, and a 90-foot tunnel under Lillian’s garden. As he did later at Disneyland, he built a berm around the property so his neighbors wouldn’t be bothered by the train. I found some pictures of the backyard, the train barn, and the train itself, if you want to see them.”
Lance nodded as Adam talked. “Yeah, that matches what I found. The house was on two and a half acres, so he had lots of room for the train—which is one of the reasons he picked that lot in the first place.”
“Then you probably also found that the house no longer exists.”
“The new owners tore the whole thing down right after buying it. Something about asbestos, I think.” When Adam agreed, he continued. “Too bad. I would have liked to have seen the house. Did you find out what happened to the train?”
Adam shuffled to another yellow tablet and flipped a couple pages. “Well, there was also the train barn in the backyard, built along the lines of the barn we saw in Marceline. After Lilly died in 1997 and the house was sold, the barn was dismantled piece by piece, I believe, starting in 1998. Griffith Park made an agreement with the Los Angeles Live Steamers—train enthusiasts and friends of Walt—who donated some land to reconstruct the barn in Griffith Park. That was finished in 1999. Quite a ceremony, too. They have a tremendous amount of Disney railroad memorabilia. I hoped the Lilly Belle ended up there on display.”
“No such luck?”
“Nope.” Adam’s reply had a hint of dejection. “They do have some original track from Carolwood, but that doesn’t help us. Did you find anything about the actual train?”
Lance picked up the gray capsule as Adam talked. “I did some asking at the Park yesterday.” He could see Adam’s eyes widen with curiosity. “Yes, I was back at Disneyland yesterday. Don’t ask. The train on display inside the station on Main Street used to be the real deal. But, sometime before the year 2000, it was taken down and a duplicate train was made by Broggie’s son.”
“That’s too bad. We would’ve been able to look it over.”
“I thought that, too, at first. But, thinking about it, it would’ve been more difficult to get at than Walt’s desk was. The train station is the focal point of Main Street and pretty busy all the time. I don’t think we could have gotten to it.”
Adam couldn’t resist. “Not even with the help of one of your girls?”
Lance refused to be baited. “Well, shutting the doors of a relatively quiet show is a lot different than shutting down a popular train station that’s full of windows and has trains coming and going every ten minutes or so. There is a limit to what even I can do.”
“Your humility is touching.”
Lance ignored the crack. “What about these screws?” Lance dumped them into his hand and looked at them again.
“Not sure on that either. Obviously, from the size, they would fit something small. They look like #6 or #8 screws. Maybe that’s a hint on what to look for. We might need them to replace some screws we have to remove. The fact that they are machine screws and not carpentry screws might indicate something on the train as opposed to a building surrounding it.” He stopped and shrugged. “I don’t know. But I suggest that wherever we end up, we bring a screwdriver that fits those screws.”
Lance nodded as he returned the screws to the capsule. They had been safe in there for forty-two years—they should be fine for a few more days. “So,” Lance surmised, “we have about two years that the train’s been missing.”
Adam smiled. “Well, missing from our perspective, yes. I’m sure whoever has it knows exactly where it’s been each step of the way.”
“And now we need to know who that person is and see if we can get in for a look.”
“Too bad about Griffith Park. I wouldn’t have minded a trip out there.”
Lance put down the capsule. “We could take a run now and ask around.”
Adam glanced at his clock. “That’s a good idea, but I’m meeting my folks for dinner.… Don’t look so smug. It was time to get together with them anyway. Why don’t you go out to Griffith Park and let me know what you find.”
“I could do that. Where’re you going for dinner?”
“I was going to take them to Granville’s Steakhouse at the Disneyland Hotel. Why?” Adam was suddenly wary and wondered if he should have asked ‘why’ first. You never knew what Lance was up to.
Lance looked all innocence. “No reason. Sounds nice. Tell Allison I said hi. I’ll take off and see what I can find.”
“Who’s Allison?”
“The server.”
“Of course she is.”
Adam didn’t know why he was surprised when Lance, dressed in an expensive dark brown suit, showed up at Granville’s and pulled a chair up to their table. Adam’s mom, Margaret, gave a cry of delight at seeing Lance, and John, his dad, thumped him on the shoulder a few times. Then they gave Adam the “what a delightful surprise” look as if he had arranged the whole thing. Adam also noticed Lance didn’t meet his eyes for the first half hour.
After a bubbly greeting from Allison, Lance ordered a drink and dinner and caught up on the salad that had just been served. Chatting animatedly with John and Margaret, Lance covered everything from John’s golf game to Margaret’s new tennis instructor to the new carpet in their living room. At a break in the conversation, while the plates were being removed and his parents distracted, Lance leaned over to Adam and said something in a low voice. “San Francisco.”
Much to the chagrin of his mother, Adam gave a loud outburst as the news. “Dang it!”
“You know, Lance, I did train him better than that.” Margaret tried to apologize for her son.
Lance nodded seriously. “I know, Margaret. You do your best and hope they turn out well.” Lance looked over at Adam and gave him a stern, fatherly glare. Adam just rolled his eyes, shaking his head in disbelief.
Sometimes Dead Men DO Tell Tales! Page 19