With the realization that Peter had something definite in mind, Catie knew she probably had to amuse herself. She walked to the far end of the banquet table and looked up at the Doom Buggies. To figure out where everything else was located in the ride and what floor they might be on, she tried to picture the ride’s route. She knew it began by going up a staircase before it started to travel through the different scenes. After the riders looked down into the room where she was standing, it then wound through the attic and dropped down a floor into the graveyard they had just left. She assumed the majority of the scenes were up above them one floor, possibly on ground level since there was the steep ramp after the Hitchhiking Ghosts and the unload area. “Peter, we’re only one floor underground, aren’t we?”
Her question broke through his preoccupation. About to sit on the dusty organ bench, he stopped to turn and look at her. “What? What do you mean?”
“I just figured out that most of the scenes are up above us at the same level we came in. Right?”
“Well, yes and no.” At her confused look, he tried to explain. “Remember riding Pirates? You go down the waterfalls, but you really aren’t underground. Uncle Wolf and Dad explained it and I saw what they meant when I jumped out of the boat. I already had gone down the waterfalls, but I was at ground level when I went outside.” Her look was now completely baffled. “Your mom works Pirates. Didn’t she ever explain this? Okay, when you come in the Main Gate, you start going uphill a little as you go up Main Street. Then, when you head to New Orleans Square—where we were—you go up even more. You are higher than the entry gates. Same here in the Mansion. You have to go down to get under the train tracks to reach the main show building. But, I think, once you are on the ride, if you went out an emergency door you’d been on the same level as the old parking lot. I think. Or maybe one flight?”
“In other words, you don’t know.”
“Yeah.”
“Sounded good, though. What are you doing?” Catie sounded anxious when she saw Peter turn back to the organ and prepare to sit down. “You can’t sit on that!”
“Why not? The organist is in the other room.” He meant it as a joke but could see she wasn’t in the mood. “I want to check out a…uh…rumor I heard about the organ.”
“It doesn’t really play, Peter. Everyone knows that.”
“I know. But I still have to check.” Against her better judgment, he sat at the console and touched one of the keys as she came over to keep an eye on him. Just like at the Gracey house, there was no sound. He looked down at the foot pedals and, with a smile, began to pump his feet. There was still no sound from the dead organ, but they both definitely heard the sound of a wood panel as it slid to the side.
“What did you do!? You broke the Ballroom!”
“Get your flashlight. I know what I’m doing. Sorta.” His last words were mumbled as he dove into the opening.
“How did you know about this? Where are we?”
“I don’t think you need to whisper, Catie. I…just heard about a secret panel and wanted to try it out. There’s the stairs!”
Catie would have preferred to stay in the ballroom. It wasn’t as bad as this narrow, dusty stairwell. She knew this dust was real as she started to climb behind Peter. When he suddenly stopped, she heard him grunt. “What are you doing? I can’t see anything down here.” She heard the sound of something falling above her head. Before she could ask, Peter let out a happy yell and started to climb upward again.
“Woo hoo! It worked! Just like at Gracey’s!” He stepped into the attic and turned to make sure Catie could get up the last steps all right.
“How did you know where this would lead? Of course this is the Gracey’s attic.” She had gotten more and more confused by Peter’s unusual familiarity with the Mansion. It was as if he expected certain things to be there—whether it was something seen on the ride or hidden behind secret passageways. She was more perplexed when he walked all the way over to the mannequin of the Bride in the Attic and bypassed all the neat things on the floor. As she watched, he gently touched the sleeve of the wedding dress, careful not to muss any of the effects. “Peter! Don’t touch anything!”
“You sound just like Master Gracey.” He turned to face her with a grin on his face. “Uh, at least, I think that’s what he would say….”
“Gosh, he isn’t real, Peter. You sound like you know him or something.”
“Ha ha.” I’ve got to quit that. “Let’s look around at some of this stuff. I won’t touch anything else.” Unlessit’s really cool.
They spent most of their time at the edges of the room away from the ride track. That way they could examine everything that wasn’t easily seen when they rode past in their Doom Buggy. Peter went over to the small piano, a secret smile on his face as he smoothed the doily that was placed on the lid. When he turned to Catie, she thought he was going to say something, but he just snapped his mouth shut and moved to a different area.
“We don’t have very long before we have to meet your dad.”
Peter’s head shot up at the reminder. He had forgotten all about his dad. “Oh, yeah. Rats. This is so cool.”
“Did you just hear a noise?” Catie’s flashlight jerked over toward the far corner of the attic, but she couldn’t see anything. “I thought I heard something move.”
“Musta been your imagination. Or a mouse. Hey, are these the trunks? Wow, they look pretty old. Wonder what’s in them?”
Catie looked over his shoulder into an open one and wrinkled her nose. “Well, this one has one of those scary pop-up ghosts. Ooh, I hate them! What’s in that one?”
Peter put his hand on the rubbery green ghoul. It bounced a little but didn’t fly up at them. When they had ridden through earlier, he had been so anxious to look for Constance’s things that he couldn’t remember if that effect had worked or not. “It’s dead, Jim.” His joke was rewarded with a blank stare. “Star Trek? No? You’re kidding, right?” With an unbelieving shrug that she didn’t know what he was talking about, he turned back to the largest camel-topped chest. Designed to look like it had leather straps over the top, it was really just darkened wood. He pulled the top open and shined his light inside. If he had to guess, he would have expected it to be empty. But, it wasn’t. “Look at this, Catie. What’s that doing here? It doesn’t fit the Mansion.”
“What is it?”
“It…it looks like a mermaid wearing a pearl necklace. I want to pick it up. It looks really old.”
“I don’t think you should, Peter. It might be there for a reason.”
The mermaid was surprisingly light as Peter removed her from her hiding place. As he tested the weight and guessed she was made out of wood, something thudded dully inside. Only about sixteen inches long, her arms were at her sides as if she was swimming. Catie’s flashlight played over the mermaid’s light green tail. Her long red hair was carved to look as if it was flowing back over her shoulders.
“She’s so pretty! Are those pearls attached? They don’t look like the rest of her.”
“No, they’re separate. Look here, Catie. There’s another set of pearls under these that cover her…uh…chest. They looked carved. Wonder why there are two. Hey, do you think she’s supposed to be Ariel? She has red hair.”
Catie wasn’t sure. “Her face is all wrong for Ariel. This doesn’t look like a real mermaid.” At Peter’s laugh, she quickly added, “You know what I mean! This looks too…too old, I guess. Like the other stuff in the room.”
Before they could continue their discussion, they both heard noise come from the corner of the room. When they shined their flashlights to investigate, they were shocked to see the same woman who had watched them from the gate.
“Put the mermaid down.” The order was clear as she moved closer, her hand going into the huge purse at her side. “That doesn’t belong to you.”
“Who are you? How did you get in here?” Peter stepped in front of Catie and han
ded her the mermaid behind his back. He could feel her fumble with his backpack as she tried to cram it inside. Good girl, Catie. Even though he put on a brave front, his heart pounded in his chest as he faced this very angry woman.
“Don’t you question me, boy. I saw you sneak in here and followed you. You aren’t the only one who knows how to pick a lock.”
“I didn’t pick the lock. I have a key! And that means you don’t work here and don’t belong!”
A smug smile came over the woman’s face. She looked to be in her early forties. “A key, huh? I might just have to take that away from you.”
“I’d like to see you try!”
“Peter, don’t make her madder.” Catie had gotten the mermaid stuffed into his pack and began to panic. “We have to get out of here!”
“It’ll be okay. Start backing to the stairs. I think we can get out through the graveyard.”
“Quit whispering and drop that mermaid. I’ve been waiting for years to get my hands on her and you aren’t going to stop me.”
“How’d you know it was here?”
“I know who hid her. That’s all you need to know. Put her back in the trunk and back away. Now!”
Catie gave a startled gasp. “Peter! She’s got a knife!”
His flashlight dropped from the woman’s face to illuminate five inches of bright sharp steel. It was a switchblade she had pulled out of the depths of her purse. “Give me the mermaid or I will hurt you!” Her arm raised and went into the throw position, her face still and determined. They had no doubt she would do exactly what she claimed.
Peter crouched down in front of the chest as if he was going to do what she demanded. He then saw a scrap of paper he hadn’t seen before and snatched it. “Run, Catie! Now!”
As Catie scrambled behind him, the woman gave a frustrated scream. “Stop! I warned you!” Her arm suddenly snapped and the knife sailed across the dark attic.
Prepared for that, Peter had grabbed the ghoul out of the other trunk and thrust it over his head as he stayed down. The knife landed in the middle of the green head and stuck. Peter threw the mannequin down and ran after Catie. Already halfway down the stairs, the terrified girl kept going when she saw Peter start to follow her.
“Head back to the graveyard! Hurry!”
The two burst back through the hidden panel in the ballroom and slid the door shut behind them. With the hope the woman in the attic wouldn’t know which way they went, they reentered the graveyard and ran in the opposite direction. Careful not to step on any of the effects or trip over the numerous wires and cables, they looked for one thing: A sign that read Exit.
They saw the welcome red words glowing over to their right. They had to squeeze through the row of Doom Buggies as they headed for the exit. When they pushed through the door, there was a flight of stairs. Another door blocked their way, but this one led them just where they wanted to be. They were now outside the show building on the other side of the berm.
Their eyes blinked rapidly in the bright sunlight of the waning afternoon as they looked in each direction. “Where do we go, Peter? I…I don’t know where we are.”
Peter heard the panic in her voice. “We’re okay, Catie. I know exactly where we are and I know how to get to Dad and Michael. Are you okay to run some more? We have a ways to go.”
Catie put a hand on her chest as if that would stop the pounding of her heart. “I can run. I don’t want to stop running.”
At the pleading look on her face, he pulled her in for a quick hug. He needed one, too. “We’ll be all right. Come on. We have to go this way. See the Monorail track over there? There goes Big Red. I know how to get to New Orleans Square from here.”
Hand in hand, they ran across the wide backside of the show building. There were cars and trucks parked nearby and they passed another door that led into the Mansion building. The familiar sound of the steam train could be heard as it pulled into the Frontierland Station and they knew they were close to their goal.
The Key to Disneyland once again came in handy to get into the next building. When they came out the other side, it turned out to be the façade of one of the buildings behind the train station. With the hope that they wouldn’t attract too much attention, they calmly walked across the track behind the parked train and climbed onto the loading platform.
“Dropped my shoe.” Peter felt he had to mutter some kind of excuse to a guest who stopped to stare at the two kids who shouldn’t have been back there. “’Scuse me.”
They slowly walked the length of the platform to the exit ramp, right next to the Mansion. “Now, just turn right and go to the Blue Bayou. I think we’re in the clear.”
As they cut behind Magnolia Park, resplendent in spring blooms, and then behind the French Market, Catie suddenly froze. “Peter! She…she’s over there looking for us! On the other side of the tables.”
Without even looking, Peter grabbed Catie’s hand and pulled her toward Royal Street and, hopefully, Dad.
Out of the corner of her eye, the woman saw the sudden movement and started to run in the same direction.
“Run, Peter! She saw us!”
They ran as fast as the crowd would let them, dodging aside and muttering, “Sorry,” just about every foot of the way. They turned the corner of Royal Street just as their pursuer arrived at the far end, a triumphant smile on her face when she thought she had them blocked. No matter which way they ran, she could head them off so they couldn’t get to the main part of the Park and disappear into the mass of people.
Peter spotted his dad and Michael standing in front of a push cart as they looked over watercolor drawings of the Mark Twain. “There he is!”
Lance was surprised when he was suddenly engulfed by two winded, white-faced kids. “There you are. Thought we’d have to eat without you. You two okay?”
“Yeah, Dad, we’re fine.” Peter looked around his dad at the woman who never took her eyes off of them. She had edged closer and was now near the entrance of Café Orleans.
Peter could feel the weight of the hidden mermaid inside his backpack. With the assurance that he was safe next to his dad, he gave her a smug smile behind Lance’s back as if he dared her to do something.
Unperturbed, the woman suddenly raised her arm. It satisfied her to see the two kids flinch. It was only a camera and she took a quick picture of Peter and Catie as they peered out from behind Lance. A smug look of her own crossed her face as the camera was dropped into her purse. When she finally turned away and slowly sauntered off, she knew she was still being watched. At the edge of the bridge to Adventureland, she turned back to give a final, sarcastic salute to Peter.
Peter had been positive she would go away once she saw they were under Lance’s protection. Now his heart sank in his chest. He knew this wouldn’t be the last time he saw her.
—THE END—
The story continues with...
A FORGOTTEN TREASURE REVEALS A MISSING PUZZLE PIECE
Going through family mementos in their grandmother’s attic, twins Alex and Catie Michaels, along with Peter Brentwood, stumble on a familiar grey capsule—and pictures of Margaret Michael’s past.
GRANDMA MARGARET WAS A MERMAID?
Thrilled to learn she was a Disneyland Submarine Lagoon Mermaid in 1965, they suddenly connect the missing link to the beautiful mermaid Peter and Catie found in the Haunted Mansion attic.
A MYSTERIOUS WOMAN HAS TO PROVE HERSELF
Given a simple assignment by her boss, Walt Disney, Omah was unable to complete it and sent away in disgrace. Decades later she’s still trying to make it right, but three kids are in the way.
HER DEDICATION TURNS FANATICAL
Disneyland—then and now—is the backdrop of this exciting Mermaid’s Tale. Pieces of the puzzle get closer as three diverse groups are woven together in the past and the present—all of them determined to protect Walt Disney’s legacy.
ALL 3 COLLIDE AS THE MERMAID’S TALE CONTINUES…
Another "E-Ticket" ride through Disney's history.
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About the Author
Nancy Temple Rodrigue
Nancy lives in the small town of Lompoc, California.
Her works show her admiration and respect for the man who started it all–Walt Disney. Her love of all things Disney was shown in her first four Hidden Mickey novels. Now, this new Hidden Mickey Adventures series features more action-adventures starring Wolf and the next generation of clue-solvers.
Hidden Mickey Adventures 1: Peter and the Wolf and this second book, Hidden Mickey Adventures 2: Peter and the Missing Mansion were written for all her readers to enjoy–Adults, Teens & Tweens (9 to 90).
See your favorite Disney Parks in a whole new way with Nancy’s new Hidden Mickey Quests series. Designed to be played inside the Parks, these games and quests take readers on a new exciting journey.
Nancy actively holds book signing and speaking events. Visit www.hiddenmickeybook.com to follow the author’s blog and learn the locations and dates of her book signing events.
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