“I had to climb up on Uncle Hoogaboom’s display table to get you. And it’s a good thing I figured out that the roof of this house swings up,” Mimi said as she lowered it back into place. “Look what else I found out.” She pulled on the front right edge of the house. The entire front of the house pulled away as a hinged door, revealing the interior rooms.
“Well, I’ll be Mandrake’s monkey!” Beezel said. “I wish I’d known about that before you ka-poofed me.” She was amazed at the craftsmanship. When the hinged door on the front of the dollhouse was closed, you could hardly tell it was there.
“Oops, I’d better fix the kitty.” Mimi inspected the snail she held in her other hand. “She must have crept in while I was looking down the hall.” Mimi looked at Beezel accusingly. “But you’re the one who left the doors to the dollhouse open.”
Beezel thought about reminding her sister that she was a mouse when she had gone through the front doors of the dollhouse, but she decided it wasn’t worth the effort.
“So if I hadn’t heard her little bell, she would have gotten you for sure.” Mimi gave a self-satisfied smile. “I ka-poofed her in midleap.”
“Thanks.” Beezel watched as Mimi set the snail down on the floor and ka-poofed it back into a cat. Now that she was her normal self again, Uncle Hoogaboom’s cat appeared to be a rather small and highly confused house cat, instead of the fierce monster Beezel had just faced.
“Well? Did you see the little person? Was he dressed in green and wearing a pointed hat?” Mimi teased as she reached down and scratched the cat’s ears.
“No, all I saw was that … creature” Beezel brushed her hair back with both hands. She was still out of breath from running away from that darn cat. How Mimi could be so chummy with something that had been seconds away from eating her own sister was beyond her.
After they had admired the rest of Uncle Hoogaboom’s dollhouses, they walked back to the detail room. Beezel opened the door. She saw Hector standing stock-still just inside.
He must have finished having tea with his uncle, she thought to herself. But what in the world is wrong with him?
Chapter Four
“What’s up, Hector?” Mimi asked.
Beezel looked at him. They were almost the same height. The twins, having grown over the last year, were now just an inch or so taller than their tutor. One lock of Hector’s thick white hair fell across his eyes. She reached over and brushed it aside. She waved her hand in front of his face.
“Hector? You okay?”
“Huh?” Hector seemed dazed.
The twins eyed each other and shrugged.
Beezel turned and followed his gaze. About twenty feet away, in the far corner of the room, a woman was talking to a man. Nothing astounding about that. But she knew what had stopped Hector dead in his tracks.
The woman looked exactly like him. Well, it’s not that she looks like him so much, Beezel corrected herself. It’s that she’s small like he is. The two actually were quite different from each other. Hector had brilliant white hair, even though he was only in his midforties. But his most interesting feature was his eyes. They were a pale pink. Beezel had always thought they were lovely.
The woman Hector was staring at was even shorter than he was, with curly brown hair that fell to her shoulders. She seemed to be about Hector’s age, or maybe a little younger.
She was talking to an older man, tall with dark hair, graying at the temples. The man leaned over her as he spoke, as if he were questioning her about something. Beezel couldn’t make out what they were talking about, and it wouldn’t have mattered anyway, because they were speaking in Dutch.
The small woman shook her head, turned away from him with an irritated expression and began to stock a shelf.
The tall man pushed passed them and into the hallway that led to Uncle Hoogaboom’s apartment and went up the stairs without a word.
Mimi nudged Hector. “Let’s get closer to her,” she whispered.
Beezel grabbed Hector’s frozen arm and pulled him toward the woman.
“Stop,” Hector whispered in protest. “What do I say to her?”
“Say hello,” Beezel whispered. “Say good afternoon.”
Mimi sauntered over to the woman and inspected the items on the shelf she was stocking.
The woman glanced up and smiled at Mimi. “Goedemiddag.”
Beezel thought she had a nice face. Her nose was slightly turned up at the end, and she had a smattering of freckles across her cheeks. Her smile was genuine, and her hazel eyes were warm and friendly.
“Excuse me,” Mimi said. “Do you speak English?”
“Yes,” she said. “Can I help you?”
“Do you work here?” Mimi asked.
“Yes,” she said. “I’m Mr. Hoogaboom’s assistant. I run the shop for him. So if there is something particular you are interested in, just let me know. My name is Gaidic.”
“I’m Beezel.” Beezel shook Gaidic’s hand.
“And I’m Mimi,” Mimi said. “And um, well, I thought you should know, there’s a cat in the dollhouse room.”
“Oh, that’s Fieffie, Mr. Hoogaboom’s cat,” Gaidic said. “He had a hard time finding such a tiny cat. We needed one that was light on her feet and could move around the details in the shop without damaging anything. The mice nibble the furniture. Our little Fieffie hunts the mice for us.”
“No kidding,” Beezel muttered to herself.
Mimi picked up a strand of her hair from the side of her face and twirled it. “Urn, this is my good friend Hector.” She pointed to the frozen Hector standing behind Beezel. “He’s Uncle Hoogaboom’s nephew. He wants to meet you.”
Beezel winced. Subtlety was not Mimi’s specialty.
The woman looked behind Beezel to Hector, and a surprised smile lit up her face.
“Well, hallo!” She put out her hand and Hector shook it. “It’s nice to see a kindred spirit. I’m Gaidic.”
“I’m … I’m … Hector,” he said. Gaidic and Hector chatted briefly in Dutch, but then Hector put up his hand like a stop sign. “I’m afraid I’m a slow translator,” he said.
“And I’m being rude to leave out these girls,” Gaidic said, smiling at the twins. “I was saying how very nice it is for your uncle to have family come.” Gaidic glanced toward the door that led to Uncle Hoogaboom’s apartment. “I’ve worked for your uncle for five years now.” She looked at each of them, as if trying to decide if she should or should not say something. “And I think Mathias … needs you here now.”
“Needs me?” Hector asked.
“Yes,” Gaidic said, “for a couple of reasons. That man who was just in here? He’s been pestering your poor uncle for days. Maybe he’ll leave him alone now that you’re here.”
“Is he one of Uncle Hoogaboom’s friends?” asked Beezel.
“Edwin? Goodness, no,” Gaidic said. “He’s a cousin of Pieter’s. Do you know about Pieter? Mathias’s best friend who died?”
“He just now told me about him,” Hector said.
“He was a nice man.” Gaidic looked out the window and then turned her attention back to them. “Edwin came to visit not long after Pieter died. He’s been staying upstairs.” She pointed to the ceiling. “I think he was hoping to inherit something … I don’t know. It’s always questions, questions … and too much nosing about with him. It’s not my business, I’m sure, it’s just that I’m very fond of Mathias.”
“I’ll keep an eye on him while I’m here,” Hector reassured her.
“And perhaps, the other thing … I shouldn’t be telling you,” Gaidic said. Her cheeks reddened slightly. “But I’ve been worried about Mathias.”
“Why?” asked Beezel.
“He’s been talking to himself more and more,” Gaidic whispered.
Hector laughed nervously. “Don’t worry. He’s always done that.”
“I know, I know.” Gaidic leaned in conspiratorially. “But now he’s acting like someone is answering him.” She touche
d her forefinger to the side of her head and tapped it once. “I just wanted you to know this … how do you Americans say it? Giving a heads-up?”
While Hector assured Gaidic that Uncle Hoogaboom had always been eccentric, Beezel and Mimi wandered around the room and looked at the dollhouse details.
“Look at him,” Mimi whispered. “I think he’s in love.”
“Hmm?” Beezel was thinking about what Gaidic had told them. Talking to yourself was no big deal, but answering someone who wasn’t there sure could be. She glanced at Gaidic and Hector. “She looks very nice. I hope she likes him.”
After a few minutes, Hector beckoned to the girls to come over.
“I forgot to ask, did you get to see inside Mathias’s dollhouses?” Gaidic asked them. “Did you know they open up?”
“They’re amazing,” Beezel said.
“Beezel thought she saw a leprechaun,” Mimi added.
Beezel felt her cheeks get hot. “I didn’t say it was a leprechaun.”
“Oh, it’s not a leprechaun,” Gaidic said with a twinkle in her eye. “They live in Ireland. Here in Holland we have little people called kabouters.” She smiled at Beezel. “But not to worry, they’re friendly. Many people who come to see these models have said they too have seen a kabouter. Me, I think he likes living where everything …” She paused for a moment before continuing. “Where everything is the right size for him.”
Gaidic elbowed Hector in the arm and whispered, “Perhaps this is who your uncle has been talking to, eh?”
Hector laughed. “I wouldn’t put it past him.” “Have you ever seen a kabouter?” Beezel asked her.
Gaidic nodded. “One night, when I was locking up, I thought I saw a tiny man running through the models.” She laughed. “You want to know what else I thought I saw?”
“Yes,” the twins said together.
“I thought I saw him carrying a flashlight!”
Hector, Gaidic and Mimi laughed and carried on for a while about a tiny man needing a tiny flashlight after dark, but Beezel’s mind was somewhere else. She was remembering the tiny man who had run up the stairs of the dollhouse.
Was it really a kabouter? she thought to herself. Because I know I saw something.
Chapter Five
“Move over, I can’t see out the window!” Mimi shoved against her twin.
Hector had called a cab from Hoogaboom’s shop. “After this,” he said, “we’ll use the buses and trams. It’ll save money.” Once they had piled their luggage in the trunk, they were on their way to their hotel.
It was late afternoon and the busy streets were full of people, many on bicycles, heading home after a day’s work.
“There it is!” Mimi slid across the seat to the other window, pinning Hector against the taxi door.
Beezel leaned across the seat to see. She let out a long whistle. “Walloping wizard whiskers,” she said. “The Merlin Hotel.” She grabbed Mimi’s arm. “And we’re going to perform our magic act there!”
The girls squealed and then began to bounce up and down on the taxi seat.
“Listen, ducks,” Hector said. “Can we sit still for a few more minutes? I have a lot on my mind.”
“Sorry, Hector,” Mimi said.
As the taxi drew nearer to the hotel, Hector reminded the twins for the tenth time that day that even though they were in Amsterdam, and even though they had never set one big toe outside the United States in all their eleven years of life, they would still have to study and do homework.
Beezel knew Hector was trying his best to take over for Mr. Whaffle, the girls’ previous tutor.
“Sure, Hector, sure,” Mimi said, patting Hector’s shoulder. She pointed at the front of the hotel. “Look at the flags, Beezel!”
“Come along now,” Hector said as he got out of the taxi. The girls followed him into a grand hotel lobby with marble floors and cut crystal chandeliers.
“Professor Finkleroy can decorate my house anytime,” Mimi said as they stepped inside their hotel room. A lush ruby red bedspread was on the bed. Gold and red brocade curtains hung at the window.
“You don’t have a house,” Beezel reminded her. The girls lived in a trailer with their parents, the owners of the Trimoni Circus.
“I will when I’m a famous artist,” Mimi said as she whirled around the room and fell across the double bed on her back. “If you’re nice to me, I’ll let you come visit.”
“And if you’re nice to me,” Beezel said as she heaved their suitcases onto the luggage rack in the closet, “I’ll stop by on my world tour.”
Hector opened the door that connected the two suites. “Well, I’ll be,” he said. His room was just as opulent, done in shades of blue and gold, with a big four-poster bed covered in a satin bedspread.
“Your bed is huge!” Mimi hopped up from their bed, ran across their room, took a running leap and jumped on Hector’s.
“I’ll get lost in that.” Hector smiled and set his suitcase down. “Now you girls get cleaned up. We’ll have dinner with Uncle Hoogaboom and turn in early. Tomorrow is a big day. You’ll have to rehearse for your show and get used to the stage.”
Back in their room, Mimi and Beezel unpacked. Ten days. Right now it seemed like forever to Beezel. But she knew it would go by quickly.
“Tomorrow I want to go sightseeing,” she told Mimi. “I hope Hector will take us.”
“Me, too,” Mimi said. “We don’t need to practice much for our show, do we?”
“Well,” Beezel said. “Not too much. Just so we’ll know where everything is. And we have to make sure all our props got here. And the animals we hired.”
“Oh, that reminds me.” Mimi reached inside her backpack and took out a small plastic container. Beezel noticed it had tiny holes punched in the lid.
Mimi popped off the lid and poured the contents into her palm. “There you are, sweetie,” she said to the ladybug that crawled across her hand. She carefully set the bug on the carpet.
“Mimi,” Beezel said. “Exactly what are you doing?”
“Nothing.” Mimi pointed at the little bug on the floor. Ka-poof. A five-foot-long boa constrictor appeared in its place.
“Great suffering sawdust! Not Gumdrop!” Beezel moaned. Gumdrop was Mimi’s favorite pet. She took the snake with her everywhere. Beezel wasn’t going to tell Mimi, because it would hurt her feelings, but she had been looking forward to some time without the big snake. The care and feeding of boa constrictors was something Beezel could live without. She shook her finger at her sister. “Mom said you couldn’t take a snake on an airplane.”
“Well…” Mimi smiled mischievously. “I didn’t take a snake on the plane, now, did I?” She reached down and picked up Gumdrop. “Besides, I couldn’t leave her at home.” She petted the boa on her head.
“Oh, heavens no,” Beezel muttered as she put her clothes in the dresser. “And exactly how do you plan on keeping a snake in a five-star hotel? You’ll give the maid a heart attack and we’ll get kicked out.”
“I’ve figured it all out, smarty.”
“Well, all I can say is you’d better not let Hector see her.” Beezel zipped her empty suitcase shut and shoved it to the back of the closet. “Because he’ll box her up and ship her home.”
“Hector won’t see her.” Mimi set the snake on the corner of their bed. “I’ll just ka-poof her into something more …” She struggled for the right word. “More manageable when he comes in.”
Beezel tilted her head to listen at their shared door. “Then you’d better ka-poof her right now,” she whispered, “because I think I hear Hector coming.”
Mimi pointed at the snake. Ka-poof. Gumdrop was a ladybug again just in time, because Hector tapped once on the door and opened it. Mimi nervously eyed the ladybug as it edged along the bedspread toward the corner of the bed.
“Listen, ducks,” Hector said as he entered the room. “I’ve been thinking. Before we go out, I need to talk to you about my uncle.”
Beezel look
ed at his face. He seemed worried about something.
“Is he okay?” she asked. “Did something happen?”
“No, no,” Hector said. “But I had the strangest conversation while we were in his apartment today. My uncle talked to me about Pieter, his good friend that Gaidic mentioned, the one who died a few months ago. Pieter owned the building that Uncle Hoogaboom lives in. He lived on the second floor, above Uncle Hoogaboom. They spent a lot of time building models together in Uncle Hoogaboom’s studio, he told me.”
Hector coughed. “But here’s the thing. Uncle Mathias said they were on a treasure hunt.” Hector ran his hand over his face. “And this is the weird part.” He stared at the twins. “He said it’s the treasure from some Spanish galleon. And he said that all the treasure from that ship is still hidden somewhere in Pieter’s house. In the very house my uncle lives in.”
“Well, maybe it is,” Mimi said. “Maybe it’s in an old chest up in the attic or something.”
“It is possible, Hector,” Beezel said. “Isn’t it?”
“Wait, it gets worse,” Hector said sadly. “He said he and Pieter had been looking for the treasure for twenty years.”
“Twenty years?” Mimi said. “Heck, they should have found something by now! A gold coin at least.”
“That is a long time,” Beezel agreed.
Hector sighed. “I’m wondering if having his best friend die hasn’t been too great a blow. Maybe it’s confused things in his head. So tonight, if Uncle Hoogaboom starts prattling on about treasure, just humor him and change the subject.” He nodded and smiled at the girls. “Well, enough of that. Let me see you two.”
Hector leaned against the bed and eyed the twins from head to toe. “Aren’t you going to change for dinner?”
Beezel nodded as she tried hard not to stare at the bed. Where was Gumdrop? Hector was almost sitting on the corner of their bed.
Mimi’s eyes widened as they darted back and forth from Hector to the bedspread.
“Well,” Hector said, “let’s get a move on. I’m starving. My uncle said he is taking us to a nice café right around the corner.” He pushed off the mattress and stood up. “I’ll meet you girls down in the lobby.”
The Trimoni Twins and the Shrunken Treasure Page 2
