“With bad breath,” Beezel said.
“Oh my gosh!” Mimi said. “We forgot about Wil!” She turned the box around and opened the secret panel, and Wiliken climbed out. “Are you okay?” she asked him.
“I’m fine, but it was hard not to bust out of the box and punch that guy in the nose,” he said.
“You can’t do that,” Beezel said as she handed him the reporter’s card. “That’s just what he wants you to do. Think of how he’d write that story.”
“You’re right.” Wiliken smiled. “But, still, it’s very tempting!” He glanced at the card. “I knew it was Slear. He follows me everywhere. That guy has made me his personal mission. I can’t buy a slice of pizza without that jerk’s face popping up.”
“Do you know who it was that talked to him about your grandfather?” Beezel asked him.
Wiliken nodded. “I know exactly who it was. My grandpa’s second cousin, Edwin.”
Beezel and Mimi exchanged looks. Edwin was the name of the man Gaidic had told them about.
“He’s a real pain,” Wiliken said. “Hoogaboom said he was always dropping in on my grandpa uninvited for weeks at a time. As soon as grandpa died, he was at the front door, bags in hand, waiting to hear the will read. And he’s still here. Hoogaboom says he’s miffed that my grandpa left me the house instead of him.” Wiliken shrugged sadly. “But I didn’t think family did that sort of thing to each other, you know? Sold family stories?”
“They shouldn’t,” Beezel said. In the Trimoni Circus, their family and friends were the most important things they had. She couldn’t imagine doing what Edwin had done.
“Yep, that Edwin guy is as big a jerk as Slear,” Mimi said.
“Mimi!” Beezel said, glancing at Wiliken to see if Mimi had offended him. After all, they were related. But Wiliken just laughed and agreed.
“Hoogaboom will hit the roof when he hears Edwin did this,” Wiliken said. “He’s been worried that Edwin is after our treasure. But at least he’s leaving at the end of the week, and we’ll be rid of him.”
Mimi’s mouth fell open.
“Great sorcerer’s sweat socks!” Beezel said. “You mean to tell me that you think there’s treasure inside your grandpa’s house, too?”
“Of course,” Wiliken said as he dusted off his pants. “Didn’t Hoogaboom tell you we were looking for it? He told me he was going to.”
“He did tell Hector,” Mimi said. “But he said it was all the treasure from a Spanish galleon. And that all of it was hidden inside the house somewhere.”
“And he said that he and your grandpa have been looking for it for twenty years,” Beezel said.
Wiliken grew silent.
“Wil?” Mimi asked. “Are you okay?”
“Huh?” Wiliken said. “Oh, I was just thinking, and Hoogaboom is wrong.”
Beezel’s heart sank. Uncle Hoogaboom was unraveling after all. The treasure was probably just some gold coins tucked away somewhere. Hector was going to be so upset when he found out.
“Yeah, he’s dead wrong,” Wiliken said thoughtfully. “I think it’s been twenty-two years.”
It was the twins’ turn to be silent. Finally, Mimi said the thing that was on Beezel’s mind as well. “But that’s just crazy,” Mimi said. “If there was all the treasure from a galleon inside the house and they had been searching for it all that time, they would have found it.”
“Well, we are getting closer,” Wiliken said cheerily.
Beezel and Mimi looked at each other. Beezel didn’t know what to say. The twins stood motionless next to each other and stared at Wiliken.
“Hey …” Wiliken ran his hands through his hair. “I really enjoyed your show tonight. You guys are amazing.”
Beezel managed a thanks. Did Wiliken actually believe what he was telling them? He seemed to. She didn’t get a chance to ask him, because Hector had returned.
“Coast is clear, Wiliken,” Hector said proudly. “I personally escorted each and every one of those guys out of the hotel. And the security guard is waiting for you in the hall. He’s got a Merlin Hotel car parked by the kitchen door ready to take you back to your house.”
“Thanks, Hector,” Wiliken said. “I’m sorry about all this.”
“Not a problem,” Hector said. “I don’t like their type one bit. It felt good to toss them out.” He smiled and looked at the twins. “What’s the matter with you two?”
“Nothing,” Mimi said. “We’re just thinking.”
“Well,” Wiliken said, “I should get going. Hoogaboom and I still want to do a little treasure hunting before we turn in.”
As they stood and watched Wiliken leave to meet the security guard, Hector said to the girls, “Correct me if I’m wrong, bumblebees, but did Wiliken Riebeeck just say he was going on a treasure hunt?”
“Yep.” Mimi nodded.
“He sure did,” Beezel said.
“Then I guess my poor uncle isn’t the only one unraveling a little bit, is he?” Hector shook his head and herded the girls back to their room.
Chapter Ten
“Beezel, I’ve lost her,” Mimi sobbed as she crawled across the floor the next morning. “Oh, poor, poor Gumdrop!”
“Stop crying, Mimi,” Beezel said as she looked under their bed again for the missing snake. “We’ll find her. It’s not like it’s the first time you’ve misplaced Gumdrop.”
Mimi sniffed and wiped her eyes. “You’re absolutely right, Beez. I just have to be logical about it, like you.” She chewed on her lip. “Let’s see. First, I got Gumdrop from Enid and took her up to our room. Then I fed her some kibble. Then I ka-poofed her into her old self again….” She looked at Beezel. “Because Gumdrop can’t be a dog all day—it makes her grumpy.”
“Then we sat on the bed and looked at the guidebook,” Beezel said. “And I took a shower.”
“And then I went into Hector’s room to ask if we could see Rembrandt’s house this week …” Mimi froze.
The twins slowly stood up and stared across the bed to the door that separated their room from Hector’s. It was wide open.
“MIMI!” The twins flinched as they heard Hector scream her name.
“Guess I’d better go explain,” Mimi said in a small voice.
Beezel sighed. “I’ll come with you.”
Hector didn’t wait until the twins were actually inside his room to begin yelling at them.
“You’ve actually smuggled a boa constrictor into the Merlin Hotel! In Amsterdam!” he shouted. “Of all the idiotic animal muddles you’ve cooked up, this one takes the cake!” He pointed to the big snake on the floor. “There are times when I think Gumdrop has more common sense!”
Hector ranted for a few more minutes, but when he saw tears welling up in Mimi’s eyes, he caved. “Oh, don’t cry, duck,” he told her. “We’ll figure something out.”
“I already did, Hector.” Mimi blew her nose on the tissue Beezel handed her and proceeded to tell Hector all about Operation GAAD. “And Enid, the prop manager, takes care of her. She’ll even take her for a walk if we want her to. I’ll pay for everything with my allowance.”
Hector rubbed his hands over his face, then stared down at the boa curled up at his feet. “Gumdrop. This is just what I needed. Well, it can’t be helped. You get her downstairs now … as a dog” He shook his finger at Mimi. “And you leave her downstairs as a dog. Let the prop manager take care of her. I’ll work out the details with her.”
“Thank you, Hector.” Mimi jumped up and kissed his cheek.
Beezel shook her head. She knew Mimi couldn’t go two hours without checking on her snake. There was simply no way she would leave the big boa alone for several days.
That afternoon, Hector took the girls to the Van Gogh Museum. Beezel thought he did it because he was feeling a little guilty over his reaction to Gumdrop.
Mimi was thrilled to see the paintings of one of her favorite artists, Vincent Van Gogh. So thrilled that she spent the entire way back to the hotel makin
g plans for her own art career.
“It’s going to be so great, Beezel,” Mimi said. “I’ll have a studio, and I’ll paint all day and all night. I’ll be poor at first, and miserable. But then, someone will discover me, and I’ll be fantastically rich! And Gumdrop and I will come visit you!” She twirled her hair thoughtfully. “Of course, it would be good to combine our visits with an art opening, wouldn’t it?”
Beezel nodded.
“You’re awfully quiet, duck,” Hector said to her. “Are you feeling all right?”
“I’m fine,” Beezel said. She wasn’t sick; she just was remembering all the times she and her sister had practiced their magic act together. Performing magic with Mimi always made her happy.
It was no different that night. The show went well and Beezel felt on top of the world. Mr. Hendricks, the petting zoo man, finally found the hotel and brought two very docile sheep for the twins to use in their finale. Beezel was extremely thankful they did not have to use Gumdrop. And as she gazed out into the audience, she realized Hector wouldn’t have been available either. He was sitting in the front row with Gaidic.
“He must have called her sometime today,” she said to Mimi while they were taking their bows.
Once they were back in their rooms, Hector told them that he and Gaidic wanted to take the twins and Wiliken sightseeing the next day.
“Uncle Hoogaboom wants to come along as well. But if you want to go, you have to finish the first draft of the essay I assigned to you,” Hector said, hands on his hips.
“Not ‘How the Euro Is Different from the U.S. Dollar’!” Mimi moaned.
“I’ll be back to check them in thirty minutes.” He went back to his room.
Beezel and Mimi quickly wrote down everything they could think of about currency. Then they brushed their teeth and got into bed.
Hector came back in and reviewed the girls’ work. Then he said, “By the way, Uncle Hoogaboom said he wants Wiliken and me to talk privately with him soon.” He raised his eyebrows as he looked at the girls. “I have no idea what this is about, but the next time we’re over for a visit, if you girls could help Gaidic in the shop, I’ll find out.”
Hector pulled the covers up over the twins and frowned. “But why in the world would my uncle want to talk to me and Wiliken together? I just met Wiliken.” He sighed. “You don’t suppose the two of them want to get me involved in their crazy treasure hunt, do you?”
Beezel didn’t say anything, but she had a feeling that was exactly what they wanted.
When the twins woke up on Sunday, it was a glorious, sunny spring day.
“We don’t have a show tonight!” Mimi said as she bounced on the bed.
“Mimi!” Beezel said. “Stop it! I’m getting seasick!”
After breakfast, Hector, Beezel and Mimi took Gumdrop the dog for a quick walk before depositing her back with Enid. Uncle Hoogaboom, Wiliken and Gaidic appeared in the lobby of the Merlin Hotel at ten o’clock sharp, and they set out for the day.
At Mimi’s request, they went to see modern works of art at the Stedelijk Museum in the morning. They ate a quick lunch, and per Beezel’s request, went on a canal boat tour in the afternoon.
Afterward they went for a walk down the Prinsengracht, the Prince’s Canal.
“I wanted you to see my neighborhood,” Uncle Hoogaboom told the girls. “It is a very special place.”
“I love it here,” Beezel told him.
“It sure feels different from back home, doesn’t it, Beezel?” Wiliken asked, and she agreed.
Uncle Hoogaboom explained that the canal dated back to the seventeenth century and that the beautiful homes that lined it were part of what was once the Golden Age of Amsterdam.
They strolled lazily along, and spent the afternoon popping in and out of the shops. When they passed a street named the Tuinstraat, Uncle Hoogaboom herded them into a little café for dinner followed by appelgebak, a delicious apple pastry. A few more houses down the street was Uncle Hoogaboom’s shop on the ground floor of Wiliken’s grandfather’s house.
“There’s one more place I want to show you.” They walked past Uncle Hoogaboom and Wiliken’s house to a wide street called the Westerstraat and then across to an old market square, called the Noordermarkt.
“There’s a flea market here tomorrow,” he told them. “You girls would love it. Hector, maybe you can bring them back here to do some more shopping?”
“Yes!” Beezel and Mimi said together.
Hector laughed. “All right.”
Then Uncle Hoogaboom showed them the Noorderkerk, the North Church. Outside in the square, Beezel and Mimi fed bread crumbs to some birds and watched the sun beginning to set.
Beezel nudged Mimi and pointed to Hector. He and Gaidic were holding hands. The twins looked at each other and tried hard not to giggle.
“Should we head back?” Uncle Hoogaboom asked them after awhile. They all agreed that they were getting tired. Gaidic said good-bye and left for her bus stop.
“Uh-oh,” Wiliken said as a black car drove in front of the square and slowed down.
Beezel saw a familiar round-bodied man with frizzy orange hair inside the car. “Isn’t that Slear?”
“Great,” Wiliken said. “Listen, I’m going to lose this guy and then I’ll catch up with you, okay?”
“That’s fine,” Uncle Hoogaboom said as he pointed right, in the direction of their house. “We’ll head home the long way, across the Violettenstraat. You should go left, Wiliken. Head up the Boomstraat and cut over. We’ll meet back at the house.”
Wiliken rejoined their group after several blocks of outmaneuvering Slear. “That guy just doesn’t give up,” he said, panting.
“We’re almost home,” Uncle Hoogaboom said. “Just a few more blocks. If that Mr. Slear sets foot inside our home, I’m calling de politie!”
“That’s the police,” Hector whispered to the girls.
They walked quietly along the Violettenstraat together. The street was almost empty. Beezel looked at the houses and imagined each one had a family enjoying a cozy dinner inside. The thought made her homesick, and she wondered how her parents were doing in Katmandu.
The sound of a car screeching around the corner broke into her thoughts and got all of their attention.
“He should slow down,” Wiliken said. “What a jerk.”
“Oh no! Look!” Mimi pointed to a scruffy dog that had decided at that moment to pad across the street to greet them.
“Go back, doggie!” Mimi said softly.
The black car raced down the street toward them, and toward the dog that seemed oblivious to the approaching danger. The dog ambled halfway across the street and sat down to scratch himself, smack dab in the path of the oncoming car.
Mimi raised her hand and pointed at the dog.
Oddly, at the same time, Uncle Hoogaboom raised his hand and pointed at the car.
Ka-poof! The dog was a clam.
Zuuft! The black car shrank to the size of a sandwich.
The pint-size car bumped into the clam and sent it spinning in circles, inches away from its bumper.
Mimi turned and stared wide-eyed at her sister. “Beezel! How in the heck did you do that?”
Beezel looked at Mimi. “Me? I didn’t do anything!”
The girls turned and stared at Uncle Hoogaboom.
He smiled sheepishly at them and said, “I’m afraid that was me.”
Chapter Eleven
“You have the Shrinking Coin,” Beezel proclaimed immediately. “I just know it.”
“Yes,” Uncle Hoogaboom confessed. “I do.” He broke into a grin. “I call the magic zuufting. It makes that sound, don’t you think?”
“We call ours ka-poofing for the same reason!” Mimi said. “Does the magic work like ours?” Without waiting for an answer she said, “Isn’t this great, Beezel?”
Beezel nodded happily. It was great. She wasn’t sure why it made her happy, but it did. It was good to know that the magic had stayed
alive in two of the three coins. And somehow, knowing Uncle Hoogaboom had been given the same responsibility as the two of them made Beezel feel less alone. As if they had found a comrade of sorts.
“Uh, Hoogaboom,” Wiliken said as he pointed to Mimi, “what did Mimi just do to that dog?”
“I do believe you’ve just witnessed the magic of the Changing Coin!” Uncle Hoogaboom said happily.
“You know about the Changing Coin?” Mimi said.
Uncle Hoogaboom nodded.
Beezel thought he seemed very pleased about things. She was just about to ask him how he knew about the Changing Coin when she thought of something. Wiliken hadn’t reacted at all to Uncle Hoogaboom shrinking the black car. She turned to him. “You already knew about the Shrinking Coin, Wiliken?”
“Yep.” Hector, Beezel and Mimi gawked at him. Wiliken laughed. “You should see your faces!”
“Well, well, we do have a lot to talk about, don’t we?” Uncle Hoogaboom said as he gestured toward the center of the road. “But first… Hector, perhaps you could get them out of the middle of the street. It’s getting dark, and we don’t want them to get run over.”
Hector looked back and forth, and then ran to retrieve the clam and the car.
“Well, I’ll be …,” Hector said as he handed Mimi the clam and examined the outside of the tiny car. “My own uncle has had the Shrinking Coin all these years and …”
“Let me take care of this first, nephew, and then we’ll chat,” Uncle Hoogaboom said quietly. “In my experience I’ve found that if I un-zuuft someone fairly quickly, they are easily led to believe they’ve had a small accident of some kind, and as a result experienced a momentary loss of consciousness.”
Uncle Hoogaboom set the car down by the curb near a streetlight. “But I don’t see the driver, do you?”
They knelt next to the little car and peered inside.
“Oh, I see him,” Mimi said as she put her face against the back windshield. “There he is. He’s hiding on the floor in the backseat.”
The sight of a giant Mimi staring at him caused the tiny man to scramble back into the front seat.
“Hey, he looks kind of familiar,” Mimi said.
The Trimoni Twins and the Shrunken Treasure Page 5
