Later that afternoon, we headed for the shoot. Natasha was with us. Dana said it was all right for her to come, too, as long as she kept the commercial a secret. I hoped Natasha would be able to keep her mouth shut for once!
We hurried out of the lodge. Dana was walking into the woods--toward the spot where we saw the monster! We ran across the snow and ducked into the woods. Ahead of us, we could hear Dana’s footsteps crunching on the snow and ice. Crunch, crunch, crunch. Dana marched quickly along the path. “She’s not out for a stroll, that’s for sure,” I whispered. “She’s walking too fast.
Maybe Animal Magnetism is an animal talent agency. Wally the polar bear could be one of their animal actors.” “Right! So…” I frowned. “What does it mean?” Ashley sighed. “I still don’t have a clue!” Just then, Dana Hartwick walked past our table. She hurried toward the front door. Ashley and I jumped up and followed her. Solve the case first, I thought. Eat later!
Aaahhh!” Ashley and I both screamed. “Unnngghh!” the creature grunted. Its huge, weirdly-shaped head bobbed up and down. “Unnngghhh!” “Go!” I spun around and grabbed Ashley’s arm. “Go!” We raced back down the path and burst out of the woods. We didn’t stop running until we were inside the lodge. “What was that?” Ashley gasped. “It looked like a…” “Like a monster!” I said. “Exactly!” Ashley was shaking. I couldn’t believe it. Was Natasha actually right? Was there really a Big Scare Mountain Monster? Did the monster wreck the kitchen and the snowmen? I didn’t know what to think. All I did know was that I planned to spend the rest of the evening in our nice, safe, cozy room!
What’s taking so long?” I cried. “Why doesn’t somebody tell the lift worker that it’s stuck?” “Maybe no one knows,” Ashley said. “We’re the only ones on the lift.” Oh, no! I thought. “Plus, the snow is so thick, I bet no one can see us!” Ashley added. “Stop being so logical!” I told her. “We have to do something!” “Like what?” “Like scream for help!” I leaned over the side of the chair. “Help!” I shouted. “We’re trapped on the lift! Somebody help!
I suddenly felt a strong jerk. At first I thought it was the wind blowing our chair. But then I realized--we weren’t moving. “What’s going on?” I asked nervously. We weren’t at the top of the slope yet. “Why did we stop?” “Don’t worry,” Ashley said. “I’m sure we’ll move again in a few seconds.” A few seconds passed. We didn’t move. My teeth chattered. My nose felt like a blob of ice. A few more seconds went by. A minute. Two minutes. Three…four. The lift still didn’t move. “Ummm, Ashley?” I said, trying to keep my voice steady. “Are you thinking what I’m thinking?” “I don’t know.” Ashley sounded worried. “What are you thinking?” I gulped. “I’m thinking--we’re stuck up here!
I feel kind of bad for him,” I said. “All he wants is to be left alone. I wish we could help him somehow.” I sighed. “But we do have to check out his story.” “I don’t know how we can check out whether he was at Rainbow Lake,” Ashley said. “Who would we ask--the fish?
She went straight to the dining room for breakfast.” The clerk shrugged. “Of course, that was the morning we found the kitchen torn part, so she was out of luck.” We thanked the clerk and moved away from the desk. “That means she couldn’t have wrecked the kitchen,” Ashley said to me. “She didn’t get here in time.” “I know. I guess we can cross her off our list of suspects.” I sighed. “It’s too bad--she seems so suspicious!
Are you saying there’s a fourth suspect?” I asked. “Someone we don’t even know about?” Ashley doodled on the top of her note page. “It doesn’t make sense.” “Great-Grandma Olive would say that’s why it’s a mystery,” I pointed out.
We walked through the lobby toward the dining room. “Look out!” Ashley cried. The three of us jumped aside as a woman came rushing through the dining room doors. She wore a long white fur coat and dark glasses. She didn’t even see us. She was too busy muttering into a cell phone. “I wonder what her hurry is,” I said. “I think she’s a spy,” Natasha said. “Spies always wear fur coats.” I rolled my eyes at Ashley.
Ashley and I glanced at each other. We saw Tony King at a concert last summer. We got his autograph, too, so we stood close to him. No way was that man Tony King, even without the beard! Boy, Natasha had a wild imagination. Last night, she told us that another man was an escaped prisoner. She’d seen his picture on the TV show Criminals on the Loose. Later, Ashley and I found out the man was the assistant manager of the lodge.
