Midnight Rambler: A Novel of Suspense

I did a three-sixty revolution and looked for places where a person could have taken Shannon without being spotted. I was suspicious about the fact that Shannon wasn't heard during her abduction, until the doors to the “It's a Small World” exhibit opened. Then, five hundred noisy kids and their parents poured out, and I realized that Shannon could have been screaming her head off and not been heard.

“What's your name?” I asked the guard.

“Vernon,” the guard replied. “People call me Vern.”

“Vern, where's the closest restroom?”

“There are several,” he said.

“Do they all have family restrooms?”

“No, only the restroom around the corner has that.”

“Show me,” I said.

Vern led us to a small redbrick building right off the main drag. It had three doors—His, Hers, and Family—and was a perfect place to bring a child to. I banged on the door for Family. Getting no answer, I went inside.

Like everything at Disney, the bathroom's interior was spotlessly clean. In the corner sat a metal trash can, and I dragged it outside onto the grass. Pulling off the top, I rummaged through the smelly diapers and other garbage stuffed inside.

“What you doing?” Tram asked.

“Looking for your daughter's clothes.”

“You think they changed her, huh?”

“Yes, I do.”

Tram started to help. His face was milk white, and he was sucking down air. If I hadn't known better, I would have thought he was having an epiphany and going through a life-altering experience. But more than likely, it was all the beer he'd drunk burning through his system. I held up a child's ripped T-shirt.

“This look familiar?”

Tram squinted at the piece of clothing and shook his head.

“No, that ain't hers.”

We kept searching. Vern was a step ahead of us and pulled trash containers out of the two other lavatories, dumping their contents onto the grass as well. By the time we were done, garbage was strewn everywhere. Vern made a call on his walkie-talkie and told someone to send people to clean up our mess.

“There's another place we should check,” Vern said.

“Lead the way,” I told him.

We followed Vern a hundred feet down a path. He stopped at a trash container designed to look like a Chinese pagoda. Yanking open a metal door, Vern removed an enormous garbage bag and dumped the contents onto the walkway. We started to sift through the pile.

Mostly it contained wrappers with half-eaten food or juice containers. Near the bottom, Tram found a plastic bag with its mouth tied in rabbit ears. Tearing the bag open, he let out a shout. Stuffed inside were a child's pink shorts and matching pink shirt.

“Those are my baby's clothes,” he said tearfully.

“You're sure?” I asked.

“Yes, sir.”

I examined the clothes and found several long red hairs stuck in the fabric of the shirt. Shannon's abductor had given her a haircut.

“Let me see the bag,” I said.

Tram handed me the bag. I turned it upside down, and a metal can fell out. It made a funny sound as it rolled down the pavement.

Tram ran after the can and snatched it off the ground. He tossed it to me, and I grabbed it out of the air and stared at the label. Blue spray paint.

“They must have changed her hair color,” Tram said.

I continued to stare at the label. Blue hair would have made Shannon stand out like a sore thumb. There was another reason for the spray paint, something as devious as the people behind the abduction, only I didn't have a clue what it was.

I found myself thinking of the little girl who'd disappeared at the theme park in Fort Lauderdale. Her abductors had changed her appearance so that even her parents, who'd been standing by the turnstiles as the crowds left, couldn't identify her. Her clothes and a can of blue spray paint were later found in the trash, yet I was never able to make a connection between them.

I have a maxim that has served me well. I always assume that the criminals I'm chasing are as smart as I am, or smarter. It may not always be true, but it keeps me on my toes. Driving toward the Magic Kingdom's main entrance in the golf cart, I suddenly realized what the can of blue spray paint was for.

CHAPTER TWENTY-SEVEN

I jumped out of the cart as it reached the turnstiles. Catching Sally's eye, I held the can of blue spray paint triumphantly over my head. She hurried over to me.

“Please tell me you have some good news,” she said.

“Shannon's abductors have cut her hair, changed her clothes, and also changed the color of her shoes,” I said. “My guess is, they made her look like a little boy.”

Sally took the can of paint out of my hand.

“Is this the new color of her shoes?”

“Yes. Get me some paper.”

Sally went to her golf cart and removed all the paper from a clipboard on the dash. She handed the paper to me, and I sprayed all the sheets with blue paint and waved them in the air to dry. Then Sally and I approached each pair of guards watching a turnstile and handed them one of the sheets.

“Look at the shoes of each child leaving the park,” I instructed them. “If you see this color, grab the kid and yell for us.”