Two Hot Dogs With Everything by Paul Haven

Author:Paul Haven [Haven, Paul]
Language: eng
Format: epub
ISBN: 978-0-307-49844-1
Publisher: Random House Children's Books
Published: 2008-12-24T05:00:00+00:00

The Snowed-Out Summer of 1934

By the time Seymour Sycamore moved into the Boddle-brooks mansion in the summer of 1934, the place had been home to three previous caretakers, men hired by Skidmore to keep an eye on the rambling estate but who had little enthusiasm for its unusual charm.

All ended up leaving in a huff, unable to cope with the mountain of rules that Manchester had laid out in his will. No going into the study. No cleaning up the popped popcorn kernels. No flying the hot-air balloon in the backyard.

Fear that the Curse of the Poisoned Pretzel might rub off on them was enough to keep the caretakers in line. But the final man couldn't resist breaking the last rule, untying the enormous bubble-shaped balloon in the dead of night and taking it out for a joyride. He floated up over West Bubble, waking the surprised residents with a terrifying laugh, then soared out over Ball Four Sound and finally drifted into the moonlit night over the Atlantic Ocean, never to be heard from again.

It had been hard to find a replacement after that, and the house lay empty for many months before Seymour Sycamore knocked on Skidmore's door.

Skidmore didn't like the new man, but he had to admit he was taking good care of the place, and just in time too.

After decades of ineptitude, the Sluggers were suddenly playing well again. All the excitement surrounding the team's sudden rise in fortune might even make it easier to sell the ugly mansion, Skidmore thought. He might get a good price for it.

On a brilliant August morning, Skidmore's mustard yellow Rolls-Royce again pulled up outside the mansion's enormous front door. Behind him in a smaller mustard yellow car were three lawyers, two real estate agents, and the first-ever prospective buyer of the fifty-two-bedroom mansion, a chain-smoking young businessman named Erckle C. Windhammer.

The group brushed past Seymour Sycamore when he opened the hot-dog doors and immediately began sizing up the place, taking measurements of the walls, stomping on the floor to make sure it was solid, flicking the lights on and off.

“You're absolutely right, Mr. Boddlebrooks,” the businessman said once they reached the grand ballroom. “It really is hideous. It'll be perfect.”

“I know, I know,” Skidmore chuckled. “It's a match made in heaven.”

Erckle C. Windhammer was just twenty-three years old, but he had already made a fortune investing in roller coasters. He was looking for a gimmicky site to put up the world's biggest theme park, and he figured no place would be more gimmicky than Manchester Boddlebrooks's enormous bubble-gum estate.

Mr. Windhammer envisioned a mile-long roller coaster in the backyard, which he had tentatively decided to name the Monster of Manchester, and a parachute ride he was thinking of calling the Big Bad Bubble Plunge, which would be so tall it would feel like jumping out of an airplane.

The only problem was the mansion itself.

“I hope you don't mind, but I'll probably need to knock most of the building down,” said Mr.

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