The Mystery on Lost Lagoon

By Rita Monette

Legend has it… if you go onto Lost Lagoon, you never return.

Nikki Landry and her friends are off on a quest to track down the prehistoric-looking bird that’s been flying around a nearby swamp island. However, their plans get sidetracked when they meet a stranger in their small town who seems to have

• Language: English
• Publisher: Mirror World Publishing
• Release date: Nov 17, 2017
• ISBN: 9781987976366

Rita Monette

Rita Monette was born and raised in Southwest Louisiana. After retiring from her "real" job as an administrative assistant for the State of Michigan, Rita began doing what she always wanted to do...write and draw. Her stories are set in the beautiful, yet mysterious, bayous and swamps of her home state. The Mystery on Lost Lagoon is the fourth book in her Nikki Landry Swamp Legend series, which is based on her childhood. Rita now lives with her husband, four lap dogs, and one lap cat, in the mountains of Tennessee.

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The Mystery on Lost Lagoon

Rita Monette

E-BOOK EDITION

The Mystery on Lost Lagoon © 2017 by Mirror World Publishing and Rita Monette

Edited by: Robert Dowsett

Cover by: Justine Alley Dowsett

Published by Mirror World Publishing November, 2017

All Rights Reserved.

*This book is a work of fiction. All of the characters, organizations and events portrayed in this novel are either products of the authors’ imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual locales, events or persons is entirely coincidental.

Mirror World Publishing

Windsor, Ontario

www.mirrorworldpublishing.com

[e-mail]

ISBN: 978-1-987976-36-6

To:

Darlene, Timmy, and Sonny

Love you with all my heart.

A special dedication to Brother Bob Carpenter, who made sure all the levee children knew about Jesus.

Cajun French Words and Terms

In Cajun country, folks talk a little funny. Here are some Cajun words and expressions used in this story:

Cooyon - Real spelling is Couillon, but pronounced Coo-yon – crazy, foolish, idiot

Je suis impressionne' - I’m impressed

Mon dieu! - My God!

Ouais -Yes

Pirogue - A small boat, pointed at each end, designed to traverse the stumpy bayous

Poo-Yai - A Cajun expression to which there is no official definition. Used like: Oh my!, My Goodness!, or Lordy Mercy!

Rougarou - Werewolf, said to be living in the bayous of Louisiana

Tite’ fille - Little Girl

Tracas - Trouble or worry

Chapter 1 - Fixing Up the Club House

August. 2, 1957

Dear Diary,

Legend has it if you go into Lost Lagoon, you never return. But I did.

Nikki Landry

The August air was steamier than a pot of boiled crawfish. Tiny bugs danced like fairies on the gumbo-colored bayou. Cypress trees on a nearby swamp island dipped their moss-draped branches into the still water, trying to stay cool. I had been sitting in my new tree house for days, trying to catch a cool breeze and pondering on how to turn a plain old fort into an official club house, when I decided what it needed most of all was furniture. My friend Spikes had come over to help me build some. He was pretty good with tools.

I saw that strange bird again. Spikes stood beside me with a hammer in his hand.

What bird? I asked, busy with trying to arrange some old boards in the shape of a table, just before they collapsed into a heap. Drats! I folded my arms in front of me.

You have to lay them on the floor, Tomboy, he said. We need to nail them together first.

So you have to build it upside down? I wiped the sweat off my brow with the back of my hand.

Spikes’ real name was Spencer Sikes, but I’d never heard nobody call him that ’cept for his grandpa. He was twelve years old, a whole year and a half older than me. I couldn’t imagine being almost a teenager. Me and him argued a lot, but we always stayed friends. He told me once he only liked me ’cause I wasn’t like other girls, and could climb trees, and didn’t mind getting dirty. He sometimes called me Tomboy instead of my real name, Nikki.

He grinned, showing his broken front tooth. Yeah.

We need some nails.

He reached into his pocket and pulled out a handful of bent nails. I was over at my grandpa’s yesterday. We took a boat ride out to Flat Lake, and I saw it flying around Pelican Pass, see.

Saw what?

The bird. He sounded annoyed. You know, the one that makes that screeching sound. The same one we saw over in Mossy Swamp. He sat on the floor and began straightening the nails by laying ’em on their sides and tapping ’em with his hammer.

We had gone out to Mossy Swamp back in June trying to find out about a legendary monster, when we saw a big bird swoop down and make a horrible noise. Spikes had been bringing it up ever since...and I had been trying real hard to ignore him.

Oh yeah. I twirled the hair at the end of my braid. The one you said looked like a dinosaur or something.

A pterodactyl, he added. Actually, the real name is pterosaur, see, which is a species of flying reptiles. So technically it isn’t a bird at all.

Why do you read all that stuff? I sat on my bare heels across from him.

It’s just interesting. He squinted at me like it should be something I should be curious about.

Spikes was not very good at school work, and barely passed his classes, but he loved to read when it was something that caught his interest. In fact, he could become pretty darned obsessed on a subject he liked, usually ghosts or pirates. Seemed his new obsession was prehistoric creatures.

So, what about it? I asked, stacking my boards to the side. I ain’t caring about no reptile-looking bird, unless it was to come after me or my dog.

I watched it fly in and out of the pass near Rabbit Island. I think it must have a nest near there, he said, still banging on his nails. And actually…according to a book I got from the library…their average wing span can get a little over twenty feet.

How big is twenty feet? I asked, still not much caring as long as it stayed in the swamp where it belonged.

He looked around, then pointed. Oh, longer than your houseboat, there.

I poked out my lips. You’re telling a fib, Buzzard. It wasn’t that big at all.

Well, it might just be a young one, he said, and you know what that means?

I didn’t answer. He could go on and on forever, like he had something caught in his craw.

Buzzard was a nickname I gave him on my first day at Morgan City Elementary. He looked just like one sitting up on that great big branch of the coolest tree in the school yard. It was our first argument, on account of I had already claimed that branch for my own lunch spot. He learned real quick that I wasn’t the type to give things up that easy, and since nary one of us like to be called names, we only did it to annoy each other. Sometimes we could go for days using each other’s rightful names.

That means its mama might be lurking around out there in that swamp, see. His eyes got real big, like he actually wanted it to be so.

I gazed at him sideways. Spikes you do know those things are extinct, don’t you? Miss Allgood taught us all about the dinosaurs last year. She said they’ve been gone since the Ice Age. That means it got too cold for ’em to survive. So there.

"Well, I ain’t saying it is prehistoric or anything. He nailed the boards together. I just said it looks like one."

Oh, I see. Well, it’s probably just a big pelican anyway. Hey, can we stand the table up yet?

Not yet. We need braces on these legs so it won’t fall down. Go over to Nana’s shed and get me a couple smaller boards while I straighten some more nails out.

Me and my friends had started building my tree house right after school let out for the summer. I needed a getaway from my bratty little brother, Jesse, who I had to share a room with. My neighbor, Nana Trahan, gave us some wood from her shed to help us out. When it was finished, I decided to turn it into a club house. I came up with the name, the Legend Busters Club, on account of that seems to be my destiny…to learn the truth behind legends and solve mysteries. I’d been doing it for almost a whole year, since I was ten years old. Papa said there’s always the truth that folks don’t know about, and Mama said I was real good at pondering on stuff until I figured it out. Of course I got some help from my friends and my trusty dog, Snooper.

There were three of us in the club so far. Spikes did most of the hard work and was the bravest person I knew…next to my papa. My best friend, after Snooper, was Patti LeBlanc. She didn’t do much in the way of work, but she was a good drawer and was real smart at solving puzzles.

I climbed down the wooden ladder Spikes had nailed to the side of the tree, while he went to hammering on some more nails. Snooper laid in the shade near the trunk, and raised his head when he saw me. He liked being close by in case I needed to talk. He was a real good listener. He followed me as I ran to grab Jesse’s red wagon for hauling stuff. I spotted Patti pushing her bike toward my house.

We’re over here, I called to her. Spikes is in the tree house.

What y’all doing? she asked. I heard some banging over here. I thought the tree house was all finished.

We’re fixing it up, I said. You know, furniture and stuff. I’m going over to Nana’s to get some wood and whatever else I can find. Wanna help?

Sure. She laid her bike down and followed me to my neighbor’s shed.

I still had the key to it, since Nana said we could have pretty much anything we wanted out of it. She just said to make sure we locked it up afterwards. I didn’t see much anyone would want to steal out of it though, but she worried about people, or rougarous, sneaking around her back yard. I opened the door and looked around the dusty shed for something that would work to brace the legs on the table.

Patti stood in the doorway wearing a yellow dress with a big bow in the back. She always dressed like she was heading off to church or something. She wasn’t much like me at all. I wasn’t about to wear no dress unless I really was going to church, and only if Mama made me. My overalls worked just fine for anything I wanted to do. I could get as dirty as I wanted to and it hardly showed at all. If I tore ’em, Mama just put a patch on, and I was good to go.

It’s really dirty in there, Patti said, and I’m sure there are spiders crawling around.

Come on in or get on out, I told her. You’re blocking the light.

Patti stepped to the side so the light would shine on what I was doing, but kept her head in the doorway. I picked up a couple of empty wooden crates. Hey, maybe these would be good for chairs. I scooted ’em toward the door.

Patti took a step into the shed and pointed to a chair hooked to a nail on the wall. What about that?

Great. I struggled to get it down, then I spotted some metal shelf brackets behind it. Those might work for the table legs.

We dragged the stuff out and piled it onto the wagon, and I made sure I clicked the padlock back on the shed door.