"Hey,
look at the size of that trunk!" shouted Brady.
Everybody
inspected the smashed remains of a tree that lay partially submerged
in the shallow water near the left bank. Devin stared in awe at the
battered trunk with just broken shards remaining of what had once
been large branches. He gulped nervously as he realized what similar
forces would do to a human body.
Down
the bank a few yards was a large pile of debris that had been dumped
by the river where the canyon widened a bit. On top of the debris sat
the 50-gallon drum they had seen. The two rangers headed straight for
it – Ranger Smith jogging and Ranger Sorensen hobbling along
behind.
“What
on earth are you doing?” asked Uncle Darrell as the ranger
inspected the outside of the barrel.
“Oh,
uh, I’m just checking to see what kind of barrel it is,” answered
Ranger Smith, looking a little flustered.
“Why?”
asked Uncle Randy.
“Oh,
uh, well…we can’t leave hazardous materials in the canyon,” he
answered. “They can ruin the environment.”
“Yeah,
we better carry it out,” agreed Ranger Sorensen. He turned to Brady
and said, “I’m afraid we’re going to have to confiscate it.”
“That’s
fine,” answered Brady. “I was just joking about it being mine
anyway.”
Then, a couple of chapters later, after the rangers and Arthur had gone ahead:
Brady
breathed a sigh of relief as the panic and adrenaline seeped from his
body. He had made it across the pool and could once again feel the
ground beneath his feet.
Then
he remembered the obstacle he’d encountered. “Hey, Dad, I kicked
something in the water.”
“It
was probably a rock.”
“No,
it was smooth,” insisted Brady. “Like plastic.”
“So?”
“I
think it was the barrel the rangers were carrying.”
“There’s
no way they’d leave it there after all the trouble they went
through bringing it this far,” argued Uncle Randy.
“Unless
they no longer needed it,” Brady reminded him.
“If
this is about them being robbers again…” began his dad.
“You
wanted proof,” Brady reminded him. “If this is the barrel, then
it proves they were lying about wanting to take it out of the
canyon.”
His
dad considered it for a second. “Well, go back and check. We could
use a rest anyway.” He and Uncle Randy laid the stretcher on a
large boulder and his dad checked the man’s vital signs again.
“I
was hoping someone else would check it out,” muttered Brady as he
peered anxiously at the pool they’d crossed.
“I’ll
check it out,” volunteered Amber. She took off her pack and waded
out against the current until she was forced to swim. She had to swim
full bore to make any progress, but about halfway across she stopped.
Only her head was above water, but she was anchored in place. “I
found something!” she gasped.
Brady’s
dad and Uncle Randy looked over with interest.
“Is
it the barrel?” asked Brady excitedly.
“It
feels like it, but there’s no lid. It’s full of water inside.”
“It
could be a different one,” suggested Uncle Randy.
“It’s
just as I suspected!” declared Brady. “As soon as they ditched
us, they opened up the barrel, transferred the money to their pack,
and then sunk the evidence!”
The
others looked at him in surprise. Then his dad slowly shook his head
and declared, “Either you’re the next Sherlock Holmes or the next
Franklin W. Dixon. I’m not sure which.”
