In Too Deep - 39 Clues 06 (9 page)

"Interesting decor," Nellie said."You ain't seen nothing yet," Shep said."I can get you a mate's rate if you care to spend the night. Ken rents out rooms, too."

Jeff opened the door without knocking and shoved his head inside. "Cooo-eee!" he shouted. "You home? It's Jeff, mate! Got some folks who want to meet you!"

"No need to shout, just come on in before you let in all the blowies, you blooming twit!" a voice roared back.

Jeff winked at them.
"Don't let him bother you.

He
does the Aussie act for the tourists. He's a bit deaf, so speak up."They crowded inside and Nellie quickly shut the door. They were in a small hallway. Faint light came from the two small windows near the door.

There were hundreds of things tacked to the wall -- license plates, bumper stickers in every language, T-shirts, candy wrappers, postcards. The items were so numerous that they were nailed over each other and made a kind of crazy wallpaper. Where there was bare wall, people had scrawled signatures and messages.

"The house was built straight back into the hill, so we're underground right now," Jeff explained as they passed through a kitchen and dining area.

The rough walls curved around them. It was like being in a cave, except there was a stove, a refrigerator, a dining table, and a rug on the floor.They followed Jeff farther into the house, where he led them to a living room lit with lamps.

They'd expected to find themselves in some kind of a bunker, but instead they were in a regular room, with a brown couch, a coffee table, a shelf of books, and a TV. It took you a minute to realize the weird part -- there were no windows.

But after the blasting heat outside, the inside felt cool and comfortable.

An old man sat on the couch, reading a newspaper. He was tanned to the color of a walnut and completely bald. He, too, wore khaki shorts and a
T-shirt that
read DON'T ASK.

He looked over his half glasses at them.

"G'day, cobbers. I can see you bunch of galans made it to my shack okay, so pull up a pew and I'll fire up the barbie.""Stuff the lingo, Kenny," Jeff said. "They're here for a bit of history of Coober Pedy, not your Aussie act."

"You say this is your posse?" the man asked with a chortle.

"Knew you'd turn out to be no good." He slapped his knee."Aussie act," Jeff shouted. "Oh, never mind. These folks need some information." He raised his voice.

"Did you ever hear of a bloke called Bob Troppo?"

"We think he might have lived here in the 1930s," Amy said in a loud voice.

"He could have been a miner, but we're not sure about that. We're not sure of his name, but it could have been Bob. His face was scarred on one side and he didn't speak."

"Go on."

"We think he knew someone here ... someone who sold a ring to Amelia Earhart."

"Blimey," Ken said. "I thought that was just old Ron taking the mick."

"You've heard the story?"

"My own dad told it! Right before the war, he took a trip up to Darwin with some loose opals and some jewelry.

He told me the story about how Earhart bought a ring off him. Typical of my dad-- he'd tell you some whopping tall tale, and you couldn't prove it didn't happen."

"Well, it did," Dan s
aid. "We know that for sure."

"Too bad he's not around to rub it in." The old man laughed."What about the scarred man?" Amy asked."Sounds like Fossie," Ken said. "My dad called him that because he got lucky fossicking."

Amy and Dan looked blank."Same as noodling," Jeff explained.

"Searching for opals on the heaps of sand that get dug out for a mine. It takes some patience, let me tell you."

"Fossie made more money fossicking than mining. He was a strange one. Didn't talk, just stared right past you. A few kangaroos loose in the top paddock, for certain."

"Has anyone else besides us ever asked about him?" Dan asked. He was hoping for news of their parents. "Eh?"Dan repeated the question, louder this time.

"Not a one," Ken said. "Not many left in Coober Pedy who remember him, and we keep things to ourselves.

Besides, Fossie didn't socialize at the pub. He died before Coober Pedy really took off."Nellie's face changed, and Amy knew she was trying not to smile at the notion that dusty Coober Pedy had taken off. She looked as if she'd just inhaled pepper and was trying not to sneeze."Did you ever meet him?" Dan asked."Once.

He didn't welcome visitors, I'll tell you that. But when he was dying, he called my dad over, and I went with him. I was ju
st a lad then. He left my dad
his mine. Nothing much to it, we never did get a stone out of it. After that, he went on a walkabout and never came back. Died out there, alone, just as he wanted."

"Do you know where he lived?"

"Too right I do! Lived right in the mine. Dug a room next to it. Many did in those days. He was the first to figure out a ventilation system, get the whole system working right."Amy and Dan exchanged a glance. Ekat."Can we see it?"

"Sure, it's just down the hall."

"Wait a second," Amy said. "Are you telling us that Bob -- I mean, Fossie -- lived here?"

"Well, not here here," Ken said, gesturing around the room. "My dad dug out more of the hill and made the house.

Fossie just carved out a tunnel and mined straight back into the hill. He dug out a room for himself."

"Is the room still here?"

Amy asked.

He nodded. "Sure. We just slapped up a wall to block the mine.

But Fossie's room is still there.

Shazzer made it up as one of the guest rooms. She was my third wife."

"Your fourth, I think," Jeff said. "And my mum, if you'll recall. You were my stepdad for about two years."

"That's right!" Ken laughed. "How are you, sonny? Sure, have a look," he said to

Amy and Dan.

"It's been fifty years at least, so I don't think you'll find a thing
. But you're welcome to try."

CHAPTER 16

A short while later, Amy sat back on her heels. "Ken's right. There's nothing here. It was all too long ago."

They'd searched the simply furnished room thoroughly, including the small closet. Nothing remained from the home that Bob Troppo had made there.

"I hate dead ends," Dan muttered. "I thought for sure we'd lucked out."They got up wearily and went back out into the crazily patterned hallway.

Amy turned back for a last look and stopped dead. She pointed to the wall on top of the doorway.

"Dan, look!"Amid old postcards from all over the world, crazy drawings, and loopy scrawled messages there was a silly drawing.HA!

[drawing of a heart-shaped head with two eyes, a smiling
hair and frizzy hair]

Be MINE

"Mom drew this," Amy said breathlessly, pointing to the heart.

"I know it. It's drawn with a purple pen! And look, the eyes are red and the smile is blue. She used to make us heart-shaped waffles with strawberries for eyes and a blueberry smile."

"Everybody's mom does that," Dan said."But do they do zucchini curls for hair? Look! Green!"

Dan gave her a pained look."I liked to dip the zucchini in syrup."

"HA," Dan said."Okay, I know it's gross, but-- ""No, HA. It could stand for Hope and Arthur. They were here!" Dan shivered with a sudden chill, as though the ghosts of their parents were right there underground with them.

"Do you think they knew we'd come here?" Amy whispered.

Dan shook his head. "They'd never think we'd be going on the clue hunt. Did Grace know about the waffle zucchini thing?"Amy nodded. "Sure. She made them for me, too."

"It must be a message for Grace, then," Dan said. "They were telling her where to go."

"Where?"

Dan pointed to the last word. "The old mine."* * *

It was late afternoon, but it was still brutally hot. The heat shimmered and
bounced. Dan had to squint to
see the map that Ken had made for them.

They stood on the hill behind Ken's house. Or, Dan corrected in his mind, on top of Ken's house."It's an old minefield back there, see," Ken had said, "so watch out for mine shafts -- they're not all marked.

The old ventilation shaft for Fossie's room is still there-- you'll see it near the circle of orange flags.

Take the first mine shaft past the flags and head down. Then head back the way you came. Easy as pie, not that pie is easy to make, heh!"

They left their bags and Saladin with Ken, who had rooms to rent for the night. Jeff had to get back to work, meeting a busload of tourists, but Shep, Nellie, Amy, and Dan carefully made their way through the field.

They saw the orange warning flags, brilliant against the blue sky.

"There's the ventilation shaft right there," Shep said, pointing. "So we take the next mine shaft over.""This isn't exactly what I had in mind when I agreed to bring you here,"

Shep added, avoiding a mine shaft.

"A little sightseeing, a little relaxation, sure. But climbing into an old mine isn't my idea of recreation.""You don't have to come," Dan said. "You can wait for us at the pub."

"I'm not letting you go down alone," Shep said.

"I haven't been there for you in the past, but I can do it now." He grinned.

"I'm here to protect you against the ghost of Amelia Earhart.

Or t
he principal without a face."

"Assistant principal," Dan corrected."Here we are," Nellie said. She stopped at a shaft. An iron ladder led straight down to a bottom they couldn't see."Well, let's get to it," Shep said.

"If we don't come up in an hour, Jeff will come looking for us.

Unless he forgets."Shep balanced carefully and started to climb down. Dan went after him. His fingers slipped on the metal, and he gripped it harder, his heart pounding. Why did they

always end up underground? Caves, train tunnels, catacombs ... Were the Cahills vampires? Did they hate the sun?

Nellie swung down, and Amy brought up the rear.

It was a long way to the bottom. Darkness crept over them, but there was enough light from the top to barely make out the rungs.

Finally, Dan heard Shep's voice. "I'm there. It's about forty feet, I'm guessing." A light switched on.

When his feet finally hit the ground, Dan let out a shaky breath of relief. Not that he'd tell anyone how he felt. But he was creeped out by being so far below, down a little hole.They had all bought powerful lights in town, and Dan turned his on.

The glow illuminated the shaft. A forgotten lantern lay caked with dust in a corner. The walls themselves looked as though they'd been h
acked and gouged out by hand.

"All right. If we follow the main tunnel and turn left, we should find Bob's mine," Shep said.

Dan felt his lungs begin to constrict. With every step they disturbed more dust, and he felt the familiar tightness in his chest. "Are you okay?" Amy whispered.

"Fine," he answered. He never liked to admit when he had trouble with his breathing.Nellie slipped the inhaler into his hand and he took a quick hit. He shot her a grateful look. The tunnel grew narrower. Every few feet they came to another spot that had been worked by a miner.

Dan had expected the walls to glitter in many colors like opals, but they were a dull, chalky beige.The tunnel narrowed further and then twisted sharply right. A pile of rubble lay in front of an opening."I think this is it,"

Shep said. He knelt down and peered over the rubble. Dan looked over his shoulder. Inside the opening was a small cavelike room. The floor was smooth and even. An old stained mattress on an iron bedstead was pushed into a corner. "He must have lived in the mine, as well as that room in Ken's house," Shep said.

Amy and Dan climbed in first. It was a bit brighter in here due to the ventilation shaft that spilled out dim light from a corner.

Amy bent down and picked up a newspaper. She shined her light on it. "It's from Adelaide. The date is 1951.

This must be it," sh
e said. "Ken said that Fossie
left here in the early fifties.

If he was a young man when he assaulted Mark Twain, he must have been close to ninety years old."Shep stepped inside. "Did you just say assaulted Mark Twain?"

He held up his hands. "Never mind. Don't tell me."

Dan swept his flashlight over the wall. "Amy, check this out," he said. "He wrote all over the walls." He'd thought it was a design at first, but he realized that it was the words ring of fire written in small, cramped handwriting.The words didn't stop.

Tiny, faded in places, in other places covered with dust, the words ran around the entire room, over and over and over, like crazy wallpaper covering every inch of the cavern.

Dan and Amy flashed their lights around."How long do you think it took?" Amy asked in a hushed voice."Years," Shep said, looking around.