The Alaskan Adventure (6 page)

Gregg mushed straight toward them without slowing down or greeting them.

“What'd I tell you?” Frank said.

David said nothing, but Joe knew he wasn't going to risk a dog fight between the two teams. Gregg could show how big and tough he was by pressing for the right of way, but David was more concerned about keeping his dogs in shape for the Iditarod.

When Gregg was about a dozen feet away, David held up his hand, signaling him to stop. Staring straight ahead, Gregg ignored him. With
an icy
whoosh,
the dogsled sped past and disappeared into the distance.

“That guy has a major attitude problem,” Joe said.

“I wanted to warn him about the thin ice,” David said. He sounded sad.

“A cold bath would probably do him good,” Frank said. “It doesn't seem to have hurt Joe.”

“Very funny,” said Joe. “Come on, let's get back to the cabin. My clothes are still damp.”

As soon as Glitter came into sight, the dogs picked up speed. Their tails started wagging, and a new energy showed in their powerful steps.

Ironheart led them up the riverbank and onto the trail to their kennel. After David unharnessed the team, with help from Joe and Frank, and checked their food and water, the three started down the path toward David's family's cabin.

They were nearly there when Joe said, “Look, isn't that Justine?”

“She looks upset about something,” David said.

Justine ran up the path toward them.

“David,” she called while she was still a few yards away. “Come quick! My dad's sick.”

“Peter?” Joe asked.

She nodded.

“What is it? What happened?” David demanded.

“I don't know. It was something he ate that made him really, really sick.” Justine's eyes filled with tears. “David, I'm so scared. I'm afraid he's dying!”

David stood paralyzed with shock. Then he whirled and dashed toward his cabin with Frank and Joe close behind. They burst through the door and stopped dead.

Peter was lying on the bed, doubled up and groaning. His hands clutched at his stomach. Mona sat beside him, wiping his forehead with a damp cloth.

David went over and put his hand on Mona's shoulder. “What happened?” he asked. “What is it?”

“I don't know,” Mona answered. “All of a sudden he had this terrible pain. He barely made it to the bed.”

“I'm so worried,” Justine said, looking at Frank and Joe. “We have to do something.”

Mona stood up. “David?” she said. “I can't leave Peter like this. Will you go to the grove for me? You know what to look for.”

David hurried toward the door. “You come, too,” he said to Frank and Joe. “You can help.”

“Where are we going?” Frank asked as he and Joe followed David along a trail into the forest.

“The grove,” David said. “It's a place that Mona knows about.”

“What's there?” Joe asked.

“Mona's a healer,” David replied. “Her mother and grandmother were, too. To help Peter, she needs some plants and roots that grow only in the grove.”

Frank had heard about Native American healers. Like peoples in other areas, David's people had learned over hundreds of years which local herbs, leaves, and roots were helpful in treating illnesses. Even the big drug companies had learned to respect this knowledge. Teams of scientists were traveling to all parts of the world to find out as much as they could before the ancient lores were lost.

After a twenty-minute hike Frank noticed a change in the trees. The dense stand of spruce was behind them, and they were in an open area
of mixed birches and aspens. The bare, ice-decked branches sparkled in the weak sunlight.

“Over there,” David said, pointing to a patch of ground near the base of a big oak. “Brush the snow away and dig up some of the moss you'll find growing there.”

Frank and Joe ran to the spot and worked together, exposing and gathering thick, earthy-smelling moss. Meanwhile, David dug up a patch of low-growing wintergreen, cut a section of bark off a black cherry birch, sliced off root sections of an alder bush, and took twigs from other trees and shrubs Frank didn't recognize.

Ten minutes later the three friends were on their way back to Glitter. The return hike went faster. When they got to the cabin, they found it filled with a strange aroma. On the stove a black iron kettle bubbled and steamed. Mona stood near it, putting in handfuls of herbs. She took the bag of stuff that David and the Hardys had collected and started adding that, too.

While the herbal remedy steeped, Frank asked Mona, “Do you know what made Peter sick?”

She shook her head. “Maybe the apple he ate was bad,” she said. “He started feeling sick right afterward.”

“Did you or Justine eat any of it?” asked Joe.

“Just him,” Mona said.

David said, “I didn't know we had any apples.”

“We didn't,” Justine told him. “It was a present from Curt Stone. We got a whole basket of fresh fruit from him.”

Frank looked over at Joe and saw that his thoughts were running along the same lines. Why would Curt send a present to Peter? He had to know that Peter was one of the leaders of the opposition to ThemeLife's plans for Glitter. Was the basket of fruit meant as a bribe? A pretty stingy one, if so.

But what if Curt had deliberately poisoned one of the apples? Frank wondered. It sounded like something out of a fairy tale, but such things were known to happen. If Peter or one of his family got sick, it would keep Peter from organizing the town against the theme park. In fact, this and the fire in Peter's cabin and the damage to Ralph Hunter's boat could
all
be part of a plot to scare off people who were opposed to ThemeLife!

“Where'd Curt get fresh fruit at this time of year?” David asked.

Mona looked up from stirring the caldron. “It must have come in on the bush plane,” she said. “We thought he gave it to us to help us feel better about losing our cabin.”

“What did he say when he brought it?” Joe asked.

“He didn't bring it,” Mona replied.

“Gregg brought it,” Justine added.

“Hold it, I'm a little confused,” Frank said. “Why did Gregg bring it?”

Justine said, “Jake asked him to.”

Mona must have seen the look of confusion on Frank's face. She said, “Flip Atkins, the bush pilot, flies in the mail deliveries and food orders from Fairbanks. Everything but the mail goes to Jake at the general store. Then he delivers any special orders. Or asks somebody like Gregg to do it for him.”

Frank opened his mouth to ask another question, but Mona held up her hand to stop him. She pulled on a pair of thick gloves and lifted the hot kettle. Justine held a piece of cloth over the mouth of an earthenware pot, and Mona poured the steamy liquid from the plants into the pot, straining it through the cloth.

She then scooped a ladleful of the brew into a thick mug, poured in a little spring water to cool it, stirred in a teaspoon of honey, and took it over to Peter. Justine helped her father sit up on the edge of the bed while Mona held the mug to his lips.

Peter finished drinking and lay down again. Frank asked Mona, “This basket of fruit—was there a card with it?”

Mona crossed the room to the dresser and
returned with a business card in her hand. Frank and Joe looked at it. It read, Curt Stone, Field Representative, ThemeLife, Inc. Handwritten on the back were the words “Best wishes, Curt.”

“That's his card, all right,” Frank said. “But it doesn't have
your
names on it anywhere. He could have given that card to someone else, who put it in that basket of fruit. Someone like Gregg, for instance.”

“I don't get it,” David said. “Are you saying there was something wrong with the fruit?”

“There's no way to tell without a lab test,” Joe said. “But after what happened to Peter, I don't think
I'm
going to try to eat any of that fruit.”

David's face reddened. “If Gregg thinks he can force me to drop out of the Iditarod by making me and my family sick, he's going to find out different. And after I've beat him in the race, I'm going to do some major alterations on his face!”

Justine put her hand on his arm. “David, we don't know that Gregg did anything wrong,” she said. “I know you and he don't get along, but he's always been nice to me. I don't think he'd try to hurt us.”

Mona looked from Joe to Frank and said, “I hope you can get to the bottom of this, before anything worse happens.”

She took the mug from the table and went back
to Peter's side. “How are you feeling?” she asked.

“Better,” he croaked.

“Good. Want some more?” she said, holding up the mug.

Peter scrunched up his face. “That horrible stuff? Eeyuukk.”

“It's good,” Mona said, smiling. “It worked on you, didn't it?”

“Maybe it's good for my stomach,” Peter replied. “But it's eeyuukk for my mouth.”

He tried to sit up. Mona pressed his shoulders back down. “Rest,” she said. “You need it.”

“See what happens when you take something from ThemeLife?” Peter said, lying back. “Next thing you know, you're sick as a dog.”

“Hey, watch how you talk about dogs,” David said. “The Iditarod's just a few days away!”

•  •  •

Just after nightfall Mona said she wanted to fix Peter some good, healthy moose steak. “Would somebody like to get some from the cache?” she asked, smiling and looking at Frank and Joe.

“Sure,” Joe said, leaping to his feet.

“Where is it?” Frank asked.

“In the shed behind our cabin,” Mona said. “There's most of a side of moose hanging there. You'll find a big knife and a saw, too.”

“How much do you want?” Frank asked as he donned his parka.

Mona held her hands out, about six inches apart. “About this much,” she said.

David lit a lantern for them, and the Hardys set off into the darkness. The Arctic sky was thickly sprinkled with glittering stars. An owl hooted nearby, and a small animal scurried away through the bushes.

“They just leave their meat supply outside in a shed?” Joe asked.

Frank laughed. “Don't worry, it won't spoil. The whole outdoors is one big freezer compartment.”

“I get it,” Joe said. “Now I see why Mona mentioned that saw. We're going to need it to cut off the meat.”

The Windman cabin still smelled of smoke. Frank and Joe went around it and found the shed. Joe pulled open the door, and they stepped inside.

Frank held up the lantern and looked around. To the left, fur pelts were stacked, stiff and frozen, on a wooden crate. A two-man crosscut saw hung from a spike on the back wall. Other tools lay tossed in a big woven basket.

“So where's the moose?” Joe wondered, peering around. “Do you suppose Mona sent us out here as a joke or something?”

“I don't think so,” Frank said. “She needs that meat for dinner.”

“Fine,” Joe said. “But where is it?”

Frank held the lantern higher. “There's a big hook in that beam,” he said. “It looks like that's where the side of meat
ought
to be hanging. The only problem is, it isn't.”

“Frank,” Joe said, in a changed voice. “Frank, look!”

Frank turned and looked. Painted on the plank wall with black paint was the rough outline of a heart. But this was no Valentine card. Protruding from the center of the heart was a wicked-looking butcher knife, the point driven deep into the wood.

Joe and Frank stared at the knife stuck in the wall. After a long moment of silence Joe said, “The Windmans are counting on that meat to last them until spring, aren't they?”

Frank nodded grimly. “Probably.”

“What kind of rat would steal a family's food?” Joe asked.

“A two-legged rat,” Frank said. “But I don't think he cares about the meat. He wants to frighten Peter and Mona by showing them how easily they can be hurt.”

Frank went over to the wall, put his nose near the painted heart, and sniffed. “The paint's fresh,” he reported. “At a guess, no more than a
couple of hours old, unless the cold keeps it from drying.”

Joe thought about that for a few seconds before saying, “We know someone who was over this way at about the right time: Gregg. What if he brought that poisoned fruit, then took the moose carcass?”

“He could have done it,” Frank agreed. “But so could almost anybody. The woods are just a few steps away. You slip in, do your dirty work, and slip away.”

“ ‘Slip away'? How much do you suppose a moose weighs?” Joe asked. “They're awfully big, aren't they? You're not going to toss it over your shoulder and stroll off through town.”

“That's a good point, Joe. Okay, we're not talking about a whole live moose, which might weigh as much as a ton. Let's say it's a half or maybe a quarter of a dressed carcass. And Peter and Mona have been living off it since fall. Even so, what's left must weigh a hundred pounds or more—maybe a lot more! Here, let's take a look around outside. But watch where you step.”

Even by the flickering light of the kerosene lantern, the tracks were easy to spot: two ruts about an inch wide, the distance between them about a foot and a half.

“That's too narrow for a dogsled,” Joe pointed out.

“Remember when Justine went to get water from the spring?” Frank asked. “She used a sledge she pulled by hand.”

Joe felt his jaw drop in shock. “Justine! Frank, you're not saying—”

“Of course not,” Frank said quickly. “But what do you want to bet she left the sledge outside the cabin, where anyone could get it?”

Joe knelt down in the snow to get a closer look at the marks left by the sledge. “Look, Frank!” he said. “The tracks get deeper off to the left. The thief must have pushed or pulled it here from the path, loaded the meat on it, then gone off in the direction of the woods.”