“Don’t know. Lightning, I guess,” Charlie told her. Then with a few quick directions he split the group into pairs. He and George worked side by side, making a furrow two shovels wide through the meadow. Nancy and Maddie moved side by side in the opposite direction. By the time they had dug a line fifty feet long, Nancy was near exhaustion. The fire was drawing closer. The smoke was so thick, Nancy couldn’t see Charlie and George at the other end of the fire line. Nancy’s back was aching from the hard work, but she knew she couldn’t stop digging.
Suddenly Maddie grabbed her roughly by the arm and jerked her aside. Nancy took two flying steps and fell sprawling into the meadow, just as the fire rushed through the grass behind her and stopped at the line of dirt they had just dug.
“Got no sense, young lady?” Maddie said gruffly. “You must be one of those city folks. Don’t know when to get out from in front of a fire.”
“I was trying to finish the line,” Nancy said, scrambling to her feet. She was close enough to see the lines in the older woman’s leathery skin.
“Well, it’s as done as it’s going to get,” Maddie told her. She spoke quietly as she turned to watch the blaze, and the harshness had left her voice. “Now it will either hold or it won’t.”
Nancy watched as the flames gathered themselves behind the line. The fire appeared to be growing smaller as it ran out of grass to burn. Suddenly, with a mighty roar, the wind picked up again, whisking tongues of flame across the hard-dug trail of dirt. Once again the fire raced toward the forest, burning to the edge of the line of trees. Nancy and the others stood helpless as the first giant pine exploded into flames.
A flash of lightning and a crash of thunder seemed to announce their defeat. Nancy raised her head toward the sky. She could see why this kind of storm put the forest in so much danger. The huge thundercloud seemed to hang just overhead, ready to throw its lightning bolts toward the ground. Another flash drew Nancy’s eyes toward the mountains. There, rushing across the meadow, was a curtain of rain, blowing in with the wind! “Look!” Nancy cried, pointing toward the rain. Maddie saw it and breathed a heavy sigh of relief.
In another moment the downpour reached them. Nancy and Maddie were instantly drenched, and the fire that had seemed unstoppable minutes earlier was reduced to a few smoldering ashes. The danger was past.
Maddie and Nancy ran for the cover of the forest to wait for the storm to pass. Nancy could see Charlie and George coming toward them through the smoke. Their wet clothes clung to their bodies, and streams of water had turned the soot and dirt to mud on their faces. Despite their frazzled looks, both Charlie and George were smiling.
“That was close,” George said. “I thought we’d lost the whole forest.”
“I want to thank you girls for your help, and you, too, Maddie,” Charlie said.
“You can thank people all you want, but sooner or later that’s not going to be good enough,” Maddie said. Her scowl had returned. “Looks to me like your luck is running out, Charlie Griffin.”
“What do you mean by that?” Nancy asked, frowning.
“I mean, he’d better figure out a way to stop all of these fires, or Highland Retreat is going to be nothing but ashes.”
“Now, Maddie, this could have been caused by lightning,” Charlie said. “Besides, it’s under control.”
“This time it is. But next time you may not be so lucky,” Maddie said. Then she turned and started heading back toward her jeep.
“That almost sounded like some kind of threat,” George said as Maddie waded across the creek and headed for the road.
“Oh, she’s just mad about the sale,” Charlie said. “Maddie runs a wild bird hospital. She cares for birds that have been shot or hit by cars. Maddie thinks a state park will bring more people and more problems for the birds.”
The thundershower passed over in a matter of minutes, and Nancy, George and Charlie emerged from the forest. As Maddie drove away in her gray jeep, the retreat’s van suddenly came into view. It parked by the big rock, and Rachel and Bess jumped out. Behind them was a dark-haired, stocky man. The three of them trudged through the wet grass as Nancy and George helped Charlie put out the embers from the fire.
“I guess you girls got an unusual welcome to Highland Retreat,” the man said when they came up. He was of medium height, with broad shoulders and a large stomach that partially covered the big buckle on his western belt. His wide-brimmed brown cowboy hat kept the last drops of rain off his tanned face.
“This is Pete Sims, our main hand at the retreat,” Rachel said.
“Pleased to meet you,” Nancy said. “And our first day has been a little more exciting than we’d expected.”
“And we haven’t even gotten to our cabin yet,” George added.
“You all run along now. I’ll finish up,” Pete said, waving toward the van.
Nancy thought fast. She wasn’t ready to leave the fire scene quite yet. The first shadow of a doubt about the cause of this fire was forming in the back of her mind. Charlie had said it was probably the result of lightning, but Nancy remembered seeing lightning only near the mountains before the fire started. That, plus the fact that this wasn’t the first suspicious fire on the retreat, made Nancy want to investigate.
“I’ll catch up,” she said to the others. “I think I lost my watch while I was digging.” As she spoke, she quickly slipped her watch off her wrist and into her pocket.
“We’ll help you look for it,” Bess offered.
Nancy waved her friend away. “That’s okay,” she said. “I think I know exactly where it is.”
As the others headed toward the van, Nancy began to follow the fire line, looking at the ground carefully as if searching for the watch. When she got to the end of the fire line, she circled around toward the spot where the fire had started. Pete was still back near the fire line, throwing dirt on the last embers. She hoped he wouldn’t look up. Across the meadow Charlie and the girls were almost to the van.
Nancy was looking for anything that seemed out of place—anything that would tell her someone had been near the start of the fire. She found nothing on the ground, but then, just as she was about to give up, she spotted a flash of white caught in the thorns of a low bush. Nancy reached in carefully and pulled out a partly burned piece of paper.
Suddenly she heard a noise behind her. Nancy turned to see Pete Sims scowling at her from beneath his wide hat brim.
“What do you have there?” he demanded.
3
Half a Clue
Nancy quickly tucked the paper into her pocket and pulled out her watch. “I found my watch,” she said, showing it to Pete.
“Then you’d better get out of here,” the dark-haired man ordered. “Don’t you know this is a dangerous place to be? This fire could start up again any minute.”
“Are you coming, too?” Nancy asked. She thought Pete seemed awfully anxious to be alone in the meadow.
“Soon enough,” Pete told her shortly. “Now, go on before the van takes off without you.” He gestured in the direction of the road, where Charlie and the girls had just reached the van.
“Sorry. Thanks for your help.” Nancy tried to sound cheerful as she started off to join the others.
A few rays of sun streaked through the heavy clouds overhead. Bess stood by the van with her head hung to one side, squeezing the excess water out of her long blond hair. Her blue shorts and denim blouse were soaked to her skin. George and Rachel were already inside the van. They looked as if they had just been pushed into a swimming pool with their clothes on. Everyone was smudged with dirt and ash. They could all use warm showers, Nancy thought.
“How will Pete get back?” she asked as Charlie held open the van door for her.
“Don’t worry,” Rachel volunteered. “There’s a trail that leads from the meadow back to the lodge. In fact, Pete was just coming back from there when we found him and told him about the fire.”
“He’d been in the meadow?” Nancy asked i
n surprise.
Rachel nodded. “He’d been putting out a salt block to attract deer for the guests to watch.” She paused, frowning. “He seemed very surprised about the fire. He hadn’t noticed it when he was there, so it must have just started,” she said.
It seemed to Nancy that a lot of people had “happened” to be around the fire scene. Pete had been in the meadow just before it started. Maddie Emerson had shown up just after. It was even an interesting coincidence, she thought, that the fire had started as they were driving by. Could someone have planned for them to see it? She remembered Maddie’s words: “He’d better figure out a way to stop all of these fires, or Highland Retreat is going to be ashes.”
Could Maddie Emerson have been threatening Charlie instead of warning him?
Nancy reached into the pocket of her shorts and carefully pulled out the soggy paper that she had found in the bush.
“What’s that?” George asked.
“I’m not sure,” Nancy said. She looked at the note briefly, but she could make out nothing of what was left of the words.
“Did you drop this?” she asked Charlie, handing the note over the seat to him.
The van slowed as Charlie looked at the paper and handed it back. “Never seen it,” he said. “Where did it come from?”
“It was near the fire,” Nancy answered. She spread the paper out on her lap and once again tried to decipher the words.
ly 13, 19
say Labo
n Home Rd.
eport
mple #653
and Re
The rest of the message had been smudged or burned away.
“I can’t tell anything from that,” Bess said from her seat beside Nancy.
“The first line must be the date,” Nancy said. “That’s the day before yesterday. Whoever received this letter must have gotten it within the last two days—and he or she could have dropped it in the meadow right before the fire.”
“Do you think someone started the fire?” George asked.
“Maybe,” Nancy said. “But if so, who? And why would anyone want to do something like that?”
“Now, wait a minute,” Charlie broke in, glancing in the rearview mirror. “I think you girls are getting carried away with all this mystery stuff,” he said. “The fire was started by lightning. There’s no mystery in that.”
“Your grandfather’s probably right,” Nancy said to Rachel, tucking the paper back in her pocket. “You said yourself the storm could be dangerous.”
Rachel looked unconvinced, but she didn’t say anything more as the van rounded the turn into the retreat. On the left stood a large barn with horse corrals behind it. Across the road from the barn Rachel pointed out Pete’s small house and a row of five cabins with a creek flowing behind them. At the end of the row of cabins a large wooden lodge perched on a hill at a bend in the creek.
Charlie stopped in front of the cabin closest to the lodge just as a truck with a United States Forest Service emblem on the side drove up the driveway behind them. It was a small fire-fighting truck, with a water tank and hoses on the sides.
“You girls have an hour to clean up before dinner,” Charlie said, unlocking the cabin door. “Rachel and I’ll go talk to the men in green—and tell them they’re late.”
Nancy, Bess, and George threw their suitcases on the two sets of bunk beds and began to peel off their rain-soaked shoes and socks. The cabin was rustic but comfortable. One room served as both living room and bedroom. Off that room was a small kitchen and a counter with four chairs. There was also a small bathroom with a shower, which the girls took turns using to scrub off the mud and ashes.
“I feel a hundred percent better,” Bess said as she straightened the collar of her mint-green shirt. “Next time let’s leave the fire fighting to the Forest Service.”
“Let’s hope there isn’t a next time,” Nancy said. “That fire could have been disastrous.”
“You don’t think it was caused by lightning, do you?” George asked, lacing up a pair of clean white tennis shoes.
“I’m not sure,” Nancy said. She explained why she’d thought that the fire had started before the lightning arrived. “It could have been arson,” she said. “But why would someone want to burn down a beautiful forest?”
“To scare tourists away?” George suggested.
“We know Maddie would like to do that,” Nancy said. “But she wouldn’t want to destroy the trees.”
“And Maddie helped put the fire out,” George added. “Why would she do that if she had started it in the first place?”
“So we wouldn’t suspect her?” Bess suggested. She was standing in front of a small mirror, brushing her hair as she spoke. “Maybe Maddie was afraid someone had seen her too close to the fire, and she wanted to protect herself.”
“I think Maddie’s definitely a suspect,” Nancy said. “But she’s not the only one.”
“That’s right. Pete was there, too,” Bess said. “And he was awfully anxious to get us out of there.”
“We need more information,” Nancy said as the three of them closed their suitcases and started toward the lodge for dinner. “Let’s keep our eyes and ears open tonight and see if we can learn more.”
The rainstorm had settled the dust on the retreat’s dirt driveway, and a fresh mountain scent mingled pleasantly with the faint smell of food as the girls neared the lodge. Nancy rapped on the big wooden screen door, and the girls were quickly greeted by a motherly looking woman in a ruffled apron.
“Come right in. Guests don’t need to knock,” she said, smiling broadly. “You must be Nancy, George, and Bess. I’m Elsa Parker, the cook. Dinner’s almost ready.”
“I can’t wait,” Bess said. “Can we help?”
“Thank you, but it’s all under control,” Elsa said. “In fact, I believe Rachel is just finishing the salad. I’ll send her out.”
While they waited for Rachel, the girls looked around the main room of the lodge. They had entered beneath a balcony that overlooked the main floor. A huge stone fireplace covered most of the far wall of the room, with the rock work climbing two stories high. In front of the fireplace a large wooden table was set for dinner. Several of the retreat’s other guests were already gathered nearby.
“Let’s go over and meet people,” George suggested, but Nancy had already spotted a large display of old pictures and mining equipment arranged on the wall beneath the balcony.
“I’d like to check this out first,” she said, nodding toward the shelves and glass cases of old artifacts.
Bess was quickly attracted by a small piece of snowy-white quartz with gold-colored veins running through it. It was displayed on a shelf inside a locked case beneath a small miner’s pick.
“Pretty, isn’t it?” Rachel said, surprising the girls as she entered the room. “It’s valuable, too.”
“It’s really gold, then?” Bess asked.
“Yes? running through the quartz,” Rachel said. “Wait here a minute.” She disappeared into the kitchen and came back with a small gold key. After unlocking the case, she picked up the piece of quartz and handed it to Bess. “For such a small rock it’s pretty heavy, isn’t it?”
“I’ll say,” George said, taking the quartz from Bess. She passed it on to Nancy.
“Gold is one of the heaviest metals,” Rachel explained. “That’s why it settled to the bottom of the prospectors’ pans.” Rachel took the gold ore from Nancy and set it on a nearby shelf before pointing to a deep pan with sloping sides that sat on a special stand. “That’s what the prospectors used to pan for gold.”
“It looks a little like a wok,” George commented.
“It’s shaped for washing sand,” Rachel said, picking up the pan. “People use the same ‘panning’ technique today. They swirl a pan full of sand around with water until all but the heaviest material washes away. What’s left is usually black sand. With luck there will be gold flakes or nuggets in with it.”
The girls could se
e black sand in the bottom of the display pan, but there was no gold in it.
“Is the sand valuable?” George asked.
“No, it’s just for show,” Rachel told her, putting the pan back in place.
“But the white quartz is worth something, I bet,” Bess said.
“Yes, but it’s important to Granddad and me because of its history,” Rachel explained.
“Where did it come from?” Nancy asked.
“Charlie got it from his dad, Cyrus,” Rachel explained. “It was found near Miner’s Creek by a prospector named Jeremiah Benner. He was using that pickax right there above the quartz. But Charlie tells the story better than I do.”
“Dinner’s ready!” Elsa’s voice echoed through the big lodge as she placed a large bowl of potatoes on the table.
“And I’m ready for dinner,” Bess said as she and George followed Rachel to the table.
Nancy was about to follow when she heard the sound of an argument on the porch outside.
“I told you everything is fine,” a voice said.
Nancy could tell that the speaker was Charlie, but he sounded very nervous. She didn’t recognize the second voice.
“You don’t seem to understand how serious this matter is,” the second man said sternly. “The senator isn’t going to be pleased. Any more problems and the park deal is off!”
4
Jeremiah’s Gold
Nancy edged her way toward the front door of the lodge, pretending to be interested in a picture on the wall. She was hoping to get a glimpse, through the screen door, of the stranger on the porch. Unfortunately, Charlie spotted her. There was an awkward moment of silence as Charlie realized his conversation had been overheard.
“Excuse me, but dinner is ready,” Nancy said quickly.
“Thank you, Nancy,” Charlie said, looking somewhat relieved. He pushed the screen door open and introduced Nancy to a handsome young man in a well-tailored suit. “Nancy Drew, this is Tyler Nelson,” Charlie said.
The young man forced a tense smile and extended his hand to Nancy.