Wilson finally left around noon, making it too late to head for Mosquito Pass. As badly as I wanted to get going, I also needed to put Wilson’s check in the bank before he changed his mind. We would start out early the next morning now that I no longer had to search Appleton’s cabin, but that plan would change later that night when my homemade alarm stopped working.

It was the silence that woke me at two in the morning. I had become used to the radio going on and off every few minutes, and fallen sound asleep, but woke with a start when my subconscious told me something was wrong. I went out to the kitchen where I had placed the radio, and saw the headlights of a car backing out of Bonnie’s drive.

With shotgun in hand, and attack dog at my side, I crept down to Bonnie’s house. I went up her back stairs while Fred ran around to the front. I knew the intruder was gone, so I didn’t worry about Fred not being armed. He probably knew it too, for he didn’t so much as growl on our trip down the hill.

I tried shining my flashlight into Bonnie’s kitchen, just to make sure we were alone, before joining Fred on the front porch. He was sniffing at the deck rail, where I had placed my camcorder, and turned to bark at me when he saw me. I couldn’t see much in the moonless night, but soon discovered why he greeted me that way. My camcorder was gone. Further investigation showed the extension cord had been unplugged, and Bonnie’s flower pot had been moved again.

We spent the next thirty minutes checking Bonnie’s house before locking everything up and heading home. Nothing was out of place and I didn’t see anything that wasn’t supposed to be there, so we went on home after plugging the extension cord back in. I could hear my radio immediately, and realized that must have been what alerted the would-be burglar.

***

“And he took your camcorder?” Bonnie asked when I called her to tell her about the failed burglary. She was staying with Margot in Cherry Creek since being released from the hospital, and had called me several times to ask about my progress, but each time I had nothing new to report–until now.

“If it is a he,” I answered. “Maybe it’s the gray haired lady again. We’ll never know now, will we? I wish I wasn’t so cheap and had bought a real surveillance system.”

“It’s not Patty, Jake.”

If only I could see her face, I’d know for sure if she was mad or joking. “I know, Bon, you already told me. Patty doesn’t drive.”

“Too bad he took your camcorder. Then we would know for sure.”

“Well, whoever it was, he or she is going to be in for a real shock next time they come snooping,” I wished she could see my face. I had just thought of a way to get even, and the expression on my face must have made me look like Batman’s Joker.

The pause on Bonnie’s end told me she didn’t understand. “I mean that literally, Bon, so don’t touch the doorknob until I deactivate my little surprise.”

“What?” she asked.

“I’m going to wire your door to the household current. Whoever touches it will be knocked flat.”

“Please don’t do that, Jake. It would be my luck the perpetrator will die of a heart attack and his family will sue me for everything I’ve got.” She did have a point; there were far too many instances lately where homeowners got in trouble for protecting their property.

In the end, I was able to reset my Rube Goldberg surveillance system with a camcorder Bonnie had that was even older than mine. This time I used my twenty-foot extension ladder to put the camera in a tree where it couldn’t be removed unless the intruder happened to be the offspring of Big Foot, or have a ladder of his own. I also hid the extension cord in the gutter so it wasn’t so obvious.

With my ladder locked up in my tool shed, Fred and I were finally on our way to Mosquito Pass.

By the time we passed Pine Junction, I knew we were not alone.

CHAPTER EIGHTEEN

This time I didn’t stop at the service station in Fairplay. I didn’t need the nosy owner calling his brother-in-law, Deputy White, to alert him of my presence. But I did need to check out who was following us, so I waited until I passed the station before pulling over to the side of the road.

My paranoia told me it was Craig Renfield. The car had been too far away to tell for sure, but I was pretty sure it was his beat-up Toyota. The driver pulled into the gas station but didn’t get out to pump gas. He must have been surprised when White’s brother-in-law came out to do it for him. I wasted no time in getting back on the road before he could follow us again.

***

I seemed to have lost the car by the time I turned onto Mosquito Gulch Road. Not that it would matter; the old Toyota couldn’t possibly make it up the pass.

Several ATVs and dirt bikes raced by me belching blue smoke from their two-cycle motors and spraying my windshield with rocks and dirt as I approached the spot where Bonnie and I had parked the last time we were here. There was some kind of off-road rally going on, or school must have let out for summer vacation. Either way, it was impossible to park on the road because of the traffic, so I put the old Wagoneer in four-wheel drive and left the road, heading for the mine.

Nobody seemed to notice our ascent up the side of the hill, for no one bothered to follow us. Perhaps the slope was too steep for them, but more likely they couldn’t see me past the clouds of dust they were creating.

The ground leveled off into what was once a mule trail just below the mine where a huge pile of tailings was created by some poor soul who had dug it out so many years ago. From there the trail went up the hill another hundred feet or so by cutting switchbacks into the side of the mountain until it wound its way to the top of the tailings. It was far too steep and narrow for my Jeep, so I parked, and would have to walk the rest of the way. Fred was out of the Jeep and sniffing the ground the minute I opened the door. The scent led him up the trail and out of my sight.

He couldn’t know the floor inside the mine had collapsed, sending Cory and Jennifer to their deaths. I didn’t want the same thing happening to my best friend, and ran after him.

I was gasping for air when I made it to the top, but found the breath to call him. “Fred! Get back here this instant.”

His head poked out of a dark hole in the side of the mountain.

“Come here, boy,” I pleaded, bending down to his level. To my relief, he ran toward me, and planted a big, wet kiss on my face.

“Can you be a good boy and stay out here while I check on that mine?” I asked, once I wiped off my face.

Fred sat on his haunches and barked. “Good, boy. Now, stay,” I said, and headed toward the entrance.

The yellow police tape stretched across the opening didn’t stop me; I was just glad it couldn’t be seen from the road where someone might see me breaking the law. I turned on my flashlight, stepped inside, and crept toward what used to be an old wood floor. Now it was just a hole in the ground with slivers of decaying wood around the perimeter that resembled rotten teeth waiting to devour their next victim. It looked like the mouth of the three-headed dog guarding the gates of Hell I had seen in a Greek Mythology class. I was trying to recall the creature’s name when Fred came up behind me, nearly making me drop my flashlight.

“Didn’t I tell you to stay outside?” I asked, grasping my chest. “Do I need to tie you to the Jeep?”

Fred barked, ran back toward the entrance, then turned around to look at me, and barked again. The hair along his spine looked like porcupine quills.

I hurried back to the entrance and grabbed his collar when he started to growl. “What is it, boy? Is someone out there?”