The Hidden Valley Mystery Read online

  Hunching low, Mike and Gunnar raised their arms to protect their faces and crashed into the tangled brush. Branches whipped Mike’s bare arms and legs. He longed to slow down, to clear his way. But he couldn’t stop. The barking was louder!

  “Run, Mike, Run!” Gunnar cried.

  “Gunnar this way,” Mike grabbed Gunnar’s arm, trying to drag his friend sideways to where the trees thinned.

  Gunnar yanked him back. “No! Poison ivy!”

  Mike gulped. Let twigs and bushes scratch his legs. That was better than a stinging wet rash, any day.

  Moments later they burst through the bushes and broken wire fence onto the golf course. Past the dogleg and down a slight slope, straight to the river they dashed. Under a huge willow tree they threw themselves flat on the cool sand, gasping for breath.

  “We ... are safe here,” Gunnar panted. “No dogs ... allowed ... on the golf course.”

  Mike’s puffing calmed. He rolled onto his back and stared up at the willow overhead. Like long, green hair, its strands drooped around them. He listened. “Hey, there’s no more barking.” Instead, he heard the stream trickling. He rolled onto his side and gazed at the water. A few metres away, four flat stones gently broke its flow. Mike sat up. “Look, Gunnar,” he pointed at the stones, “I bet we can cross right there. We don’t have to walk all the way to the footbridge at the fourth green.”

  Gunnar pushed himself up. “You’re right.” On his feet, he brushed the sand off his beige pants and yellow shirt. “Let’s go!” he shouted and ran. Hop, jump, jump, jump, his long legs took him easily across the stones. He stood grinning on the other side.

  Mike tried to follow. He hopped to the first stone. He tottered, swinging his arms in the air to get his balance back.

  “Hurry up, slowpoke!” Gunnar shouted.

  Mike sucked in his breath. He studied the next three stones. They sat much further apart and were smaller. He had to take them fast, or really lose his balance and fall into the water. He closed his eyes and breathed deeply. Then he leaped. “One! Two! Three!” he shouted, and landed beside Gunnar.

  Gunnar gave him a friendly smack on the back. Up the shallow bank they strode together.

  “Hey,” Mike waved toward their left, “that looks like a path.” In and out, through birches, evergreens, and tall bushes, a trail wound up the ravine slope.

  “So, let’s find out what’s on top,” Gunnar replied. “Last one up is a rotten egg.”

  “You stink already!” Mike laughed, but Gunnar dashed ahead.

  Mike ground after him. His legs might be shorter than Gunnar’s, but his muscles felt like pistons from racing his bike. Especially going uphill, he could outlast his friend. One, two, three. One, two, three. His running shoes beat a steady rhythm along the path.

  Half way up, Gunnar puffed, “This is ... slower ... than I thought!”

  Steady and sure, Mike’s pace was closing the distance between them. Ahead, the path grew steeper, then veered out of sight, around a clump of birches. If he burst forward, right where the path turned, Mike could cut in front of daddy longlegs.

  Gunnar’s strides lagged. Now Mike had his chance. He steeled his muscles. Heaving his shoulders forward, Mike leaped across the bend in the path, ahead of Gunnar. But as his feet hit ground, the loose soil crumbled beneath him.

  Falling! He was falling!

  CHAPTER 4 – A Close Call

  Mike’s running shoe shot through thin air. “AAGH!” he screamed, as down, down, he plunged until, like a bag of flour, he flopped against a small ridge of grassy soil. The ridge crumbled under his weight. Down again he hurtled, twisting and sliding lower through loose gravel. His knees burned. Flailing, his fingers strained for a root, a rock, a bush—anything to grab. His palms scratched on twigs and stones. Lips and tongue thickened with dust. He closed his eyes against the grit. Faster and faster, down he sped. Would he never hit bottom, never stop tumbling, helpless as an ant hosed down a wall?

  THUMP. Mike sprawled onto his back. Had he really stopped moving at last? The ground beneath his arms and legs felt cool. He opened his eyes. Above him, across the blue puffed a cloud shaped like a lamb.

  From far away, Gunnar’s voice echoed. “Mi-ike! Mi-ike! Are you O.K.?”

  Slowly Mike turned his head to the right. He gaped.

  “Ho lee!” he gulped. A cliff towered above him. It was steep, alright. No wonder he couldn’t stop falling and sliding. Thank goodness the jutting earth was sandy and loose. It slowed his drop, kept his bones from smashing.

  “Mi-ike!”

  Mike raised one hand to shade his eyes. Further right of the cliff face, midway down, Gunnar sprang through the trees.

  Mike lay back on the damp sand. Again he heard the stream’s trickle. He rolled his head to the other side, toward it. He was lying less than a metre from the water’s edge, near jagged rocks that broke the shallows.

  “Whew!” he thought, easing up on one elbow, “A few more centimetres, and I would have smashed my head.”

  He sat up and leaned forward. He breathed deeply, in and out, a few times. He looked at his knees. No wonder they burned. Two wide scrapes bubbled with blood. He upturned his stinging palms. Both were laced with bright red scratches where he’d grasped for a root, a stone, to stop his fall. He pulled his ankles toward him. His running shoes weighed like cement blocks. Bending low, he yanked off his right shoe. Out cascaded a little mountain of pebbles and sand. Painfully, he bent to the left and tugged off his other shoe. “Yuk,” he muttered, as dirt grated between his wiggling hot toes.

  He glanced at the stream. That water looked so fresh and cool! Leaning sideways, he took a deep breath, heaved himself up on one arm, and tottered to his feet. He breathed deeply again, then stepped into the bubbling current. The ankle-deep water sent a delicious chill up his burning legs.

  “Mi-ike! Mike!” Out of the trees, along the cliff base, Gunnar raced toward him. Stumbling to the river bank, he stopped and panted. “Are you ... O.K.?”

  “What took you so long?” Mike joked. “Scared of the fast way down?”

  “Don’t kid around, Mike,” Gunnar grabbed his friend’s arm. “You’re lucky you’re only messed up with scratches and scrapes. If you’d hit those rocks, you’d be a dead man.”

  “Yeah,” Mike muttered, leaning on Gunnar. He was glad his friend steadied him. He looked again where the gravelly wall of earth and sand towered above. “‘Dead Man’s Cliff’ that’s a good name, alright.”

  “We’d better get you back to my house. Those hands and knees need first aid.”

  “Right,” Mike answered. He slung an arm over Gunnar’s shoulder and hobbled out of the stream.

  “You sure you can walk all the way?” Gunnar asked.

  “I’ll be O.K.,” Mike replied. “Nothing’s sprained or broken. I just feel a little dazed and sore.”

  Gunnar picked up Mike’s shoes and led him along the river bank. “We’d better go home our usual way,” he said. “We’ve had enough adventure.”

  “Enough?” Mike managed to laugh. “At least until after lunch.”

  CHAPTER 5 – Time Out

  In the shade of Gunnar’s front porch, Mike was glad just to sit in the high canvas chair. He leaned back comfortably. Up he eased one stiff leg, then the other, until the heels of both running shoes rested on the wooden railing. Two soft squares covered his knees, glowing white against his tan. After washing Mike’s scrapes with disinfectant, Gunnar had patched them with gauze.

  “Your mom will freak out when you walk in with these,” Gunnar had chuckled. All Mike’s friends knew how much Mrs. Steriou fretted. Gunnar was lucky both his parents worked Saturdays.

  “No way,” Mike had snorted back. “I’m whipping these patches off before I even get up the driveway!”

  For now, though, while Gunnar was in the house making sandwiches, Mike could relax. No more shows of bravery. He closed his eyes. Down the street he heard a distant lawnmower rrrr to a start. A car hummed past. Near his rig
ht ear, something small buzzed, then brushed away. A breeze rustled the lilac bushes surrounding the porch. He breathed in their scent....

  He was floating, floating so high his arms encircled a white cloud shaped like a lamb.

  “Baa,” said the cloud.

  Mike looked down. Miles and miles below shone the earth, no bigger than a blue golf ball. He tightened his hug on the lamb.

  “Baa!” it bleated again and started to buck.

  Mike tried to lock his grip. The lamb only bucked harder. Its soft whiteness grew dark, hard, like a big rock. As the rock rumbled and shook, its sharp edges cut into Mike’s flesh. Blood streamed over his hands. His slippery fingers couldn’t hold on. The rock wrenched from his grasp, hurling him into space. Falling—he was falling

  “Hey, dreamboat, wake up.”

  Mike felt something tug at his shoe. He opened his eyes. A shadow bent over him.

  “Hey, dreamboat, it’s me, Freddy.”

  Mike blinked. “Oh, Freddy. Hi there. Was I asleep?”

  Freddy eased his solid hips back onto the railing. His navy shorts and light blue shirt looked as neat and fresh as his freckled face and trim orange hair. “Sure you were asleep,” Freddy answered, “if you call moaning, and waving your arms around, sleep.”

  A third voice joined in. “You looked real funny, Mike. Were you having a nightmare?”

  Mike turned. Beside him squatted Tuan, his thin almond skinned arms poking like matchsticks from a baggy green T shirt that reached to his knees. Of all Mike’s friends, little Tuan looked the youngest, even though he was half a year older.

  Once, Tuan had explained his small size. “In my village, during the war, we never got enough to eat. Until we escaped, and the boat brought us to Canada, I went to sleep every night with my stomach growling.”

  Despite what Tuan and his family had suffered, his large, dark eyes twinkled when he spoke. “Mike, you bounced around so much in your sleep, you almost fell off the chair.”

  The porch door squeaked. Gunnar peered through the screen. “He was probably dreaming about Dead Man’s Cliff.” With an elbow Gunnar eased the door open. One hand held a platter of cheese and lettuce sandwiches. In the other teetered four cans of pop. “That’s where he got those patches on his knees.”

  Freddy and Tuan jumped up and grabbed a pop and sandwich each. Gunnar held out the platter to Mike. Tuan squatted again beside him.

  Freddy sat back on the rail and swallowed a chunk of bread. “Dead Man’s Cliff? Where’s that?”

  “I bet I know,” Tuan piped in. “That’s the cliff not far from my apartment, at the end of the street. I’ve climbed down there many times.”

  “Yeah, sure,” Freddy glugged back some pop, “when you’re not glued to your computer.”

  Tuan giggled and continued, “The first summer my family came to Canada, my brother and I scooped a hide out in that cliff. We used to crawl inside and look at comic books—to learn English.”

  “Yeah,” Freddy chuckled, “important words like ‘wham’ and ‘bang’. That’s all you knew your first day at school.”

  Mike sat up. He stared at Tuan. “You dug holes in that cliff?” He couldn’t imagine anyone playing there by choice, not after his nasty fall.

  “Oh, you know Tuan,” Freddy stuffed another sandwich into his mouth, “he’s so light and fast, he could crawl across a ceiling and not fall.”

  “I had to go somewhere,” Tuan giggled. “With seven people crowded in one apartment, it’s too noisy for me to read. I still go there sometimes.”

  Gunnar swallowed a crust. “Only now you read books about computer programming, not Batman comics,” he added. He propped his back against the door and crossed one long foot over the other.

  “So, Mike, you want to come see my hide out?” Tuan asked, mischief dancing in his eyes. “Maybe you could add another patch to your knees.”

  Mike groaned and flopped back on the chair.

  Gunnar uncrossed his legs and slid down onto the floor to sit beside Tuan. “Tuan, when you and your brother played on that cliff, did you ever see a mansion below?” Gunnar asked.

  Tuan nodded. “There is another small valley north of the golf course. Once, late in the autumn, when the branches were bare, I did see a big house.”

  Gunnar continued. “Did you notice anything strange going on there?”

  Tuan thought. He shook his head. “In summer the leaves are too thick to see much. After school starts, and the weather turns cold, my hide-out is the school library instead.”

  Freddy thumped his feet to the porch. “Who cares about some big old house?” He beckoned the others closer. “I think we should take Mike to the show at the Cinetron.” He glanced around. His voice dropped to a whisper. “I overheard Maria say she and Elise are going this afternoon.”

  “Oh, Mike,” Tuan shook his finger, “you didn’t tell us you had a girlfriend.”

  “I don’t!” Mike snorted. “It’s Freddy who’s crazy about girls, not me. Elise is just somebody in my Math class.”

  “And Maria?” Gunnar kicked Freddy’s leg. “Is she in your Math class too?”

  “Shut up, you guys.” Freddy bent toward the platter by Gunnar’s shoe. He snatched the last sandwich. “Do you want to go to the show or not?”

  Gunnar laughed. “You didn’t even tell us what’s playing.”

  “Revenge of the Bat People,” Freddy answered.

  “It sounds good to me,” said Tuan.

  “Me too,” Gunnar agreed.

  Mike eased himself off the chair. He stretched. “O.K., guys, it’s settled. Let’s go.”

  CHAPTER 6 – The Van

  In the Cinetron lobby, the boys said good bye to Elise and Maria. With the rest of the movie crowd, they jostled through the glass doors onto the sidewalk. Outside, the air still felt warm, although cars were pulling into the plaza’s exit lane. Food Basics and Shopper's Drug Mart had closed.

  “Oh, man, that ending was gross,” Mike chortled.

  Freddy gave him a friendly shove in the back. “What do you mean? I loved how the mountain blew up at the end.”

  Up the sidewalk, Tuan darted ahead of them. He twirled around, his giant green T shirt flaring like a skirt. He tilted his head to one side and clasped both hands. In a high pitched voice he squealed, “Oh, help me, Freddy dear. Your Maria is so scared.”

  Mike bent double with laughter. They couldn’t tease him about Elise. She’d sat on Maria’s other side, on the aisle. “So,” Gunnar slapped a long arm around Freddy’s shoulder, “now we know why you picked this movie. To make Maria grab your hand in the dark.”

  Freddy shook off Gunnar’s arm and walked ahead.

  Tuan danced closer. He twirled around again. “Oh, Freddy dear, squeeze my hand harder.”

  Freddy’s face reddened. “Shut up, Tuan,” he growled through gritted teeth.

  Tuan paid no attention. Around Freddy he circled. He puckered his lips and fluttered his eyelids.

  Mike watched Freddy’s shoulders tighten.

  Gunnar stepped in between. “That’s enough teasing,” he warned Tuan.

  But caught up in the game, Tuan only danced faster. He darted in front of Freddy and squeaked, “Give Maria a kiss!”

  “I said shut up!” Freddy shouted and lunged. His fist met only air. Out of reach, Tuan scampered across the sidewalk and into the parking lot. He blew Freddy a kiss.

  “I’ll get you!” Freddy howled, his face deep red. After Tuan he ran, muscles bulging, running shoes thumping from concrete to asphalt.

  Tuan wove and darted through thinning rows of cars. Freddy charged after him. Into the centre they ran, toward The Beer Store on the far side. The store was closing for the day. In the distance, the last customers trickled out.

  Mike and Gunnar chuckled as they watched. They knew what would happen now. By the time Tuan let Freddy catch him, they’d both have run off their mischief and anger. Together they’d flop on The Beer Store bench.

  Mike shook his head, as Tuan s
kipped left, just missing a stray shopping cart. “He sure is quick on his feet.” Gunnar shaded his eyes. “Try to tell that to Freddy.” He laughed. “He’s still tearing after Tuan.”

  Beyond the runners, Mike’s eye caught a stocky figure, laden with cases, striding out of the beer store. Before the glass doors flashed closed, the man turned back and shouted something inside. Swinging his cases forward again, he stomped to an old grey van parked down the curb. He opened the back and slung the cases in. After whamming the door shut, he stomped around to the driver’s seat and heaved himself up.

  “There goes Tuan!” Gunnar shouted.

  Mike chuckled as Tuan skirted more shopping carts, circled a lamp post, and dashed into the home stretch, Freddy plodding behind. A moment later, Mike heard an engine roar and wheels squeal to a start. He grabbed Gunnar’s arm.

  Tuan darted toward the bench. Without even slowing, the van swung straight toward Mike’s friend.

  Mike gasped. The van! “Tuan! Tuan! Watch out!” he bellowed.

  Wheels screeched. Dust few up. As if in slow motion, Mike watched Tuan’s body twist and fly into the air, his long green T-shirt wrapping around him. Without a sound, he doubled over and crumpled onto the asphalt. The van lurched to a stop.

  “Tuan!” Mike was running—running, hard as he could across the lot. His scraped knees ached with each jolt, as one foot, the other, hit ground. But despite his stiffened muscles and pain, he had to run. Easily Gunnar’s long strides passed him.

  Lagging behind, alone, Mike felt hot tears stream down his cheeks and blow off into the wind. But he didn’t care who saw. All he cared about was Tuan.

  Feet pounding the asphalt, he kept his eyes glued ahead. Gunnar and Freddy knelt on the ground beside Tuan’s small form. On the sidewalk behind them, bystanders gathered. “Gunnar!” Mike yelled. He staggered closer.

  Gunnar turned and waved. “He’s O.K.,” he shouted.

  With Freddy’s help, Tuan sat up. A couple of adults bent over his friend, nodded, then walked away. The crowd on the sidewalk broke up.

  Mike slowed to a hobble. Bending his head, with the backs of his fists he wiped off the last tears. When he looked up he saw the van crawling toward him. Still a short distance away, the stocky man leaned out the driver’s window and peered back. Mike glared at his hard, unshaven face. Behind bobbed the head of a huge black dog.