CHAPTER FIFTEEN

End of the Trail

Sleeping in a pup tent was out of the question that night. Ankle-deep mud covered the ground as the rain continued unabated. Russ Steele bunked in with Paul Landers and the boys were invited to use three empty cots in one of the Canadian squad tents. It was pleasant sitting around in a circle on the cots by the dim light of an oil lamp, hearing the drops pelt and drum on the canvas sides of the tent. They shared these quarters with two older men who were veterans of a thousand outdoor adventures, and their stories held the boys spellbound.

But by ten o’clock none of them could keep their eyes open, and they put out the light and rolled up in their blankets. For nine hours, Sandy slept the deep, untroubled sleep of exhaustion until his uncle shook him gently awake the next morning.

“Time to break camp,” Russ told him. “The helicopter pilot is going to give us a free ride back to Red Lake. I don’t imagine Quiz will be able to do much walking on that bad leg for a while.”

“He’s not the only one,” Sandy groaned. “I feel about ninety years old. Every muscle in my body aches.”

“You’ll loosen up once you start moving around.”

In the next cot, Jerry pushed himself up drowsily on one elbow. “I’ll _never_ be the same again.”

Russ Steele laughed. “Hey now, that’s no way to talk. You boys have almost three weeks of your vacation to go.”

“What!” Jerry squawked. “It feels as though we’ve been living in the woods all our lives.”

“Too much for you, eh?”

“Heck, no!” Jerry said hastily. “I wouldn’t have traded a minute of it for anything.”

“Even the couple of hours we camped on the hill with that bomb?” Sandy asked slyly.

“Absolutely not,” Jerry maintained. “Only if it’s all the same to you guys. I’d just as soon spend the next couple of weeks camped smack in the middle of Red Lake aboard that nifty power launch—with plenty of water all around me.”

“I’ll buy that,” Sandy agreed.

Russ Steele nodded. “You can swim, fish and go water skiing. And explore the lake. It’s pretty big, you know. Some day, we can cruise down to the lower lake and visit the Indian Reservation.”

“Great!” Sandy looked around to make sure that their Canadian tent-mates were not around. “What about the bomb? Are we just going to take off and leave it?”

“Everything’s under control,” Russ assured him. “A special military detail arrived at dawn to expedite that matter. You’ll be relieved to learn that there is no trace of radioactivity in the area whatsoever. Evidently, the casing was not shattered by the impact.”

Quiz woke up just in time to hear the last part of the conversation. “That’s good. Last night I dreamed that I glowed in the dark like the radium numbers on a watch face. What a nightmare!”

“So what?” Jerry said brightly. “Just think, you could read in the dark by the light of your nose.”

Sandy swung his feet around to give Jerry’s cot a hard shove. “You didn’t think it was so funny yesterday, old buddy.”

Russ Steele stood up. “Get a move on, boys. We don’t want to miss that plane ride back to the lodge. I’ll meet you over at the mess tent.”

While they were dressing, Quiz began to speak self-consciously. “You know, I never did get a chance to thank you guys.”

Sandy and Jerry exchanged puzzled looks. “Thank us for what?”

“Oh, you know,” Quiz said gruffly. “I mean you two wouldn’t have been trapped by the fire if you hadn’t come back to look for me. Well, you risked your lives to save me. I don’t know quite how to say it, but—”

“Don’t say it,” Sandy cut in, bending over quickly to tie his shoelace. “Have it engraved on a medal.”

“Solid gold,” Jerry added. “None of this cheap gold-plated stuff.”

“Aw, wait a minute!” Quiz roared. “I’m trying to be serious.”

“On second thought,” Jerry said, “the town of Valley View might have given us a gold _cup_ if we hadn’t bothered.” He ducked as Quiz heaved a shoe at him.

“Oafs!” Quiz fumed.

Sandy laughed. “Old buddy, you know perfectly well that we couldn’t have deserted anybody in a spot like that—not even Pepper March.”

“Good old Pepper,” Jerry mused. “He sure will feel bad that _you_ got off that hill, Sandy. Just imagine, that would have left the quarterback slot on the school team wide open for him this fall.”

“Good night!” Sandy sat up straight. “That’s right, summer is practically over. In less than three weeks, the new term starts.”

Jerry slumped forward sadly on the edge of his cot. “You know what I just did? I just went and ruined the rest of my vacation.” He sniffed as the smell of frying bacon drifted into the tent. “But not my appetite. Come on, you guys, let’s go to chow.”

SANDY STEELE ADVENTURES

1. BLACK TREASURE

Sandy Steele and Quiz spend an action-filled summer in the oil fields of the Southwest. In their search for oil and uranium, they unmask a dangerous masquerader.

2. DANGER AT MORMON CROSSING

On a hunting trip in the Lost River section of Idaho, Sandy and Mike ride the rapids, bag a mountain lion, and stumble onto the answer to a hundred-year-old mystery.

3. STORMY VOYAGE

Sandy and Jerry James ship as deck hands on one of the “long boats” of the Great Lakes. They are plunged into a series of adventures and find themselves involved in a treacherous plot.

4. FIRE AT RED LAKE

Sandy and his friends pitch in to fight a forest fire in Minnesota. Only they and Sandy’s uncle know that there is an unexploded A-bomb in the area to add to the danger.

5. SECRET MISSION TO ALASKA

A pleasant Christmas trip turns into a startling adventure. Sandy and Jerry participate in a perilous dog-sled race, encounter a wounded bear, and are taken as hostages by a ruthless enemy.

6. TROUBLED WATERS

When Sandy and Jerry mistakenly sail off in a stranger’s sloop instead of their own, they land in a sea of trouble. Their attempts to outmaneuver a desperate crew are intertwined with fascinating sailing lore.

PUBLISHED BY SIMON AND SCHUSTER

Transcriber’s Notes

--Copyright notice provided as in the original—this e-text is public domain in the country of publication.

--Silently corrected palpable typos; left non-standard spellings and dialect unchanged.

--In the text versions, delimited italics text in _underscores_ (the HTML version reproduces the font form of the printed book.)