Monster in the Mountains by Shane Peacock

Author:Shane Peacock [Peacock, Shane]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Nimbus Publishing, Limited
Published: 2019-06-04T14:27:01+00:00

11

Confession in the Forest

Cosmos greene wasn’t in any mood to believe me about what I’d seen in the woods. I needed to talk to Alice. Alone. So, I told Cosmos we’d take the first shuttle bus back to town, and he could go on ahead. He put up a bit of a fight at first, but soon he gave up.

As we watched him drive off, Alice turned to me.

“You really think you saw it, Dylan?” She was staring into my eyes.

I nodded.

“Then we have to find it! We have to. We can’t miss this chance!” Her face was lit up.

I was really torn. My pulse was racing. I wanted to do this…and I didn’t. A big part of me wanted to go home and curl up in my bed.

“But we’d need an adult to come with us,” I finally sputtered. “One who has what it takes to track it…who understands, who will listen to us. Seen any of those around lately?”

We looked at each other. We were both thinking the same thing.

Uncle Walter.

Then Alice sighed. “But he’s retired…from everything.”

At that moment I realized what I really wanted from my uncle. I wanted him to be what he once was. I wanted him to lead me on this amazing adventure.

“Let’s un-retire him,” I snapped.

“But we don’t even know where he is.”

“Oh yes we do.”

“We do?”

“Think about it. Where do you think he’d go if he wanted to be alone?”

I could almost see the light bulb turn on above Alice’s head.

We weren’t far from the spot where Walter had driven into the trees with his Hummer while we’d hidden in the trunk. We were sure we could find it, and then all we had to do was follow the tracks through the bush.

But when we got to where he’d entered the forest, his vehicle wasn’t anywhere to be seen. What did that mean? Worried, we kept going.

It must have taken us an hour to find the hideout.

By the time we arrived the sun was almost setting over Harrison Lake. The trees were waving gently in the darkening sky, like giants warning us. It took us a while to actually find the stump, even though we were standing right near it. I hadn’t realized how perfectly it was camouflaged. We couldn’t even see the tree fort, high above us.

We pulled up the stump and went underground. Not long after, we were climbing up the spiralling staircase and then stepping out onto the wooden floor. At first, we thought the place was empty. It was very dark. But at the far end of the room, in the shadows, we could make out a faint light, candlelight. And soon we could see Uncle Walter sitting there, just staring into space.

“Dylan?” he asked quietly, without even turning around.

“Yes?”

“Alice?”

“Yes, Mr. Middy.”

“She fell off my back,” he said out of the blue, very quietly.

I knew what he was going to tell us. We sat down at his feet.

“That’s her picture that you saw in my hallway. I suppose I was old enough to know better…carrying her on my back across a high wire.

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