The Alaskan Adventure by Franklin W. Dixon

Author:Franklin W. Dixon
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Aladdin

9 More Dirty Tricks

* * *

Joe was out back, trying to figure out a complicated piece of old machinery he’d spotted. He heard a strangled shout and looked up and recognized Lucky’s dirty green parka and faded red cap. Lucky had his arm in a choke hold around Frank’s neck.

Not for long. As Joe rushed to help his brother, Frank got grips on Lucky’s wrist and elbow, then made a sudden leap to the side. An instant later he had a hammerlock on his astonished attacker.

“Let go, you’re hurting me!” Lucky protested. “I’m an old man!”

“You should have thought of that before you jumped me,” Frank retorted. He released Lucky’s arm and took two quick steps backward, ready to meet any further attack.

Lucky scowled and rubbed the muscle of his upper arm. “You were spying on me, that’s what,” he said. “I can’t stand spies.”

“We just wanted to talk to you,” Joe said. “We didn’t mean to scare you.” The instant he said it, he realized that he had used the wrong word.

“Scare me!” Lucky said. “You think you scared me? Nobody scares me!”

“No, no,” Joe said hastily. “What I meant to say is that we didn’t mean to surprise you.”

Lucky spat on the ground. “You didn’t surprise me neither,” he growled. “You don’t creep up on Lucky Moeller. I saw you coming. I heard you coming. I even smelled you coming!”

“Well,” Frank said. “Now that we’re here, can we talk?”

Lucky peered at them from under his bushy eyebrows. “What about?” he asked, suspicious.

“We were wondering what you think about the ThemeLife plan,” Joe said. “How do you think people in Glitter ought to vote?”

Lucky’s face brightened. “You boys doing a survey? Well, I think everybody ought to vote yes. Why wouldn’t they?”

“What do you think is good about the ThemeLife plan?” asked Frank.

Lucky’s head bobbed up and down as he said, “The money, that’s what. The money! All those tourists coming to town with their pockets stuffed with money. Hundreds of them, thousands of them. And they’ll all come out here to tour my mine. It’ll be the biggest attraction around—the Gold Rush days live again. In a year or two I’ll make enough to retire to Florida.”

Lucky reached deep into his pants pocket and brought out a clenched fist. Stretching it out toward Joe and Frank, he said, “See this?”

They looked down at his rough, dirty hand. “What?” Frank asked.

Lucky opened his hand. A gold nugget the size of a bean gleamed in the weak sunlight.

“Wow!” Joe exclaimed.

Lucky smiled, revealing the stub of a front tooth.

“You found that here?” Frank asked.

“Sure I did,” Lucky replied. He turned and walked quickly toward the frozen creek, talking a mile a minute as he went. Frank and Joe had to hurry to stay up with him.

“I found this one thirty years ago,” he said, holding up the fist with the gold nugget. “Found it in the creek. This creek’s evil and cunning, but I’m smarter than it is. For thousands of years now, it’s been washing gold out of the hillsides and carrying it down by here.

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