The Dare Sisters by Jess Rinker

Author:Jess Rinker
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Imprint

15

Captain Jolene Takes the Helm

“It’s the answer to the riddle,” I say as we run toward the park with shovels over our shoulders. Mom tried to stop us since we’d just washed up, but I promised her we wouldn’t be long. I knew that was probably a lie, but this was important and she would have to understand. Besides, they were still so distracted by sorting through things that she hadn’t even turned on the oven yet. They didn’t see us go into the shed for the shovels.

We jog down the street, turn left, and pass the lighthouse. “Don’t you get it?” I say. “The Elbow Tree—the treasure has to be buried beneath the Elbow Tree. It makes perfect sense!”

“I know, I do get it, Sav, but don’t you think we should wait until tomorrow?” Frankie asks. “We’re not going to find buried treasure and still get home in time for bed.”

“How do you know?” I ask. “Besides, so what? We have to get started. I’ll never be able to sleep if we don’t at least go look.”

“Stop flailing your arms around and tell me what’s going on,” she says. So I tell her every detail about Mr. Throop stopping me in the hall at the museum. And even about the book with Throop’s signature in it.

“Are you sure he said it like that?” Frankie asks.

“I’m surer than sure,” I say. “Somehow he knows about the map. He’s after the treasure.”

“So Grandpa stole his sketchbook of plants?”

“Or maybe it got mixed in with Grandpa’s stuff.”

Jolene runs behind us with a tiny shovel made for taking ash out of a fireplace. I ask her if she can see okay while she’s running with the eye patch on and she says, “Shiver me timbers! Why does everyone ask me that?”

“Just checking,” I say.

When we reach the entrance of the park, we kick off our shoes into the sand and I turn to her again. “Now it’s all up to you, Captain Jolene.” I salute her.

Her eyes—or eye—gets wide. Then it starts to tear up.

“Now don’t cry,” Frankie says. “You can do it. You can remember. Look, we’ll do it bit by bit. Start walking, and when we come to a fork, you do your best to choose, okay?”

Jolene nods as Frankie wipes her tear away. And then we start to walk. The sandy trails of the park are narrow and bend this way and that, like whoever made them couldn’t make up their mind which trees to walk around. We’ve been in nearly every inch of the park but I can’t remember where that Elbow Tree is. Our footsteps are silent as we tread through, and we’re surrounded by a canopy of twisted branches and moss. An occasional jay screeches overhead. Little sparrows flit off the path into scrubby bushes.

For a long time Jolene does great, shouting out left or right every time we come to a split in the trail with no hesitation. But after about the fifth turn, I can tell she’s not as certain anymore.

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