“Oh man, how can you say that?” asked Jack. “Ben’s the best.”
“He’s
normally
the best,” said Stephen. “About this, he’s only
fair
.” Stephen tilted his hand back and forth.
“I think he’ll come around,” said Jack.
“Hey—what’s this thing?” Stephen had picked up a cuttlefish bone from the shelf. Jack began to explain it’s origin. A few words in and Ben came back in the room.
“What happened?” asked Jack.
“No answer,” said Ben. “Can’t get my brother either. I left a voicemail for my dad though.”
“Sounds like we’re on for this afternoon,” Stephen said through a mouthful of ham and cheese.
“If so, we have to get around Smoker,” said Jack.
“We ought to stay off the path completely,” said Ben. He grabbed his bag and pulled out his sandwich.
**********
“We should check the fishing line,” said Jack. They sat in the woods near the edge of the hotel’s clearing. It took a lot of effort and time to reach the hotel and stay away from the normal path.
“Go ahead,” said Stephen. “We’ll wait.”
“Okay.”
Jack crept off to their left and, keeping his head down, made his way up the gully. From the corner of the building, Jack began down the old path and then bent over to look at the ground. A second later he stood up and flashed an “Okay” sign to Ben and Stephen.
Ben grabbed the ladder and Stephen helped him lift it into position. They got it against the side of the porch and then heard a distant ringing. Ben dropped his end of the ladder and pulled out his phone.
"Huh," said Jack, surprised the phone worked.
“Hey Dad,” said Ben, trying to sound normal. He listened for several moments. “She said that we have to…” he continued. “I just thought…” Throughout the call, Ben never finished a sentence. “What about…” Finally, Ben said “Ok, thanks,” and hung up.
“Was that your dad?” asked Stephen.
“Who else?” asked Ben. “He doesn’t know what my mom’s up to, but he thinks it’s no good.”
“How’s his trial going?”
“Good, I guess.”
“But you’re not going to see him?” asked Jack.
“Nope—I guess not. Must be something my mom wants me to do then,” he said.
“I hope you’re here on Thursday,” said Jack. “That’s when we’re supposed to get the new envelope.”
“Oh yeah,” said Stephen. “We’re going to have to think of a way to watch the place all day.”
“Why day?” asked Ben. “What if they deliver it at night?”
Jack answered—“You’re right, it would be best to start watching Wednesday night, but I don’t know how since we’re sleeping in the house.”
“Do you have a video camera?” Stephen asked.
“Yeah, but we can’t leave it out all night,” said Jack. “Besides, the batteries and tapes only last a few hours.”
“Let’s get inside,” said Stephen. “We can figure this out later.”
**********
On the way in they stopped at each room and Jack wrote down what they knew in a little notebook. Their goal was to document the tricks and traps so they wouldn’t forget anything. It didn’t take them long to write a sentence or two about the rooms—but they still couldn’t figure out a reliable way to trigger the door to the white room. When they reached the end of tripwire hall, they extinguished their lights and waited. For nearly ten minutes they debated possible solutions to inspiring the door to open.
Finally, the sound began, the crack showed and the door swung open to the blinding, white room. Jack wrote “?” in his notebook under “Open door to white room.”
In the attic section, Ben had an idea to solve their problem with the white room—“Why don’t we just figure out how to disarm this trap and lower down the ladder? Then we won’t have to go through the white room at all.”
“I don’t like the idea of breaking this trap,” said Stephen. “Seems like cheating.”
“You guys already broke through the wall in the white room—what are you worried about?”
“I’d be afraid that we wouldn’t be able to trust that ladder,” said Jack. “I mean what if we thought we had the trap disabled but it turned out it was still set?”
“Good point,” said Ben. “At least we know this way is safe.”
“Come on, let’s go down to the spiral room,” said Stephen. “I’ve got an idea about that.”
Stephen jumped across the pit and then they tossed their packs over to him. Once the gear was safely across, Ben and Jack followed.
“So what’s your idea?” asked Jack.
“It’s that people under the stairs thing—I’ll show you,” said Stephen.
They walked through the attic quickly and descended to the spiral room. Stephen explained his theory as soon as they had all reached the spiral tiles.
“See, we checked all the walls in here, but we didn’t check the stairs,” said Stephen.
He walked over to the narrow stairs and set his light down on the floor. Starting with the bottom stair, Stephen tried to lift the tread and pressed against the riser.
“Look at that,” said Jack as he crossed to the stairs to join Stephen. “Look at the wall there.”
Jack pointed his light at the wall above the third tread. There were faint scrape marks up the stud of the bare wall. He reached out to touch the scrape as Stephen lifted on the third tread. His hand was nearly pinched against the stud as a section of the stairs rose easily at Stephen’s push.
“Wow,” said Jack.
“Hold this open, will you?” Stephen asked Jack. He was holding the stairs up with his left hand.
The section stood five stairs high and it pivoted on a hinge at the top. By stepping over the bottom few stairs, Stephen was able to duck through the hole created. He reached back over the stairs to grab his light.
“I think it’s weighted or something,” said Jack. “I don’t have to hold it up—it just stays here.”
“Probably a spring,” said Ben who had come up behind Jack. “Do we have something to prop it open with so it doesn’t close behind us?”
“I think I’ve still got that piece of broom handle,” said Jack. He pulled the piece of wood out of his pack. It was about eighteen inches long. Jack wedged it between the exposed studs and the bottom of the raised section of stairs.
Ben looked at the arrangement with his flashlight. “Oh, look,” he said. Ben was pointing at a latch build onto the underside of the hinged stairs that extended out and engaged a stud. “I think we’re supposed to use this.” He moved the mechanism and it locked against the stud, holding up the stairs.
When they caught up to Stephen he had shuffled down the passage. The walls, floor, and ceiling were all plywood at only five feet high, requiring the boys to hunch over and shuffle their feet.
“Watch where you’re stepping,” said Ben. “Could be another pit or something.”
“Ben, can you set your alarm?” asked Jack. “I want to make sure we start back to the house at four so we’re not late for dinner.”
Ben paused and set his watch while Stephen roamed ahead. Jack waited for Ben and then the two of them moved quickly to catch up. The hall was full of turns and the boys became disoriented; not sure which direction they were headed.
“Man, this is small,” said Jack.
They came to a four-way intersection.
Stephen had stopped, blocking the hall. “Which way?” he asked.
Ben had an idea—“My brother’s friend goes in caves all the time and he said they always put arrows to mark the way out. Anyone got a marker or something.”
“I’ve got a Sharpie,” said Stephen. He pulled it out of his pack and handed it to Ben.
Ben leaned down and drew an arrow on the floor. It pointed back the way they had come. “So, if we have to get back out, we just follow the arrows,” said Ben.
“That’s cool,” said Jack.
“But which way do we go?” asked Stephen.
“I guess it doesn’t matter,” said Ben. “But if we find a dead end or something, at least we won’t get lost.”
“Let’s keep going straight,” said Jack.
For almost an hour they walked hunched over through the corridors. They marked many more intersections, and plenty of dead ends. When they came to a dead end they would back-track to the previous branch and then put a small “x” on the floor. Eventually they came to something new: the passage took a vertical jog. The ceiling opened, but they faced a wall about five feet high.
“This maze is in ‘3D,’” said Stephen. “Awesome—help me up.”
“Wait, how are we all going to get up?” asked Ben.
“Two will go up and then help the other,” said Stephen. “You go up—I’ll show you.” He laced his fingers together and held out his hands. Ben put a hand on Stephen’s shoulder and then stepped up on to his hands. Stephen lifted him a couple of feet and Ben pulled himself up to the next level.
“You go now,” Stephen said to Jack.
“Nah, I’m lighter than you two. I should go last,” Jack said.
“Makes sense,” said Stephen. “Give me a boost then, would ya?”
Jack boosted Stephen up and Ben helped from above. Then they both leaned over the edge and held out their hands for Jack to pull him up.
“Let me try something first,” said Jack. He handed his light and pack up to Ben.
The passage measured only five feet wide and Jack went to the far right side. Gripping the lip with both hands, he walked his feet up the left-hand side of the wall until he got a foot over the edge. Pulling himself most of the way up, he shot out his left hand at the last second and Ben rolled him onto the edge.
“Pretty good, son,” said Stephen. “I don’t think you even needed help.”
“I need to work on the end-part,” said Jack. “I was stuck.”
Down the corridor they took a left turn followed by right. Another thirty feet along and they faced a five foot drop. Stephen crouched, about to jump down, when Ben stopped him.
“Hey, we only have five minutes until four. Maybe we should head back,” said Ben.
“I just want to see what’s down here,” Stephen said. “We’ll head back when the alarm goes off.”
“We’re just going to have to climb back up though,” said Ben.
“I vote for going until the alarm,” said Jack. “That’s why we set it.”
“Okay,” Ben relented.
They jumped down and found that the hall turned right almost immediately. Six feet later, it ended with a door. Diminutive, but perfectly proportional, the door had an oval-shaped brass handle. It was set into the plywood wall, and it was painted blue with a blue frame.
“Can we even fit through that thing?” Jack asked.
Ben’s alarm sounded and the boys jumped at the sound.
“Let’s go,” said Ben.
They retraced their steps and came to where the corridor jogged up again. Stephen tried Jack’s technique and Ben had to push him over the lip when he could go no further. Ben suffered a similar fate and Stephen grabbed his belt loop and hauled him up.
After handing up his pack, Jack tried a new idea. He used the same positions for his feet and hands, but trotted up to the wall and executed his climb in one smooth motion. Like a high-jumper, he let his momentum pull his weight up and over the edge. Ben and Stephen clapped and whooped approval as Jack made it up on his own.
**********
“You boys are only half awake,” said Jack’s mom at dinner. “Rough day?”
Jack’s had his head turned to the side and propped up on one hand. Ben and Stephen both slumped over their plates.
“We were trying to track a deer,” said Jack. “But it ran too fast.”
“Elbows, Jack,” said his father.
“Hey mom, can we write our diaries in the morning? I’m tired,” said Jack.
“Sure, but they better be done before you go out,” she replied.