hurling them into the drink.
Eddie arrived and gawked at what they were doing. “Are you guys
Jack held up a trap. “Real y? Watch.”
He tossed it into the water.
Eddie slapped his hands against the side of his head. “What if Old Man Foster comes along and catches us?”
Weezy said, “Wel , his signs do say, ‘No Trapping.’ We’re just helping him out.”
“That means no trapping by anybody
Jack doubted that. Old Man Foster was just a name. No one had ever seen the guy. Everyone knew he owned this big piece of the Barrens and that
was about it. Though nobody saw them go up, fresh
you knew it they’d be back up again.
Another mystery of the Pine Barrens. A very minor one.
As for Eddie, Jack wasn’t sure if he was acting as the voice of good sense, or trying to duck the work of pul ing out the traps. He hated anything more
strenuous than working a joystick.
“Look,” Jack told him. “The sooner we get this done and get on our way, the less chance we’l have of being caught. So come on. Get to it.”
Eddie obeyed, but not without his trademark grumbling.
“Okay, okay. But I don’t have to ask whose idea this was. It’s got my crazy sister written al over it.”
In a flash Weezy was in his face. “What did you say?”
Eddie gave her a sheepish look. “Nothing.”
“You did! I heard you! Hasn’t this been talked about a mil ion times?” Eddie nodded without looking at her. “Right,” she said. “So you keep your mouth
shut or someone’s going to hear about this.”
Eddie sighed, saying, “Okay, okay,” and returned to working on a trap.
Baffled, Jack caught Weezy’s eye as she turned from her brother. “What—?”
“Family matter, Jack.” She turned away. “Don’t worry about it.”
Jack wasn’t worried. But he couldn’t help but wonder. He’d known these two al his life. What was this al about?
“Okay,” Weezy said, stopping her bike. “Here we are.”
After sinking al the traps, they’d pedaled like mad away from the spong. Along the way, Jack had wished for a few clouds to hide the sun and cool the
air, but the sky ignored him. At least now they’d arrived at their original destination.
Jack fol owed her gaze. “It’s just some burned-out patch.”
Fires were common in the Barrens during the summer. Tourists and nature lovers came to camp and sometimes got careless with their campfires or
Coleman stoves or cigarettes. Same with poachers. And many times Nature herself took the blame, setting a tree ablaze with a bolt of lightning.
Usual y a ranger in a fire tower, like the one on Apple Pie Hil , would spot the smoke and send out an alarm. Then the local and county volunteer fire
companies would go racing to the scene along the fire trails. But the smal er fires started during a storm often would burn only an acre or two before being
doused by the rain.
“Not just any burned-out patch.” She motioned Jack and Eddie to fol ow. “Come on. I’m going to show you something no one else—except for me—has
seen in a long, long time.”
Eddie said, “Aw, come on, Smurfette—”
She stopped and turned to him. “And you can cut the Smurfette bit. Unless you like ‘Pugsley.’”
“Okay, okay. But what about the firemen who put out the fire? They must have seen it.”
“No firemen for this one.”
Eddie snorted. “You psychic now?”
“Check it out.” She gestured around them. “What’s missing?”
Eddie and Jack did ful turns.
