Spooked

black market?'

'Yes.'

Millard didn't answer but she knew he was struggling with the truth that they couldn't go to the man who was supposed to catch bad guys. When they pulled the shed doors wide and he shone his flashlight over the dozens and dozens of five-gallon gasoline tins, he gave a low whistle. Being Millard, he nicked up a tin, unscrewed the cap, smelled.

'Gas, all right.' There was a definite change in Millard's voice when he spoke. He sounded more grownup and very serious. 'We got to do something, Gretchen.'

She knew that. That's why she'd come to him. 'I know.' She, too, sounded somber. 'Listen, Millard, I got an idea. . . .'

He listened intently while she spoke, then he looked around the clearing, his round face intent, measuring. Then he grinned. 'Sure. Sure we can. Dad's got a bunch of powdered magnesium out in the storeroom. They used to use it with the old-fashioned photography.' He looked at her blank face. 'For the flash, Gretchen. Here's what we'll do. . . .'

Gretchen could scarcely bear the relief that flooded through her when the young lieutenant stopped in for coffee and pie Wednesday afternoon. When she refilled his cup, she said quickly, 'Will you look for the Spooklight tonight?'

The lieutenant sighed. 'Every night. Don't know why the darned thing's disappeared just when we started looking for it.'

'A friend of mine saw it last night. Near the Sister Sue mine.' She gripped her cleaning cloth tightly. 'If you'll look there tonight, I'm sure you'll find it.'

It was cloudy Wednesday night. Gretchen and Millard moved quickly around the clearing, Gretchen clambering up in the trees, Millard handing her the pie tins she'd brought from the cafe. She scrambled to high branches, fastened the tins with duct tape.

She was panting by the time she finished. She tried to catch her breath as Millard unwrapped the chain to the big shed. The big chain clanked as he tossed it aside. Gretchen helped him tug the doors wide open. She stepped inside and carefully tucked the newspaper discarded by the sheriff between two tins.

Millard was a dark shadow behind her. 'Do you think they'll come?'

'Yes. Oh, Millard, I believe they will. I do.' There had been a sudden sharpness in the young officer's eyes. She'd had the feeling he really listened to her. Maybe she felt that way because she wanted it so badly, but there was a calmness in her heart. He would come. He would come.

Millard took his place high in the branches of an oak that grew close to the boarded-over mine shaft. Gretchen clutched the huge oversize flashlight and checked over in her mind which trees had the pie tins and how she could move in the shadows to reach them.

Suddenly Millard began to scramble down from the tree. 'Gretchen, Gretchen, where are you?'

'Over here, Millard.' She moved out into the clearing. 'What's wrong?'

He was panting. 'It's the army, but they're going down the wrong road. They're on the road to Hell Hollow. They won't come close enough to see us.'

Gretchen could hear the noise now from the road on the other side of the hill.

'I'll go through the woods. I've got my stuff.' And Millard disappeared in the night.

Gretchen almost followed. But if Millard decoyed them this way, she had to be ready to do her part.

Suddenly a light burst in the sky and it would be easily seen from Hell Hollow road. Nobody who knew beans would have thought it was the Spooklight but, by golly, it was an odd, unexplained flash in the night sky. Then came another flash and another.

Shouts erupted. 'Look, look, there it is!'

'Quick. This way!'

'Over the hill!'

If Millard had been there, she would have hugged him. He'd taken lumps of the powdered magnesium, wrapped them in net (Gretchen found an old dress of her mom's and cut off the net petticoat), and added string wicks that he'd dipped, he told her earnestly, in a strong solution of potassium nitrate. Now he was lighting the wicks and using his slingshot to toss the soon-to-explode packets high in the air.

Gretchen heard Millard crashing back through the woods. He just had time to climb the oak when the soldiers swarmed into the clearing. Gretchen slithered from shadow to shadow, briefly shining the flash high on the tins. The reflected light quivered oddly high in the branches. She made her circuit, then slipped beneath a thick pine and lay on her stomach to watch.

Two more flares shone in the sky and then three in succession blazed right in front of the open shed doors.

The local Gazette used headlines as big as the Invasion of Sicily in its Friday edition:

ARMY UNIT FINDS BLACK MARKET GAS AT SISTER SUE MINE

Army authorities revealed Thursday afternoon that unexplained light flashing in the sky Wednesday night led a patrol to a cache of stolen gasoline . . .

It was the talk of the town. Five days later, when Deputy Sheriff Euel Carter was arrested, the local breakfast crowd was fascinated to hear from Mr. Hudson, who heard it from someone who heard it on the post, 'You know how Euel always did them damfool crossword puzzles. Well,' Mr. Hudson leaned across the table, 'seems he left a newspaper right there in the storage shed and the puzzle was all filled out in his handwriting. Joe Bob Terrell from the Gazette recognized his handwriting, said he'd seen it a million times in arrest records. The newspaper had Euel's fingerprints all over it and they found his prints on the gas tins. They traced the tins to Camp Crowder and they checked the prints of everybody in the motor pool and found some from this sergeant, and his were on half the tins and on the boards that sealed up that shack by the Sister Sue. They got 'em dead to rights.'

Gretchen poured more coffee and smiled. At lunch the nice officer— she'd known he would come that night— had left her a big tip. He'd looked at her, almost asked a question, then shook his head. She could go to Thompson's for a cherry fausfade in a little while and tell Millard everything she'd heard. It was too bad they couldn't tell