since you were wee tykes by this point I do know what a lie sounds like in your mouth and the infinitely more stammered sound of you telling the truth Although you really do need to get better at organized public oration he went on It’s a valuable life skill that requires cultivation I made note cards Chris pointed out But before his speech he’d shuffled them out of his hands and all over the floor and then realized that he hadn’t numbered numbered them and finally given up and told the whole story off the top of his head while Carrie sorted the cards She’d interrupted a couple times to clarify usually usually when she felt that Chris was not fully explaining things but other than that she had let the story come from Chris Though she had added a few note cards of her own which couldn’t possibly end well Chris had also glossed over Dr McRae in his summary summary of their adventures He still didn’t entirely trust Dr McRae and Professor Griffin would pick up on that and Professor Griffin was terrible at hiding his feelings at faculty meetings Aunt Elsie and three or 10
four of the graduate students that she often had over for dinner to save them from Professor Griffin’s belief that one could survive on pasta and ham for eternity had emphasized that point repeatedly A meeting between Dr McRae and a suspicious Professor Griffin would end Chris was afraid in Dr McRae and Professor Griffin getting into some sort of fight the exact nature of which he couldn’t imagine Professor Griffin was just absent minded enough to be secretly hiding a black belt in some obscure martial art he had learned in his study of ocean floor geology really it could happen And Dr McRae was still far too much of an unknown He could have any number of secret agendas unexpected skills or unsavory underworld contacts and even his own daughter didn’t know what his deep dark secret was That Dr McRae was honest enough to admit to Maddison that he had a secret dark past was Chris felt only a small point in his favor He was not about to be swayed in his opinion of Dr McRae just because he was trying to help his family He definitely hadn’t 11
decided that Dr McRae’s contributions to the whole adventure were to be kept as secretive as possible in case someone was after the new archivist Totally absolutely definitely hadn’t But I’m not so sure I like the idea of you two going hiking without an adult Professor Griffin said with a frown and oh great here came the stumbling block Chris wriggled in his seat and put on his very best pleading face which Carrie said made him look like a constipated kitten It’s just a weekend he said in his best reasonable reasonable voice And we could probably do the whole hike in one day but Carrie got a new sleeping bag for Christmas and she wants to try it out It’s just the old Pine Bow trail Carrie added helpfully helpfully Then when we get to the far end of the loop we’re following the horse path all the way to the coast Well Professor Griffin said I guess And there’s even a campground right in the middle it’ll be perfectly safe Chris said The park ranger we talked to said nobody’s even gotten shot in 12
that state park in sixty years he added when Professor Griffin didn’t look convinced and then Carrie smacked him at about the same point Chris realized how bad an idea it was to mention park shootings But it was true after an afternoon of poring over maps and not coming up with a plan Maddison had suggested they try calling a family friend who was also a park ranger Oh the old mission church Helen Kinney had said finally connected to them after twenty minutes of playing phone tag It’s visible from the equestrian trail off Pine Bow Someone wrote an article for the local paper a couple of years ago that said it was somewhere somewhere in the middle of the park though and even though it’s not at all true that version of the story just will not die We’ve tried to set the record straight but we still have people getting lost when they wander off the trails with video cameras Then she’d gone on to reassure Maddison that Pine Lick was remarkably free of smugglers drug dealers and other reasons that 13
