Chapter 3

Eagles’ nests are also called aeries. On average, the basket-like nests, made of branches and sticks, are six feet in diameter and three feet deep. They are lined with feathers, grasses, pine needles, and moss.

We were leaving through the gorge. Normally I thought it was cool—how we had to walk sideways, our hands on the stone wall in front of us, our backs and butts sliding along the wall behind, barely squeezing through in some spots. But this time, all I could think about was how there was no way the goons would fit into our little canyon this way, which is what Packrat, Roy, and I called “the easy way.” Hiding the cache in it made Packrat and me extra sure those giant goons could never find it.

Thinking of Roy made me smile. I couldn’t wait to see my friend’s face when we told him about all this. He was gonna be so mad he’d missed it.

Stepping out the other side of the gorge put us into thick woods next to the pool at the bottom of the waterfall. As we followed the brook back to the lake and the spot where we’d dragged our kayaks onto land, we tried to be as quiet as we could, considering we had to stay off the red-blazed trail just in case those goons were following it.

When we reached a giant stump from an old oak that stood about three feet high, I got down on my knees next to it. I held my breath, a little creeped-out about putting my hand in the huge hole under the roots. I felt around in the cool damp dirt, on and under leaves and twigs, until I found the box. As I pulled it out, my breath let go in a whoosh.

“One of these times, there’s going to be a snake in there,” I said.

Packrat dangled a glove in front of my face. I rolled my eyes. “You have to remind me sooner next time!”

I started to stand, but Packrat stopped me. “Open it first! I don’t want to lug it back only to find it has more parts.”

I did. Seeing our usual cache goodies, I closed the lid and stood to follow my friend. I was so busy watching my feet, I didn’t see the branch swing back. Slap! The pine needles swatted my face, poking at my skin.

“Oww!” I rubbed my cheek, right below my eye.

“Sorry!” Packrat whispered, pointing down at a stick I needed to avoid.

Suddenly, wolf-howl sounds came from my shorts pocket. Packrat ducked down low, while I fumbled to pull out my phone. I knew from the ringtone it was the camp office.

“Hey, Mom?” I half-whispered. “You’ll never—”

“Coooop-errrr! You always do that! I’m not Mom.”

Packrat stood to look around. Not seeing anything suspicious, he motioned for me to follow him.

“Molly?” I whispered to my five-year-old sister. “Put Mom on, okay?”

Molly started whispering too. “She’s got customers. She said I could call you.”

Uh-oh. This was bored Molly.

We’d reached a steep, upward embankment. I gave Packrat the box so I could still hold on to the phone and have a free hand to climb. Hand over hand we went. When we reached the top, we slid and skittered down the other side. At the bottom, we bent over to pass under a fallen tree.

The whole time, all Molly did was breathe. Loudly.

“Squirt?” I whisper-asked.

“What?”

“Why’d you call me?” I looked toward Packrat in a she’s-being-a-pain-in-the-neck-again kind of way.

She giggled. “Mom wants to know if you’re still alive.”

I almost dropped the phone. Her mom radar must be beep-beep-beeping again. That, and I’d forgotten to check in.

“I don’t know. Hey, Packrat? Am I alive?” Molly giggled. I whispered into the phone, “No worries, squirt.” Seeing the geocache box swing from Packrat’s hand, I asked, “Can Mom talk yet?”

I heard Molly take a deep breath, and pulled the phone away from my ear just in time.

“Mommmmmm!” she shrieked. “Can you talk?” Two seconds later, Molly was back. “Nope. She’s got a line at the register. But she said don’t forget Maxwell!”

“I’m on my way—”

“Aaaaaand Packrat’s mom says Aunt Lucy is here. Hurry back.”

To Packrat, I said, “Your aunt?”

He shrugged. “Not really an aunt. Like an aunt, I guess, ’cause Mom wants me to call her Aunt Lucy even though she’s an old college friend of hers. Gonna stay a week with us in the trailer. I’m moving to my tent.”

We walked in silence. Molly breathed into the phone. I could hear the scritch-scratch sounds of a pencil on paper. Packrat put out a hand to keep me from stepping on a pile of dead, crunchy leaves.

“So?” I finally said into the phone. “Are we done?”

She sighed. “Yeah. I guess.”

I took pity on the kid. “I’ll take a bike ride with you when I get home, but I can’t paddle home and hold the phone too.”

“’Kay.”

Dead silence again.

“Bye, Molly.”

The second sigh came through the phone so big, I swear it moved my hair. “Bye, Cooper.”

The two of us quietly paddled home the long way, which meant going along the shoreline instead of cutting straight across Pine Lake. We hadn’t talked about it first, but I think we were both feeling the same way.

We had to check on our eagles. And their triplets.

Triplet eaglets were rare. Really, really rare. It wasn’t often that two survived to adulthood, never mind three! Usually, the nest gets too small as they grow, so one falls out. Other times, one eaglet gets picked on by the rest, sometimes dying, when the mom and dad don’t bring enough food fast enough. All our campers were crazy obsessed over whether or not all three would live. Whenever a camper only spotted two baby heads peeking over the edge of the nest, they’d get everyone worried for days until someone else finally took a picture of all three as proof.

But the next time a camper reported only two, it’d start all over again.

“So ya think we can fool those guys if we run into them?” Packrat asked.

“Yeah. If we show them this box,” I said. “They’ll think it’s a case of mistaken identity—that their box went missing—and they’ll move on. After that, we’ll turn them in.”

“To who? Your parents?”

“I don’t know. Maybe Warden Kate when she gets back. She’ll know who to report it to. And she won’t freak out at the fact that we were chased through the woods.” The words like my Mom would hung between us, unsaid.

We were almost at the Wentworths’ dock now. It felt kind of weird, knowing Mr. and Mrs. Wentworth would never again come out through their slamming screen door to wave hello and ask me about the loons or turtles, or their favorite, the herons. The Wentworths had decided they were too old to maintain the big lakeside house, and none of their kids wanted it. So they had moved into town and were selling the house.

My eyes glanced at the big red-and-white FOR SALE sign. It always made me wonder two things: One, can I still call it the Wentworths’ place, if there are no more Wentworths living in it, and two: What would the new owners think about having nesting eagles next door? The thing I’d learned from last summer was that not everyone liked nature and wildlife the way Packrat, Roy, and I did.

Whoever bought the Went—the place had better like eagles as much as Mr. Wentworth did, because they were as close as two neighbors could get! Sometimes, one of the adults would even perch on the chimney of the house. And I knew from hanging out with Mr. Went-worth on his porch that those eaglets could get wicked noisy too. Especially when they were hungry!

Right now, they looked really hungry as they shrieked, brown heads bobbing up and down. We stopped paddling to pull out our binoculars for a better look. The nest was perched at the tip-top of a white pine that leaned slightly to the left. The nest was so huge, it hung over the rock wall into the yard. I guess you could say it was actually halfway on the Went—on the property. It was made of branches, twigs, grasses, and fluff, and Warden Kate said it weighed about seven hundred pounds! There was one long, light brown stick that had gotten hung up in such a way that it stuck straight out the left side of the nest about three feet.

Those eagles had added a ton of stuff to it this year, too. They were still adding to it! I guess they knew they’d need a bigger house to keep their third eaglet safe. It was so deep that when an adult eagle was sitting low inside it, you could only see the very top of its white head.

The eaglets used their beaks to pull themselves higher on the nest, almost to the edge. You could still see some of their gray down in spots, but mostly they were brown from head to toe. At about six weeks old, each eaglet was bigger than a raven. Bigger than a duck! All three turned to look in the same direction across the lake, and called out with a bunch of short, squeaky, high-pitched calls.

“Must be lunchtime,” Packrat said, binoculars still at his eyes.

One of the parents flew in, gliding across the top of the water so we could see its reflection below. Then it soared to the top of the tree with a big flapping trout in its talons. Reaching the nest, the eagle seemed to hang in midair for a second, its wings outstretched so you could almost count each brown feather. It dropped the trout in the nest before gracefully lowering its wings, folding them, and landing on the nest’s edge.

Two of the eaglets let loose Feed-me-first-feed-me-first-I’m-dying-over-here cries. The largest one pulled himself across the nest with his beak again until he was closer. The adult nudged the trout toward him. It pecked at it once, twice.

Packrat whispered, “Go on. Take a big bite!”

The eaglet looked up and cried along with the other two.

“Well, he tried,” I said.

I swear that parent sighed before it dug into the trout, tearing it apart to feed the eaglets in no particular order. Every now and again, the eagle would raise its beak to gaze across the lake, off into the distance where its mate soared, looking for the next meal.

“How did the eagle in the box go from a life like that to having its head on a stick?” Packrat asked out loud. “Why would anyone do that?”

“I know what I’d do if I caught them!” I smacked a fist into my other hand.

“What would Warden Kate do?” Packrat asked.

I sat straight up. “Hey! You know, if those goons do stop in the campground, we can get their license-plate number and really good descriptions to pass on to her. Then she can figure out who the boss is, and maybe who really owns the stuff.” And that, I thought to myself, was a plan any investigating warden would make.

Buuuuuut probably not a plan any mother would like. Especially my worrywart mom.