Chapter 7

THE MIDDAY HEAT HAD DRIED all evidence of the previous night’s rain. Not a cloud remained in the sky from the freakish weather that had come upon Ambrosia so quickly, bringing with it a nightmare of horror-movie proportions.

Mike, joined by Winnie and Spence, walked around the plane searching for evidence of the creature. Jake sensed the tension in the air as the kids examined diligently, and he joined in, sniffing the dirt around the wheels of the plane. Slowed by the muggy air and the lack of sleep after the night’s excitement, Ben sat on a greasy oil drum and watched. He was mildly interested in the investigation, but the extent of his participation was to attempt a composite sketch of the nocturnal beast.

“Here! This is the creature! It looked exactly like this!” Ben held up his notepad to show Mike, Spence, and Winnie his finished work. Tired of their task, they moved to Ben’s side to view the masterpiece containing a large King Kong look-alike crushing a poor representation of the B-17 in one giant hand.

“Don’t you think you’re exaggerating? Just slightly?” Spence corrected the amateur artist.

“Hey, this thing was big! Right, Mike?” Ben turned to his friend for support. Winnie tossed her hair and returned to her previous task. Mike followed suit as Ben tagged along, still promoting his artwork.

“His feet weren’t big enough to keep the rain from wiping out his footprints,” suggested Spence, making a carefully calculated observation.

“I can’t believe it,” Winnie complained. She was tired of the argument and anxious to change the subject. “No hard evidence. No footprints. No videotape. No pictures. Nothing.” She wiped the sweat from her forehead and gazed around her with disgust. Her look settled on Ben with accusation.

Ben reminded her, “We had other things on our mind, Winnie.”

“Like what?” she challenged.

“Like survival.” Ben grimaced as he recalled the previous night’s terrifying events.

Winnie dropped her shoulders and sighed, “Come on, you guys probably scared it as much as it scared you.”

Jake stopped his sniffing around, freezing so suddenly that Mike nearly walked into him. The dog barked once, turning around to see if Mike was paying attention.

“Hey, check out Jake,” Mike said and knelt down next to the dog, putting a hand on his collar. Jake appeared to have found something of interest in the air near the front landing gear of the plane. “Do you smell him? Do you smell Bigfoot, boy?” The dog pulled against Mike’s grip on the collar and began making anxious whining noises.

“If Jake can smell him, maybe he can lead us to him!” Winnie said excitedly over the barking.

Mike smiled and looked up at Winnie. “Yeah!” he shouted, letting go of the collar. “Come, Jake! Come on, guys. Let’s get a move on! Go get him, Jake!”

Jake trotted a zigzag path away from the airplane hangar with his head stooped to the ground, sniffing deeply in the weeds around the trail. The Last Chance Detectives rode their quads a short distance behind so as not to stir up dust that might interfere with the scent.

Mike, leading the way on his dark blue quad, was armed with a long-range walkie-talkie. The radio enabled the foursome to stay in contact with Mike’s mother back at their base, the diner.

Jake stopped and began sniffing around in a circle as he apparently lost the scent, and the kids came rolling to a halt behind him. “I’m not sure if this bigfoot knew exactly where he was going,” Mike said as he took off his white helmet. “This path is winding all over the place, and if it goes into that”—he pointed to a large stand of cactuses in the distance—“we’re not going to be able to follow on the quads.”

“He was so big, Mike,” Ben observed. “I don’t think he could make it in there either.”

“Give me a break,” Winnie demanded. “Next you’ll say he jumped over the Grand Canyon and disappeared.”

“Actually, Ben has a point,” Mike suggested.

Ben beamed at the praise and stuck out his tongue at Winnie. “Thanks, Mike,” he began. “You know, I—”

“Gee, wow,” Winnie sneered. “First time for everything, I guess.”

Ben’s self-congratulation and Winnie’s gibe were both cut short when Mike noticed that Jake had picked up the scent and was off and running again. The chief of the detectives immediately motored off, leaving the other three behind.

“Come on, guys,” Spence said. “Let’s work together. The likelihood of us solving a mystery if we can’t even achieve a friendly attitude toward each other is minimal.”

Winnie took off without saying another word, the bobbing of her pink helmet standing out against the darker tans and rusts of the landscape. Spence replaced his helmet and sped off next, leaving Ben behind.

“Hey, wait up,” Ben called as he hurriedly lowered his visor, revved the engine, and put the quad in gear. The course of the string of four-wheelers headed right toward the cactus grove.

As they rolled up to the edge of the prickly thicket, Mike realized that Bigfoot’s size had not kept him out but was the exact quality he had used to get in, or rather, through. The succulent plants were shredded, and bits of green mushy pulp had been flung everywhere. Jake trotted right in and kept going.

“All right,” Mike said, “we can’t follow on the machines. Ben and I will leave our quads here and follow Jake in. Winnie, you go with Spence and try to find a way around. Hopefully you can pick us up on the other side.”

“I’ve got a good idea,” Ben said. “Why don’t you go in with Jake, and I’ll ride with these two and meet you.”

“Are you chicken, Ben?” Winnie snapped.

“Stop fighting!” Spence yelled. “Didn’t you hear a word I said back there?”

Mike stepped back in surprise at the outburst from this normally quiet boy.

Spence glared at Winnie. “We’re not going to find Sasquatch, Bigfoot, or anything if you don’t desist from this childish name-calling. And you, Ben, stop arguing and do what Mike says. Come on, Winnie, let’s go.” The pair motored off to the north to look for a path around the dense, thorny plants.

“Wow!” Mike said as he made his way between the plants that were still standing. “I didn’t think Spence had it in him.”

“Yeah, a real motivator,” Ben said sarcastically.

The boys continued walking through the cactuses, following loosely behind Jake. After ten minutes, they hadn’t come across anything other than trampled vegetation.

“You know, Ben,” Mike suggested, breaking the quiet that had settled over them, “it’s all right to be afraid now and then, but this thing probably isn’t a monster at all.”

“Ha-ha,” Ben said without humor. “If that’s a joke, it’s not very funny. You saw it outside the plane! Of all people, I’d think you would be the one to worry as much as me.”

Mike thought about that as he looked for Jake, who was barking somewhere in the middle of the tangled mess of toppled cactus. “I guess I’m just trying to say Winnie’s right about this thing being scared, too. Look how it came in for food and then took off out here in the desert.”

There was a rustle from the nearby brush. At first Mike thought it was Jake, but then he heard the dog barking farther in the distance. Something rattled the undergrowth again, and whatever it was, it was close by.

“Mike?” Ben squeaked. He, too, had heard the scratching and now noticed breathing noises that were not his own apprehensive pants. “Mike?” he repeated more urgently.

Mike shushed Ben and bent down near ground level to peer through a gap in the cactus trunks. There in the shadows shone a pair of grayish yellow eyes, and the panting was replaced by a low growl.

Unhurriedly, Mike stood up again and held his finger to his lips to warn Ben to keep quiet. Then he led the way across the remaining thicket to Jake.

It was just a few minutes till he reached the dog, then sat down and petted him. Ben stumbled out behind him and nearly fell over them while looking over his shoulder.

“Mike,” he pleaded, “don’t stop! We gotta get away from Bigfoot!”

“Bigfoot,” Mike laughed. “Ben, that wasn’t a bigfoot.”

“Oh, no?”

“No,” Mike said, pointing to the path behind them where a low, lean form with a gray bushy tail trotted away. “It was a coyote.”