Peril at Granite Peak (2 page)

“Great day for skiing, huh?” I said as I passed him.

The man turned and blinked at me through his goggles. He was in his early thirties, with pasty skin, thin brown hair poking out from under his helmet, and watery gray eyes. He turned away without bothering to respond.

Whatever. I shrugged and moved on.

“White Rattlesnake, here we come!” Joe exclaimed, using his poles to push himself along in the direction of the trailhead.

“Hang on, I think my buckle's loose.” Chet knelt down and fiddled with one of his boots.

“Have fun, you guys,” Cody said. “I'll catch you at dinner.” He headed toward one of the trailheads with Blizzard at his heels.

While we waited for Chet, I watched the pasty-skinned man head across the clearing. He wasn't exactly an expert skier. He almost tripped over his poles, then got his skis
crossed and almost went down. I was a little surprised he wasn't still taking lessons down on the bunny slope.

As he reached one of the signs, I glanced at it. Good. It was a green circle trail—the easiest level.

But my eyes widened when I took in the name on the sign: Whispering Pine Trail.

“Wait! No!” I yelled as the man pushed off and disappeared down the slope. I spun around and gestured to the others. “We have to stop him!”

T
HE WHITE RATTLESNAKE TRAIL LOOKED
epic. I couldn't wait to tackle it. I was totally focused on it when Frank started yelling.

He was jumping around like his ski pants were on fire. Frank wasn't usually the excitable type, so I figured something was up.

“What's wrong?” I called, skiing over. Cody was about to set off down a different trail, but he turned to look at Frank too.

“That trail!” Frank cried, pointing to a sign marking one of the trailheads nearby. “A guy just went down it. But it's on the list—it's supposed to be closed!”

“Huh?” Chet stopped messing with his boots and stood up. “But there's no closed sign.” He gestured at a different trail sign, which had a big, bright-orange ribbon
with the words
CLOSED TRAIL
tied diagonally across it.

But Cody looked grim. “No, Frank's right,” he said, skiing over to join us. “That trail should definitely be closed. Ice.”

Now I got it. Frank was—hmm, how can I put this?—a little bit of a nerd. Okay, maybe more than a little bit. But the guy was smart, and he had a memory like that of an elephant. I'd noticed him studying the lodge's bulletin board at breakfast. No surprise that he'd memorized it.

“Ice is bad news,” I said. “I'm on it!”

I pushed off, heading down the slope at top speed. Behind me, I heard the others doing the same. At least I assumed that was what was going on. I didn't bother to look back, since I'd just spotted the guy Frank had mentioned.

Yeah, definitely a beginner. He was wobbling and clutching his poles like lifelines, slowing himself down every few yards with awkward snowplow stops.

“Stop!” I yelled as I skied toward him. “Hey, you!”

The guy glanced back at me. Instead of stopping, he pushed off with both poles, picking up speed as he turned and headed straight down the hill. What was he doing?

“Seriously!” I shouted. “Hold up a sec, okay?”

This time he didn't even look back. Tucking my poles under my arms, I crouched down, picking up speed on the fairly gentle slope.

I whipped around a few easy turns, gaining on the guy all the time. As we reached another straightaway, I pulled even with him.

“Listen!” I called, raising my voice over the wind whistling past my ears. “You have to stop. There's ice ahead!”

He shot me a look. I couldn't read his expression behind his goggles.

“Who are you? Leave me alone!” he yelled.

I blew out a quick, frustrated sigh. Was this guy dense, or what?

“Stop!” I shouted. “Ice!”

I glanced ahead, wondering exactly where the ice might be. Oops. There it was—just a few dozen yards ahead. I could see where the snow must have melted and then frozen up again; there was a distinct sheen that caught the sun and made me squint even with goggles on. The ice patch didn't look very big—I doubted they'd even bother to close a more advanced trail for that sort of thing.

But this was a beginner trail. And the guy beside me barely even qualified as a beginner. His skis were already looking crooked—if he hit that ice at the speed he was going, he could break a leg. Or two. Or maybe his head.

“Stop!” I yelled once more, gesturing wildly with both poles. “Seriously, dude!”

No response. We were almost to the ice patch. Enough talking; time for action.

I tilted into a steep carve turn, aiming right at the other skier. At the same time, I dragged my poles to slow myself down a little.

“Oof!” the guy grunted as I plowed into him.

We both flew sideways and landed in the soft snow at the edge of the trail. I did my best to avoid the other guy, though I clipped his helmet with my elbow. That was going to leave a bruise.

The guy spit out a mouthful of snow. “Hey!” he cried. “What's your problem?”

“That!” I pointed at the ice, which was less than ten feet away. “Didn't you hear me telling you to stop? This trail's supposed to be closed!”

The man frowned. “I didn't see anything about that on the sign.”

“Yeah, well, that's why I came after you.” I glanced up as Cody and Frank slid to a stop beside us. A little farther up the hill, Chet was making his way down more slowly. Cody's dog, Blizz, was bounding through the snow at Chet's side.

“Is everyone okay?” Cody asked breathlessly.

“Think so.” I stood and brushed off the snow. All my bones seemed to be in one piece. I offered a hand to help the guy up, but he ignored it.

“This is outrageous,” he told Cody. “I thought this establishment advertised its good safety record! How can that be when you have hooligans crashing into your guests?”

Hooligans? Nice way to treat the guy who just saved your life. Or your femur. Whatever. But never mind—I'd been called worse.

Cody looked at me nervously. “Joe was just trying to help,
Mr. Wright,” he said. “You could have been badly hurt on that ice.”

Mr. Wright looked down at the ice. “Well, why wasn't the trail properly marked, then?” he blustered, climbing to his feet. “I could have been killed!”

I rolled my eyes at Frank behind Mr. Wright's back. Killed? Maybe an overstatement. Frank frowned at me.

“That's a good point,” he said to Cody. “What happened to the sign?”

“I don't know.” Cody shrugged. “I helped Dad mark the off-limits trails myself this morning.”

Mr. Wright was glaring from me to Cody and back again. If looks could kill, we'd both be in trouble. Maybe it was time to get out of Dodge.

I grabbed my poles, which I'd dropped in the crash. “Let's go check out the sign situation,” I told Frank. “Maybe we can figure out what happened.”

Chet reached us in time to hear me. He shot me and Frank a dubious glance. “You mean—you guys want to go investigate?”

I rolled my eyes again. “Not investigate,” I said. “Just check on things. See if we can tell where that closed sign went.”

“Yeah.” Chet smirked. “Like I said. Investigate.”

Cody and Mr. Wright looked a little confused. Ignoring Chet, I glanced at my brother. “Come on, Frank. Feel like a hike?”

Frank and I kicked off our skis and started climbing back up the hill, leaving Cody and Chet to deal with Mr. Wright. “Nice guy,” Frank muttered as soon as we were out of earshot.

I grinned. “Yeah. So what do you think happened to the sign?”

He shrugged. “Probably just an oversight. Cody and his folks seem pretty stressed out right now, what with this possible blizzard chasing away their guests. Maybe they forgot one of the signs, or didn't tie it on tightly enough.”

“Maybe.” We didn't talk much after that. As it turns out, hiking up a mountain through knee-deep snow is a lot harder than skiing down it.

By the time we reached the top, we were both panting. There was no sign of that orange ribbon on or near the sign.

“Guess you were right,” I told Frank, already losing interest. “Probably never got marked in the first place.” I glanced toward the White Rattlesnake Trail. Maybe we could get in a run before Chet caught up. That might be for the best—Chet was definitely a better skier than Mr. Wright, but he might not be a match for anything beyond a green circle hill.

“Hold on.” Something in Frank's voice made me turn right away.

“What?”

“Check this out.” He waved me over.

I saw what he was looking at immediately. The top of the Whispering Pine Trail sign had about a half-inch layer
of snow on it—the result of some midmorning flurries. But there was one spot that was clean.

“That's just about where the ‘Closed' ribbon would have gone,” I said.

“Right. So what happened to it?” Frank was already looking around.

I did the same, stepping over to peer into a snow-covered tangle of bushes near the sign. Spotting a flash of color, I pushed the branches aside.

“Aha! Here it is. Think it blew off?” I reached for the orange ribbon. When I tugged on it, it didn't budge.

Frank looked over my shoulder. “Looks like it's being held down by a rock.” He glanced at me, looking grim. “You know what this means, right?”

“It didn't blow off,” I said slowly. “Someone took it down on purpose!”

J
OE KICKED THE ROCK OFF
the warning ribbon. “Should we put it back up?” he asked.

“Definitely.” I grabbed the ribbon and wrapped it around the sign, making sure it was secure.

Joe watched me. “So who do you think dumped that in the bushes? And why?”

“I don't know.” I brushed off my gloves.

“Let's go tell Cody's parents what happened.”

Fifteen minutes later we were in the lodge's main office. Cody's father was there, sorting through some paperwork. He was a tall, broad-shouldered man with weather-beaten skin, a bristly salt-and-pepper beard, and a quick smile. But that smile faded when he heard about Mr. Wright's near miss on the slopes.

“If something like this had to happen, why did it have to happen to Stanley Wright?” he commented with a grimace. “That man hasn't been happy with a single thing since he arrived.” Mr. Gallagher sighed and shot us a look. “Sorry. Not very professional of me to say that.”

“No, we get it,” Joe said. “The dude practically accused me of assaulting him when all I was doing was trying to keep him from breaking his neck.”

“So about the closed sign . . . ,” I began.

“It's probably nothing,” Mr. Gallagher said. “An animal might have knocked it loose. Or maybe the wind.”

“I don't think so, sir,” I said. “The snow was only disturbed in that one spot. It looked like someone just lifted the ribbon right off.”

“Hmm.” Mr. Gallagher rubbed his beard. “Well, in that case it was probably a prank. We have several rather, er, lively younger kids staying here right now. I'll look into it. Thanks for letting me know, boys.”

“You're welcome,” Joe said.

I nodded, feeling uneasy. Mr. Gallagher didn't seem to be taking this incident very seriously. What if someone was trying to sabotage his business? Maybe someone from one of those rival resorts across the mountain?

Then I realized I probably shouldn't be worrying about this kind of thing anymore.

“Okay,” I said. “I guess we'll get back out there, then. Coming, Joe?”

•  •  •

Joe, Chet, and I spent the next several hours out on the slopes. After a few runs down White Rattlesnake and a couple of other trails, Joe talked us into taking a snowboarding lesson. Our teacher was Cody's mom, a petite, energetic woman who soon had us practicing our heel and toe side turns, our glides, and our stops. When she was convinced we wouldn't kill ourselves, she took us out on the real slopes to practice. It was fun, but exhausting.

So by the time we hit the dining room that evening, we were all ravenous. “I hope the food comes fast,” Chet said, tucking his napkin into his collar like a little kid. “I'm so hungry I could eat this plate!”

Our waitress arrived just in time to hear him. She was probably only a couple of years older than us, with curly brown hair and a pretty face. Her name tag identified her as Josie Lambert.

“Please don't eat the plates, guys,” she said with a laugh, setting a basket of freshly baked rolls on our table. “I'll do my best to get your dinner here fast.”

Joe grabbed a roll and grinned at her. “Cool. Because the bread basket's only going to last about thirty seconds with Chet around.”

“Hey!” Chet mumbled through the roll he'd just stuffed in his mouth. “I can't help it. I'm a growing boy.”

Josie giggled. “I'll make sure to let the chef know she shouldn't skimp on your portion.”

“Mine either,” I said, patting my stomach.

“Yeah. In fact, you can tell her to make it a double all around.” Joe glanced around the dining room. “There should be plenty of extra food back there. This place is even emptier than it was last night.”

Josie's smile suddenly collapsed. “I know, right?” she moaned. “Everyone is totally panicking about the weather. Before long there won't be any guests left! And the Gallaghers definitely don't need that right now.”

How does Josie know about the trouble the Gallaghers are having getting guests?
I wondered. But before I could ask her about it, there was an angry shout from across the room.

“What's going on over there?” Chet wondered as he reached for a second roll.