

The Millionaires Club

By Mike Wallick

Copyright 2014 by Mike Wallick

Published at Smashwords

This eBook is licensed for your personal enjoyment only. This eBook may not be re-sold or given away to other people. If you would like to share this book with another person, please download an additional copy for each recipient. Thank you for respecting the hard work of this author.

About the Author

Mike Wallick lives with his family in a suburb of Minneapolis. He is the author of several books relating to small business marketing. The Millionaires Club is his first effort into fictional writing and has been a personal challenge for him to finish. He chose to offer it for no charge and would instead ask that if you enjoyed it, send him a message telling him so. His e-mail address is mike1wallick@gmail.com. He would love to hear from you. Let him know what you thought of this story.
Chapter One: The Game of Living

There were usually 6 of us that went over to the greenhouse after school. I loved it there. It was one of those places that seem to never end, there's always another room or chamber at the end of the one that you're in. The fact that it was almost all made of ghostly translucent green glass and smelled really cool also helped. You couldn't find a better place to play rubber band guns. And that's just what we did.

Earl was the one who showed me how to make one. It was one of the first times that I was ever there. We were just hanging around and trying to decide what do when Earl asked if I wanted to shoot rubber bands. Of course, the answer to that question would always be yes.

Earl Tetree's dad owned the greenhouse. It was really cool that he let us play in there. They were pretty glad that Earl had friends since Earl was kind of unique in a lot of ways. He was really into a lot of scientific things -- he was really smart, but never did well in school. He was constantly getting into trouble in class, usually for being disruptive or not paying attention. He said that his mom told him it's because he's bored and not challenged. I don't know what to think.

My name is Steve. I'm in the same grade as Earl, 8th. We go to Miles City Junior High School and its okay, I guess. My family doesn't own anything nearly as cool as a greenhouse. My dad's a chiropractor and has an office uptown in an old stone building called the Masonic Temple. We live in a small town in Montana called Miles City. It's pretty boring even though when someone comes in from out east we can always convince them that we still have gunfights on the street at sundown and have skirmishes all the time with the Native Americans.

That simple day with Earl and shooting rubber bands turned into something big and that's what this book is all about. It started with the two of us and a couple of rubber band guns, which were nothing more than a couple of pieces of wood nailed together with a notch cut into the front and a clothespin nailed to the top to hold the rubber band until you are ready to fire it.

Earl built his and then helped me build mine. One of the non-glass rooms in the greenhouse was an incredible work room with tons of tools and scraps lying around. As I said, it was a great place. We finished making my gun and then we decided to play a game of hide and seek but instead of just spotting the other person you had to shoot them and then you would win. It was a blast. I got home really late that day and had to do the dishes since I had forgotten to call. Funny thing about that, parents always say we need to call and tell them we're going to be late, but if we do they tell us to come right home, so experience teaches us to just not call and take care of the dishes. It's a fair trade-off.

Of course as fun as that could be, there was only one thing that would make it better, and that's more players. The next day at school we asked Cora Hopwood to join. Cora was in our grade and was really cool. She was funny, smart, and she could hit a baseball further than anyone else, boys included. I knew she loved to play almost any game and rubber band hide and seek should work.

"Sure," she said. "Sounds like fun."

Next we found James Hillside. James was big, really big, but not at all fat, and not at all athletic. But he was smarter than Cora and he had the biggest vocabulary in the state. He knew words that hadn't yet made it into the dictionary. I think he once told me that he personally made up 17 new words himself that eventually found their way into the dictionary. He was an encyclopedia of knowledge and he would be really fun to have as an engineer to work on souping up the guns we were using now. James said he was sure it would be a great time.

"This should provide a more than sufficient procedure to gaining an adequate level of mirth and fulfillment. I accept your proposal," he said, in his Hillside way.

We had four people and could have stopped there with two teams of two people each, but Cora suggested asking Amie to play.

"She's fun, she's smart, she'll definitely want to play, and I want there to be another girl in the game." She said.

No one could argue with that, so Cora asked Amie. Amie said "Sure! I'd love to."

No one would be upset over Amie joining us; everybody liked her. She was the daughter of a minister who presided over the Assembly of God church, which was a super cool old church that we were all thinking would be a really cool place to explore and play in someday.

But we were stuck with an odd number again. We really needed to find one more person. I thought about it for awhile and suggested asking Peter to join. Peter's family owned the Hilltop Grill, which was positively the coolest place to eat in Miles City. It was located on top of the Airport Hill, which was the hill that rose over the northern part of town and had -- you guessed it -- the airport on top. The Hilltop Grill had the best pizza for miles around, but even better was the huge game room filled with the latest and most fun video and pinball games of all time. Everyone loved the Hilltop Grill.

There was a long and low "MMmmmMMMM..." of agreement from everyone. Peter would be a welcome addition to our group.

That's how it all started. Six of us, all innocently playing an afternoon game of hide and seek rubber band guns in the greenhouse. It could have ended there happily, but it doesn't. It is just the beginning.

We used to play several games. We'd change up the rules, switch teams, sometimes use flags, and sometimes use flashlights in the dark. It was super fun. We started a practice where after the last game we'd all meet in the tool room and discuss that day's games. We'd laugh at the funniest goofs and praise the best strategies. Sometimes we'd discuss other things as well. That's where the Millionaires Club was born.

I don't remember who first brought it up, but ask any 8th grader anywhere if he or she has plenty of spending money and the answer will always be "No!" We were squarely in that grouping. We didn't have jobs. We were technically too young to work in a regular job yet. What little money we did have was usually gleaned from our parents through a meager allowance or by performing erratic extra jobs for some cash. Not enough, though. Not ever.

I think it was Amie who first thought up that name. We were sitting around discussing that day's game when someone said that it would be nice if we could use some night vision scopes when we were playing one of our lights-out rounds.

"That is highly unlikely for us at this stage of our lives" He said. "We'd have to be some kind of a High Class Club to warrant that kind of expenditure."

"Yeah" everyone assented.

"Yeah!" Earl agreed excitedly. "We sure would. And, why not?"

"Why not what?" I asked.

"Why not be a High Class Club?" he asked. "And then why not actually be rich?"

"What are you talking about?" Cora asked. "How could any of us be rich?"

"That's just it!" Earl said. "We form a club that works at all of us becoming rich!"

"Do you think we could?" Amie asked.

"Why not?" Peter answered. "All it would take is a unique idea, like selling rocks did when my folks were kids and calling it a pet."

And that's how it started. We were now officially a club. Our mission? To become wealthy, all of us, as soon as possible. We were now looking for an idea to do it. We spent every minute dedicated to just that, at least every minute after we had played several rounds of hide and seek rubber band gun.

The first couple of meetings didn't result in much except a collection of ideas that were similar to something that had already been done. Mood hats, which change color depending on your mood. James Hillside spent that entire meeting devising the method that would work to cause this to happen. It sounded like a great plan until he estimated that each hat would cost us about $500 to make. Peter figured we would have to sell them for $1000 to make a good profit. We had to finally admit that we didn't think that many people were going to spend $1000 for a novelty hat.

We also discussed "pet twigs". Little sticks that a person would "adopt" and care for. We even tried selling one of these to some kids at school for $5 but couldn't find anyone who would buy one, even after we dropped the price to .50. Our inventory ended up back on the playground at the end of the day. Back to the drawing board.

Eventually we actually got around to coming up with some ideas that started to sound interesting. Earl had the first one we actually all got excited about. His idea was to make a life sized game that people would play and have to solve puzzles and challenges along the way to win the game. We all liked the idea and thoughts and suggestions to improve upon it came fast.

"We could have awards for those who finish!" shouted Cora.

"And certificates noting the level the person stopped at!" added Amie.

"I can visualize some incredible lighting and fog effects we can use," said James.

"I have enough electronics in this room right here to rig up some super cool stuff!" Earl added.

We took a vote and everyone was in favor of "The Game of Living" being our first millionaire venture. Amie was the most organized so she started noting the ideas and agreed upon plans in a notebook that was now called the Club Minutes.

It wasn't too long until someone raised the huge question of "Where are we going to build this?"

Silence. That placed a damper on things. After all, we all realized that there just weren't that many people walking through the greenhouse and we didn't think that Earl's parents would want us filling up the clubhouse room with something like that anyway. But, where else? Peter had the winning idea when he said that maybe we could use the game room at the Hilltop Grill.

We all loved this plan. We selected Peter, Cora and I as a committee of three to go to Peter's house and ask for permission. We held a few practice sessions with James and Amie pretending to be Peter's parents and asking us questions that we needed to be ready to answer. When everyone felt that we were as ready as we were going to be we headed over to Peter's house.

Luckily both of his parents were home, which was unusual since it was almost dinner time and at least one of them normally worked over the dinner hour at the Inn. His mom answered the door and let us in and when we asked to see both of them, we were shown into the den. We tried to look as official as we could. Peter even called his mom Mrs. Pettit. After a couple of minutes his mom and dad entered the den and sat down in chairs facing us. They smiled and asked us what they could do for us.

"Well, dad, I mean Mr. Pettit" began Peter. "We're here as representatives of the Millionaires Club with a proposition for you."

"You don't say?" his father answered.

"Yes, sir" Peter continued. "We have a proposal that we believe will significantly increase your business at the Hilltop Grill and will generate some incredible publicity at the same time."

"Really?" his mom asked. "Let's hear it."

We launched into our semi-rehearsed diatribe about the Living Game and how we would build it, staff it, market it and share some of the profits with them in exchange for the use of their game room for space. We did a pretty good job of it. At first his folks were watching us with these silly smiles and over doing the head nods, all the while exchanging looks with the "look at the cute kids" attitude. But, I noticed that after a few minutes the smiles went away and the expressions changed. We were good. We made the presentation and answered a few questions with sound answers. We had prepared some specifics regarding the costs, the installation, the expected revenues, the staffing, and the promotion. We sounded good.

Forty-five minutes later we walked out with a tentative "yes" still ringing in our ears. Mr. Pettit just had to make sure he could temporarily remove the games from the game room for a few weeks while we tried running our alternative entertainment draws in the Hilltop Grill.

We rushed back to the Greenhouse and shared the exciting news with everyone. I admit we all got a little bit excited while we celebrated for awhile. Earl was the first to calm down when he sat over a notebook and started drawing plans for the structure. James joined him and the rest of us started discussing what would be the coolest challenges to include.

We thought the best thing to do was combine some physical challenges with some brain teaser tests, to make it more difficult to pass each phase. Amie thought we should come up with an overall story line that would make it seem to be connected from the start to the finish.

"That's a great idea!" Cora exclaimed. "I absolutely love it!"

"But, what theme should we choose?" I asked.

"It needs to be something that will appeal to the widest collection of people to broaden the customer base" said Amie.

We all looked at her, somewhat stunned.

"I just had a marketing class" she explained.

"Ohhhhh" we all answered in unison.

We then suggested ideas ranging from the medieval to an outer space quest and discussed the pros and cons of each. Occasionally Earl or James would add something if they were distracted enough from their collaboration on the mechanical workings of the plan.

"How about something more realistic, but with some really cool overtones?" Asked Cora.

"Like what?" asked Peter.

"Like a journey through life, and the results you have along the way dictate your real life. The better you do in our game, the more wonderful your life will be," she said.

"I love it!" Peter said. "This way you can leave and come back to where you left off trying to continue."

We brainstormed for a couple more hours after that and for the first time not one rubber band gun was fired.

After that we spent the next couple of meetings organizing a plan. We also decided to adopt a name for ourselves. We already knew that we had a kind of a club going so Earl asked what we should call ourselves. After a few minutes of people shouting out silly choices like "The Zombies" and "The RubberBanders," Amie suggested "How about the Millionaires Club?"

Everyone loved it and it was voted in six to nothing. Now we didn't just have a name, but we had a goal. We all were to become millionaires before we graduated from high school. We had a little over four years. Plenty of time!

The first thing we had on our to-do list was to find some money for supplies. We figured that the best way to get money would be to find someone to sponsor our idea and help finance it. Peter was chosen to ask his parents if the Hilltop Grill would take on this role as well but he came into the next meeting dejectedly and said "There is no way. Dad says he's already taking a big risk just giving us that space for a few weeks."

We then nominated each other to ask our parents if they would sponsor the game. I was really surprised when at dinner that night my dad asked "How much?"

I didn't want to tell him I had no idea so I adlibbed we had a couple of different packages and I would get him the information so he could decide which was right for him.

The next afternoon we worked out the packages. We had the Gold, Silver and Bronze packages. The Gold package cost $500 and included having your business name appear as a sponsor. Also your business name would appear on all certificates we printed and be included in any print or flyer advertising that we produced. The Silver package cost $150 and included having one full day of operation named for your business and having your business appear as a sponsor onsite at the Hilltop Grill. Finally, the Bronze package was $50 and included having your business name appear within the game in at least one location in a creative way.

We printed up a one page sheet diagramming the packages and the information and headed out with the information to inform and invite our parents. My dad asked a few questions and then signed up for a Bronze package. He gave me a check for $50 made out to the Millionaires Club and I practically ran back to the greenhouse waving the check over my head. It turned out that James's, Cora's, and Earl's parents had also agreed to put in for a Bronze package, so we were off.

The next thing to do was get together to review the plans that James and Earl had been creating. They had devised a schematic where we could move "walls" around a hanging framework that would allow separate "rooms" within the game room. Everything was hung from a pulley track system mounted on the roof that could be customized to allow for different size and shape rooms depending on our need. We all agreed that it was really cool.

Even better than that was the projected cost. As James explained, "We definitely were conscious regarding the associated costs as we concocted the design. According to my astute calculations, we should be able to purchase all of the needed materials for approximately $157.34."

Earl added, "Much of what we'll need is already here and we can use it for the month. My dad already agreed."

We next created a list complete with published pricing that we obtained from the web. When we had completed our online shopping we still had about $40 left from our sponsorships that we could keep in an emergency fund to be used as needed. We ended the meeting after assigning roles to each of us to continue the process.

James and Earl were designated as designers/builders. They would head all the design and construction plans as well as supervise the actual build.

Peter and Amie were chosen to be the buyers and transport team. Amie's parents had a big, cool van that the church used which would be great for carrying our supplies to the Inn.

Cora and I were designated as fundraisers/salespeople. Our job was to ensure our emergency fund never reached zero and all advertisers were included in the building process. Cora was a tremendous ad salesperson. We raised another $200 the next day with her taking the lead and explaining to businesses why they should sponsor the project, including a collectibles store where we would get our certificates and t-shirts printed and framed. We also got the local grocery store, a pharmacy where I went asking for a job, and a jeweler.

After we had secured almost all the materials and were in a condition which James labeled "Fundamentally Secure," we started the official work of creating the storyline that would be used in the game. Our final outline consisted of a story of an average person's life that encompassed certain elements of drama, suspense, humor, and a slight amount of boredom. The goal was to emerge with an "Overpass" which allowed the player to continue to seek higher levels of life.

James and Earl had come up with a cool way of allowing the chambers inside the game to have a unique interlacing system of passages which allowed us to manipulate how each player would move through the system. If we started each team with an interval of approximately 6 minutes there should never be a possibility of an overlap and things should progress fairly smoothly while we were operating.

Justifiably the first level would deal with a person's "birth" and would entail being able to survive the trials and tribulations of "babyhood". This would involve needing to crawl through a course, somewhat adjustable depending on the person's size that happens to be playing. Then the player needed to find the baby bottle and pick it up using a set of robot baby hands that are manipulated by them. Earl came up with a neat system that made them "wobble" and work with a level of difficulty supposedly simulating the lack coordination that a baby has. To exit the room, the player had to be able to go through the "diaper pail" and enter into the next room.

I thought it would be nice to have something else happen when a room's chores were completed. James then wired up a simple system of chimes and buzzers that we could use to signify success or failure. In the furthest corner of the game we set up our control room where we could keep watch and control all the systems that we installed. We had placed small cameras with sound in each room to allow us to monitor the progress that was happening.

Each level had a goal that must be met in order to progress. If someone was unable to pass a room, a "reaper" would appear and accompany the person or group out of the game. The center of the game was a pathway that we decorated with cool symbols and things that we lit up with black lights to give it a cool look. The object is to finish all of the challenges and levels in your life and win the game with the best possible career and highest level of earnings and happiness.

The different rooms dealt with these differing themes. You scored in happiness, love, money, and career. The perfect score is set at 1000. Each of the four categories is ranked up to 250 points. If you score at 980 points or above then you win the "I rocked at life" title and get a t-shirt and certificate attesting that fact. Plus, we'd put your picture on our "Wall of Fame" and The Hilltop Grill would give you a certificate for a free pizza and pitcher of root beer to celebrate. We thought this was pretty cool.

We started construction on a Sunday, usually the slower time of the week for the Grill. We were on a spring break at school so we wouldn't have any conflict with classes and could pretty much spend the whole week at the Grill. Peter's dad and older brother Matt helped us with the building so it went really well. James and Earl's precise measurements worked very well.

It took all day and most of the night, but by 3:00am we had just about completed the build and were ready to start installing the challenges. We decided to get a few hours sleep and get a fresh start at 8:00. We each picked out a quiet corner and fell asleep almost immediately.

I don't think I had even closed my eyes when someone was shaking me and telling me to "Get up!" Earl was standing over me as I slowly peeked through my heavy lids and looked up at him.

"We need to get this ready" he said. "Are you awake?"

""I am now" I said, a little more grumpily than I intended. "Get off of me!"

He moved away and I slowly sat up and became aware of where I was. Peter's dad was pouring coffee at a table in the center of the room and for the first time in my life I actually wanted a cup.

I drank it fairly quickly and went back into the game room. Luckily for us it was a pretty big place. Separated from the main dining room it was approximately 25 by 40 feet. We had plenty of power outlets and a fairly high ceiling as well. With the framework all installed there was a nice alcove just inside of the room where the person would wait to begin their life's journey.

My main job for the next 2 hours was a painter. All the wood needed to be painted an appropriate color. Earl and James had numbered the wood for which color would go there as a base. We used several different ones depending on whether or not that challenge was designated as an "outside" one or in a particular place, like the one in a college auditorium, our graduating challenge. This was one of my favorites. We played on the word gradual and had a slope that gradually graduated upwards and had some bumps and holes along the way. You had to roll yourself, which was actually a 4 pound ball in this case, along the path and pass all of the obstacles to "graduate" with the highest honors. If you did, you'd receive your diploma and a job offer, a better one for every higher level you obtained. If you failed to "graduate" then you were a drop-out and you got a job offer for a much less glamorous or exciting career and were moved along. It was a super fun challenge, kind of like skeeball with an attitude.

I finished all the base painting and went to help install some of the lighting. Every room had a specific set of plans showing where each item needed to be installed. Everyone was working really hard and it started looking really great, really fast. The restaurant opened for business at 11:00 and after that we had a constant stream of curious onlookers asking questions and wanting to know when we would be ready for business.

We had planned on having a soft open on Monday around 6:00PM. A soft open, according to Amie, is when a new business starts selling to customers for the first time but doesn't advertise it. The theory is that this will allow them to get most of the kinks out before they get hit with a grand opening size crowd. It looked like we were going to be able to hold to that schedule since at around 2:30 we were able to all sit down for a lunch break and take stock of where we were and how much more needed to be done.

We had pizza and root beer. The Hilltop Grill was famous for miles around for its pizza but Peter had told me once that he didn't know why since everything they used was from a huge commercial supplier. Just normal dough and pizza sauce. I guess atmosphere is everything.

When we finished we spent the next few hours putting in the finishing touches. John Fulton, the owner of the collectibles store, was a huge help by running errands for us and bringing us the opening stock of t-shirts and certificates.

"Looks great, guys!" he said after walking through the set-up. "You did a really great job here."

John was probably the coolest grown-up I knew. His store, Miles City in a Box, had the neatest stuff you could imagine and his basement, which was six times as big as his store, had an amazing warren of dark and mysterious tunnels and secret stashes of weird stuff. You never knew what you might find down there. We loved hanging around there and John never got mad at us or told us to get out if we didn't buy something.

"What do you have planned for publicity?" he asked.

"Huh?" I asked. This was one area that we were lacking in somewhat.

"Your grand opening is tomorrow, right?" he asked. "Seems to me you should have something cool planned to get some publicity for yourselves."

"But how?" I asked, since Cora and I were in charge of advertising.

"Well", he answered. "It seems to me if you had some kind of a challenge match with someone from the city that might get some people noticing."

"Like who?" Cora asked.

"Well" he answered slowly with a twinkle in his eye, "It seems like the Mayor and the head of the council are always ready to accept a challenge."

The smile spread across my face as I thought about this. Miles City Mayor JD Springer did not get along with Bruce Brown the head of the city council. Supposedly it stemmed from a long ago feud involving a car dealership that the Mayor wanted to start. Bruce Brown owned the largest dealership in the eastern part of the state and had somehow put enough pressure on the not yet elected Mayor that he abandoned his plans and opened a travel agency instead. He supposedly never got over that and some people, like my dad, believe that the very reason he ran for mayor in the first place was that Bruce was chosen as the head of the council.

"Great idea!" I exclaimed. We would invite them both and make it a challenge to see who gets the best score. The newspaper and radio station would certainly cover that.

Miles City was a fairly quiet town and the local newspaper printed 6 days a week, Monday through Saturday. They took Sunday off thinking that most people ordered the Sunday version of one of the bigger papers like the Billings Gazette and wouldn't read the local anyway. I was pretty sure that a challenge grudge match between the Mayor and the head of the council would warrant them sending a reporter. What we got was way better than we had even hoped!

That night the soft opening went pretty well. We found a few glitches and were able to fix them as the night went on. By closing time we really felt we had everything working to a perfect T and we were ready to face the public tomorrow. We closed everything down and called it a day.

The next day we met at 9am with a couple of hours to get ready. I had invited the Mayor and Bruce Brown yesterday afternoon by phone and although at first each had declined, saying they were too busy, as soon as I stated that the other one would be there, then both enthusiastically changed their minds and said they would be there. Then I called the local paper, the radio station and even the local small TV station. To my great surprise and delight they all said they would send someone to cover the event. I didn't realize just how interested the local news outlets were in covering the political leaders feud.

We set-up the game and did a couple of run-throughs. Everything seemed to be ready. Mayor Springer and Bruce Brown were supposed to start things off at noon exactly. People started showing up as early as 10:00. The parking lot was filling up and people started parking along the road which went down the Airport Hill towards the Yellowstone River. We couldn't believe how many cars were stopping. The newspaper reporter got there before TV and radio. His name was Skip Waters and he was a pretty good friend of ours. He had graduated from school last year and was always ready to give us a good tip or let us know what he was writing about when we saw him around town.

"Hey guys!" He said.

"Hey Scoop!" I answered, using his nickname, which he really loved.

"Looks like you have the makings of a pretty big thing here. Got any great quotes you want in the paper?" he asked.

We all looked at Cora since she was the one we had chosen to deal with media inquiries. Since she is big on the school paper we figured she's the best one to represent us.

"Yes" she answered. "Please quote us as saying we are so thrilled that our new game has captivated the attention of the city and we can't wait to see who the first winners will be!"

"You got it!" said Skip. "Let me get a few photos of you and your game."

We showed Skip around and he took some great shots showing some of the challenges. I knew this would be incredible publicity when the next edition of the paper came out tomorrow.

After awhile we saw the KMCM radio van pull into the lot and in walked David the C. His real name is Dave Carbine but after he watched an old Happy Days show where Ritchie got a job as a deejay he changed his on air name to David the C. I asked him once what the "C" is supposed to stand for but he kept pretending he didn't hear the question until I stopped asking.

David walked over to where we were congregating and opened the recorder he had with him.

"So," he asked "tell me what's happening here."

Once again Cora was thrust on center stage and for the next few minutes she shepherded David through the origins and construction of the game, building excitement as she led into the challenge match that was coming between the Mayor and the Council Chairman.

David asked her a couple more questions and then strolled off to seek other people to interview. We figured that a significant amount of his afternoon program was going to be dedicated to our opening.

We were feeling pretty excited and held a quick meeting, deciding we should spread out and mingle with some of the growing crowd. Peter's dad and mom were already very busy serving lunch orders and getting drinks ready for customers.

Mayor Springer then walked in and started shaking hands with the voters. The Mayor was always ready to visit with the voters and there were a lot of them assembled in the Grill wanting to greet him and say hello.

Then Chairman Brown entered and it really got interesting. Almost immediately it seemed like two distinct sides emerged. The Mayor and his supporters were alongside the back of the Grill near the kitchen and Chairman Brown and his group kept together at the front, alongside the door to the outside. In the middle were the neutral parties, as well as us.

After only a few minutes the TV crew entered. Now things were at a definite peak. As soon as the bright lights were set up near the entrance to the game and the announcer, who was someone I didn't know, started to record his video the crowd stopped chattering and the tension mounted.

The Mayor and the Chairman both came forward and spoke with the reporter for a couple of minutes. He said his name was Rick Riffle and he asked some really dumb questions, like "Are you worried about a spitball?" Since this had nothing to do with baseball, we had no idea what he was talking about. The Mayor took the question in stride, however and answered that he was confident that the rules would be followed and the better man would win.

Cora then stepped up to the entrance. Along with being our media spokesperson she was also the best person to have meeting and greeting the public. Earl and James had already placed themselves into the control booth ready to operate and oversee the game. Amie, Peter and I assumed our positions inside the game and we were ready to begin.

Cora told us later that it was decided that Rick Riffel would follow the progress with a camera and the entire match would then be played on television that night for all to see. This was great news! We would be getting more free publicity than we ever imagined. Cora also made sure that Rick got a good shot of our opening poster with our sponsors prominently displayed.

Then the game was started. Both men moved into the first room and were faced with the first challenge, being born. The Mayor went first and his efforts resulted in a healthy 8lb, 6oz baby. His smile told everyone that he was satisfied and his look as he peered at the Chairman told him he thought he would have a hard time beating it. The Chairman took his turn and the result was 8lb, 4oz healthy baby.

"Yes!" shouted the Mayor. "I win!"

"What do you mean, you win!" answered the Chairman, "You're just a fat blubbery baby!"

"I'm not blubbery!" argued the Mayor. "At least I can say something besides 'goo goo ga ga'!"

"Both of the weights are in the range of healthy, happy baby weight" said Cora. "If you would like to, you may both proceed to the next room."

The sound of the chime and the opening of the door signified that they could move further into the game.

The men migrated through the game passing challenges representing stages of their lives. The scores were very close with either man holding a slim lead from room to room. The competition level only increased as the match went on and judging by the smile on Rick Riffel's face, he was getting some terrific footage. I was just imagining the TV commercials we would be seeing during the next election season as each man was sticking out their tongues and razzing the other wildly.

James and Earl played their parts perfectly. Doors opened, bells chimed, lights turned off and on right on cue and it was impressive.

The men were out of college and arguing whether a BA in English was better than a BS in Biology. The Mayor was calling the Chairman a germ lover and the Chairman was calling the Mayor a prissy librarian.

I had a quiet conversation with Amie and Peter and we decided the best thing to happen would be to have the match end in a tie, so as soon as they finished a challenge that determined that they both missed winning the lottery by only a couple of numbers Earl hit the end sequence and there was a flash of light and thunder and a fanfare of trumpets which signified the game had ended. Both men were looking confused and ready to protest at first, but as soon as each learned that they did not lose and it was a tie, they readily accepted the outcome, although as they walked out they both proclaimed that they had things well in control and would have surely won if allowed to continue.

Cora met them as they exited and immediately incorporated our plan to split them apart for the post game interviews. She sent the Mayor over to Scoop Waters for a newspaper interview and the Chairman went to David the C for some live radio time.

"Hey hey hey!" David began, "It's David the C live at the Hilltop Grill with Chairman Brown who has just completed an inaugural challenge of the brand new "Game of Your Life" launching today here at the Inn. Mr. Brown, what did you think?"

"I loved it! It was really great. We played a great match and it was really fun. I will definitely come back and do this again, but next time with someone more fun to play with," he added with a wink.

We were ecstatic. The Mayor was telling Scoop that he loved playing it, and the radio audience had just heard how much fun it is. Our advance publicity couldn't have gone better. We held a quick meeting and decided that the best thing to do was open for business immediately. We resumed our places and switched on the "Now Living" sign. We were off and running.

The next two weeks were a whirlwind. We spent almost every hour at the Grill running the game. For the most part the crowds were pretty consistent and positive. We had some very dedicated fans that played over and over again always trying to improve their score and this created some great competitive action amongst some of the players.

We did have a few incidences where we had to ban some people from playing. Bob Maguns and his friend Tracy Bartels were inside and I caught them trying to spray paint some graffiti on the walls. I immediately confronted them and led them out of the game. Cora took their photo and placed it on the "do not let play" clipboard.

When everything was over and Peter's dad had helped us put the room back in shape for the return of the coin machines we took stock of the whole escapade. After all of our expenses we each had banked a little over $1100. Not bad for a few weeks work on something that was a blast to do while doing it. We held a regular meeting at the greenhouse, called it a success, played some hide and seek rubber band games and basically had a great meeting.

Chapter Two: The Time Traveler

We relaxed on our laurels for a couple of weeks after we finished cleaning up the remnants of the "Game of Living." Then on a Tuesday afternoon I marched into the greenhouse expecting to start a game of rubber band guns but instead I found James and Earl hunched over a computer screen searching for something.

"Try 'time travel proof,'" suggested Earl.

"I already did," answered James. "I'm not finding anything like it at all."

"So it's a good idea then?" Earl asked.

"I think it could be done," James said. "Let's at least bring it up to the others and get a vote on it."

"On what?" I asked.

"Earl has our next millionaire idea," James said. "But, we should probably bring it up at a formal meeting before we discuss it anymore."

"Great." I said. "I can wait 10 minutes."

Shortly after that the others drifted in and we were soon all there. We assembled in the workroom and formally started the meeting. Cora had informally assumed the role as club president and Amie was acting as a recording secretary. I could kind of fill the role of treasurer since I had opened the accounts which held the club's money.

"Let's hear from Earl," Cora said after kind of calling the meeting to order.

Earl stood up and for the next 10 minutes he went through his idea which slowly got everyone in the room to breathe heavy with excitement as we started to share in the enthusiasm that he brought into his presentation. From his first sentence asking us how we would like to be featured on national television in front of millions of people, he had us.

"But how?" Amie asked.

"Simple," Earl answered, on a roll. "We need to stage an event so tremendously exciting that media from all around the world will come here to cover it. We'll find a huge field that will be similar to Woodstock in the 60's. People will come from hundreds of miles around and everyone who can't come will be watching it on television."

"What event?" I asked for the second time, but Earl was on a roll and didn't want to be rushed.

"We'll have sponsors and sell concessions. We'll have t-shirts and wristbands. Everyone in the country will be talking about what's going to happen in Miles City, and everyone in the country will be watching us when it does!"

"What event!" we all yelled this time.

"What event?" Earl asked, savoring the suspense. "It's the ATOAFAAPTTTIR all-time once and for all absolute proof that time travel is real!"

"What?" Peter asked.

"I think we might need to work on that name, though," James offered.

"It's so simple," Earl explained. "We stage an event and promote it like crazy that will absolutely prove once and for all whether or not time travel will ever work."

"I don't really get it," said Amie. "How can we do that?"

"It's really simple," Earl said again. "We pick a time and a date, we promote it like crazy so it will go down in history as THE time for a time traveler to appear, then we make it a huge media circus and when the clock ticks down to zero, POOF! We see if anyone shows up!"

We all chewed on that for a bit and then as we slowly thought it through, we each started to get into the spirit and began to offer additional things we could sell or ways we could promote it.

"You see?" Earl asked. "It's perfect!"

It sure seemed to be, but then again, most of what we started seemed to be perfect, at first. When we look back, it's clear that it never quite comes off as planned. That was especially true in this case. Amie was a great recorder, she took meticulous notes and she always kept her notebook safe. It was either in her hands or in her locker at school. That's where we figure Bob Maguns and Tracy Bartels somehow got their hands on it. The school we attend always tells us that the locker combinations are changed every year, but most of us realized that wasn't true. If you could remember where your locker was the year before and tried your old combination you could open it easily. Bob or Tracy must have known who had Amie's locker the last year.

We didn't find out right away. We kept planning things and adding to our list of how to maximize our profits and build the audience. Luckily, I had a separate list of some of the marketing plans we intended to use so these never fell into the hands of our enemies.

We never were sure just when they started reading our plans but they obviously were following them closely since by the time we found out it was very clear that our ideas had now become theirs.

We spent a few days picking the perfect spot for the "Spectacle in Time," as we called it. We picked a spot locally known as "Spotted Eagle" for the perfect location. Spotted Eagle was a city owned recreation area consisting of several campgrounds, picnic spots, a skeet shooting facility, archery, a playground, and, best of all, a small man-made lake with a small island in the middle. This was the spot that we decided would be a great focal point for our time traveler to arrive. There was plenty of room for cars and people to watch from all around the lake.

That's how we found out we were sabotaged. Peter, Amie and I were there spotting out the best places to put concessions, television cameras, and other requirements when a big Lincoln Town Car rolled up. Out came Mayor Springer, Dave Rivers, the owner of KMCM-TV, and Scoop Waters. We then noticed that Bob Maguns and Tracy Bartels got out of the other side. When they saw us, they thumbed their noses at us and slapped each other on the back. We could tell that something big was happening.

We casually strolled over in time to hear Tracy and Bob explaining our ideas about the 'Spectacle in Time' to the Mayor and the media. Of course, they were convincing them that it was their idea and they had all of the plans about running it.

"What are they doing?" I asked.

"They are stealing our idea." Amie answered.

"Let's get to the greenhouse." Peter said. "We need to hold an emergency meeting."

I volunteered to stay and keep an eye on what was happening at Spotted Eagle while they headed off to inform the others. I followed the group around from a distance as the two walked the Mayor and the two reporters through almost all of our plans and sold them on the idea.

From the beginning the Mayor obviously wanted to take the event over as much as he could. Bob and Tracy weren't very good at holding on to the controls.

By the time I arrived at the greenhouse everyone was there and for the most part the upset over losing our second million dollar idea was ending. What they were working on now was revenge.

"What can you report to us?" Cora asked me.

I filled them in and they all nodded their heads. Cora said "I knew that the Mayor would try to take ownership of this if they weren't able to have a firm hand on it. That's why we weren't ready to publicly launch it yet. First we would have wanted to secure that it was hosted and planned by us. By the time this thing rolls around, I bet Bob and Tracy will hardly have a say in it at all."

"But what can we do about it?" Earl asked sadly. It was his creation, after all.

Cora just looked at him sadly.

"I don't think we can really do anything Earl," Amie said sympathetically.

"Maybe that's not entirely true," James quietly suggested.

"What do you mean James?" Earl asked. "Can we get it back?"

"No. That's not what I mean." James answered. "We might not be able to get control of this again, but that doesn't mean we can't have an awful lot of fun anyway."

And that's how the great "Make a Spectacle of Time Operation" was born.

Luckily the plans that the Mayor and the town proceeded to follow were almost exactly the ones that we had prepared. That gave us an incredible advantage as to what was supposed to happen and more importantly, when it was supposed to happen. We had to spend a few nights hanging out on the island at Spotted Eagle after rowing out in James's uncle's rowboat. Luckily, it was pretty big and we could transport a lot of stuff we needed in it. And we needed a lot of stuff. Whether or not a real time traveler showed up, this promised to be a very entertaining evening, at least for us.

By the time the local paper announced the big event we were pretty much all set. We spent most of our time watching the preparations at the lake and trying to raise some money by pursuing some of our concession ideas. We had kept John Fulton at the Collectibles store pretty busy printing up some of our better t-shirt ideas and we starting selling them at the lake. My favorite slogan was "Do you have the time?" with a picture of a grandfather clock changing into a digital watch alongside the front of the shirt. John insisted on adding 'Miles City Montana' to all of our designs saying that this would add to the collector appeal of the shirt.

At night we synchronized our preplanned scheme with the actual design the city was building. So far the plans that we had initially laid out were being followed pretty consistently, which made things a lot easier for us since we had already adapted the island to our new specifications.

The whole town was buzzing over the event which was still a little upsetting for Earl. Because of this, we decided to blow almost our whole club savings into the night to make it really special for us. Earl and James had taken tons of electronics out of the club room and James's basement which was a treasure trove of cool gadgetry and stuff. We followed the plans that we designed and were really looking forward to the night.

The days ticked down and the excitement in the town was growing. On the day of the event every hotel in town was jammed, many people were renting out extra rooms in their homes, the restaurants were constantly full and downtown was crazy. The local merchants were making a fortune and everyone's spirits were high. We kept reassuring Earl that he had done a fantastic thing by bringing this to the town and he was doing great except when he would catch sight of Bob and Tracy, who were hanging out with the Mayor and kept looking at us with smug, gotcha eyes.

We decided to head out to the lake around 5:00 and take our positions. We couldn't believe how crowded it already was. We saw camera crews from all around the country. We noticed Scoop Waters hanging around a really pretty reporter from a station in Cincinnati. There were video cameras everywhere. We saw several reporters from tabloid magazines there. We had fun trying to make up silly headlines we might be seeing soon on their magazines at the grocery store.

There was a big stage built on the island where some invited dignitaries would be sitting. I was certain that whoever would be sitting there, Bob and Tracy would be amongst them. We had staked out positions in several key areas. James and Earl were in charge of the electronics we had installed. Amie was located in the branches of a huge oak tree where she would be able to see everything that was happening and be able to communicate with us all. Peter was behind the controls of his family's small motorboat which was drifting along slowly in the Tongue River, which was where the water in the lake came from when the town needed to add any. Cora and I were assigned positions alongside the beach where we were supposed to observe and record our version of the event for later viewing and sharing on the net.

Promptly at 6:00 the town band started to play. The town band consisted of the high school music, his wife and family, plus some local merchants who enjoyed spending several evenings a year performing for local events, like the fireworks display on the Fourth of July. Everybody knew that they weren't very good, including most of the members themselves, but since the town had a band for over the past hundred years they were always a sentimental favorite.

Lucky for us I had gotten my hands on one of the schedules yesterday so we all knew the planned order of events and the speakers. The evening would start out with the town band playing for 30 minutes and then the Mayor would speak. He was scheduled to introduce Chairman Brown, of course. You can't expect to have one and not the other. He was also planning on introducing Bob Maguns and Tracy Bartels who were scheduled to say a few words before the Mayor finished speaking. We knew we couldn't just sit by and watch that without doing something.

After the speakers finished, there would be a short intermission while the stage was cleared in anticipation for the arrival of the time traveler, if one was to show up. Then there would be a few fireworks, mostly noise and smoke bomb types since it wouldn't be dark yet. The drum corps would then line up and start playing a long, low drum roll as the clock and the crowd counted down to exactly 8:00PM. Then the planned schedule ended since no one knew if anything was going to happen at 8:00, however, at least 6 people knew – us.

Cora and I moved into a tree across from the stage where we could see what was happening with a couple pairs of binoculars. We had already outfitted the tree with a microphone and transmitter we would use to broadcast over the speakers the city had placed on the island. To make sure no one else climbed the tree we had placed signs at the base warning of a toxic itching disease that was on the leaves.

The band started playing right on time and with the amplified sound coming through the huge speakers we were wishing we also had some earplugs to sell to those in the crowd who couldn't stand the racket. We had a couple of hotdogs we had carried into the tree and responded when James called us to confirm we were in place and ready.

"Yes." I answered. "Eagle two is in place and ready."

"Good." James answered. "Remember, when Bob and Tracy are up, that's your cue."

"We'll be ready," I assured him.

The Mayor finally started his speech. He went through a long introduction acknowledging and thanking anyone and everyone who was here in our fine town of Miles City. We knew that the downtown merchants and hotel operators were ecstatic with all of the out of town business that had assembled for our event. He also wanted to be ready to quell any possible disappointment when he added "It's also likely that when the moment arrives, nothing might happen. Does this mean that a future including time travel doesn't exist? No. It means that that future will still remain hidden to us for a number of possible reasons." But to keep the excitement brewing, and the cameras rolling, he then said "But this night might be the one that all of us here will constantly look back on when the story is relayed and state proudly, 'I was there'. Spotted Eagle, the Woodstock for a new generation."

When the Mayor finally finished, he reluctantly handed the microphone to Chairman Brown who was speaking in his role as chairman of the downtown merchants association. He also wanted to thank everyone for coming and wanted to remind them of the incredible shopping opportunities that Miles City offers. "Make sure you visit our fine stores and bring a piece of Miles City home with you."

Both the Mayor and Chairman Brown had thanked Bob and Tracy several times for coming up with this "wonderfully innovative idea" that would put Miles City on the scientific map for all time, no pun intended.

We had decided to not interfere with these speeches in any way for a couple of reasons. One, we really didn't want to make the Mayor and the Chairman mad at us, and two we wanted to save the fun for Bob and Tracy, and of course what comes after.

Finally, Chairman Brown finished and handed the microphone back to the Mayor. My phone beeped with a message from James prompting me to 'get ready'. I was.

The Mayor then cleared his throat and announced "We are all here because of something the town of Miles City has always been proud of. Our innovative and industrious youth always lead the county in any competition."

Since Miles City was almost the only town in the county, this wasn't really saying that much, but it sounded nice.

"Tonight's event happened because two of our finest enterprising young men had an idea. A great idea. A way to affect the very history and framework of time itself. A way to set the timer on time travel. To countdown to the moment of truth that could once and for all prove beyond a shadow of a doubt that people will surpass the 4th dimension, time. In just a few minutes that moment in time, about time, will be in time."

The Mayor gave some great speeches. We could tell that he worked on this introduction for a long time.

"Ladies and gentlemen, without further ado, I present to you, one of the innovative creators of tonight's spectacular extravaganza, Bob Maguns!"

There was a lot of applause as Bob stepped up to the microphone. This was also the time that James cut the line from the microphone on stage to the one that I now held in my hand. I was now live and waiting for Bob to move his lips.

Bob was obviously enjoying all of the attention and it looked like he had prepared a nice speech for the event by the pages of paper he pulled from his pocket. He looked down and started to read, but my voice came over all of the speakers.

"Good evening." He/I said.

He looked a little confused at hearing what sounded like a slightly different voice coming through the speakers instead of his, but he trooped onward.

"I would like to start off by asking if anyone can tell me where the bathroom is on this island? I've been sitting here listening to the Mayor go on and on and on so long that I've got to really go and I'm afraid that I will end up wetting my pants if I don't find a potty soon."

As the words coming over the speakers were sounding different than the ones Bob was saying you could see his face becoming slightly panicked, but instead of stopping he just spoke faster and more panicked.

"I'd also like publicly announce that this idea wasn't really mine or Tracy's. We stole it from the Millionaire's Club just like every other good idea we've ever had in our lives." Bob was visibly shaking now, but instead of stopping, he foraged on through his prepared remarks but hearing my words instead of his. "This is probably due to the fact that as a baby I didn't have a nukie to suck on so I was faced with the choice of stealing one from the baby in the next crib or sucking my thumb. I'm proud to announce that last night for the very first time, I managed to fall asleep without sucking my thumb. I have broken that habit. Now if I could just do something about the stealing."

Bob stopped reading, looked around, listening to the stunned silence from the crowds and slowly turned and slunk away. The Mayor had a shocked look on his face and headed hesitantly to the microphone, picked it up and said "Thank you Bob, for that very overly informative confession. Tracy, do you have anything you'd like to add?"

Tracy was sitting wide-eyed and looked about, panicked, as he tried to decide what to do. Finally he slowly stood and crept to the microphone. As he prepared to speak I handed the microphone to Cora who was ready to speak for him.

"Hello" He/she said. "I would just like to reiterate everything that Bob said with one slight change."

Tracy looked fearful but decided to continue for some reason. "Bob did suck his thumb last night. He's not only a thief, but he is also a liar, and so am I. Thank you very much for coming tonight. And, if you're wondering why I don't need to use the potty right now, it's because I still wear diapers and mine isn't quite full yet, although I could use a change if anyone's available. Mr. Mayor?"

That was it for Tracy. He practically ran away from the microphone and found somewhere on the island to hide until he could slink away. We were all in hysterics laughing over the way that things had worked perfectly. The Mayor came back to the mike and tried to get things back on track.

"Well" he stated. "Let's get on with the festivities. After sending thanks to the Millionaire's Club, whom we all remember from their previous experience with the Living Game, let's try to forget everything else that those two young whippersnappers just put forth and prepare for the climax of the evening."

It was 3 minutes to 8:00. Peter had by now launched the remote controlled airplane that we were going to use to work the crowd into a frenzy of expectation before we revealed our masterpiece if there was no real appearance of a traveler from another time. Since it was dusk we knew no one would notice the plane if we flew it high enough. Earl and James had rigged up some fireworks that they attached to the plane, which was silenced so no one on the ground would be aware it was in the air. James could release the fireworks and ignite them by remote control whenever he wanted to. We figured that if someone really shows up from the future, the addition of some unexpected fireworks would only heighten the excitement. Starting at the 2 minute and 30 second time remaining James started slowly releasing some of our stuff. The first fireworks were simple flare types which burst into balls of fire of different colors. When the first one appeared over the island and slowly drifted downward the crowd reacted with a huge gasp of surprise. No one expected this would happen and it was great! About every 15 seconds James released another and they would burst into a differing color and light the island with their ghostly glow as they burned out about 50 feet above the ground.

The air was filled with the 'ooohs and aaaahs' of the crowd as they watched the increasing balls of light cascade from seemingly out of nowhere and float down to the island. At 7:59 we knew that the spotlights the city had placed on the island were to start lighting slowly and increasing until the stage would be shrouded in a blinding hail of white light as the hour struck 8.

The lights started coming on. We had changed the bulbs to color changing strobe lights and those started flashing red, white and blue. James then started our prerecorded audio which started blaring over the speakers.

"Ladies and gentlemen! Boys and girls! Children of all ages!" I got the line from an old circus movie I had watched on TV late one night. "Without further delay, please put your hands together to welcome...."

The town drummers started a drum roll then, adding to the mounting excitement.

"The Traveling Time Trickster of 2024!" The music rolled to a blaring crescendo as the lights flashed on and off rapidly, covering a screen that was being raised from underneath the stage through some swinging trap doors that we had cut into the wood. Earl had designed this to allow us to project an image on all the screens to look almost holographic.

The image was Peter, wearing a long flowing white robe and a huge white beard which fell to his knees. In his right hand he was holding an old alarm clock and in his left he was swinging around an hourglass. It appeared to the assembled crowd like he appeared out of nowhere. Since the act was all prerecorded, he didn't need to use a live microphone; his voice was being sent on tape right through the speakers at full volume.

"Thank you! Thank you!" Peter/Mr. Time said. "What a wonderful crowd. Give yourselves a hand!" With that he pulled one of the hands off of the alarm clock and tossed it into the air.

I was laughing so hard I almost fell out of the tree. The looks on the faces of the people around us were hysterical. No one had a clue what was happening as they watched this huge ghostly apparition entertain them with corny jokes.

"What should you say to someone carrying a grandfather clock around?" Peter continued. "Why not wear a wristwatch like everyone else?"

Each time Peter finished one of his stupid jokes, a skyrocket was launched into the air to punctuate the humor with a sharp explosion of sound and light.

"I stopped into an hourglass factory to ask if I could use their phone. When I asked the receptionist if she had a second, she gave me a grain of sand."

"After the man threw the clock out the window to see time fly, why'd he put it in a pan on the stove? He wanted to see time fry!"

"A funny thing happened to me on my way here through time tonight. I was passing 2025 and this other time traveler told me that time flies like an arrow, but fruit flies like a banana."

"What did the digital clock say to the grandfather clock? Look gramps, no hands!"

"A friend of mine was wearing 6 watches. I finally convinced him he had too much time on his hands."

"Well, I'd love to stay longer but I have to catch a plane. It took off 4 years ago. You've been a great crowd. Let's do it again, shall we, like right now."

Then James started rewinding the video so it reversed really fast and we all watched Peter do the act backwards. It was great! As soon as he got to the beginning, it started again, just like the first time. As soon as Peter finished the first joke the image started to blink, then fade slightly, then blink on and off faster and then with a thunderous explosion of fireworks and a huge amount of smoke set off by the rest of our hidden firework supply, Peter was gone.

There was almost a minute of silence before the crowd started to quietly applaud and then the applause slowly grew into a huge cacophony of sound. Our time traveler had stolen the show and was a huge hit. James made sure that all traces of our apparatus were again hidden from the stage and we spent the rest of the evening enjoying the people around us discussing what they had seen.

Early the next morning, Peter, Cora and I were on the island retrieving all the hidden equipment we had stashed there before the city crews were set to arrive when I spotted an envelope lying in the middle of the stage. It was addressed to 'Steve W', that's me.

I opened it and read, "Steve, it was great seeing that again. It's even funnier than I remembered when I was watching from the tree like you did. Even though it would have been fun to say hi to you, I think it's better to just write this note and tell you that you'll be back, exactly 33 years from now. Yours truly, You."

Did I come back from the future and witness the show like the letter said, or did someone else have a great little joke on me? I guess I'll know for sure in just under 33 years.

Chapter Three: The Mystery Game

After we helped the time traveler arrive in Miles City we relaxed for a few days before we held a meeting and decided that we needed to get serious again and launch a new venture to make us millionaires.

"This time we will use Level One security," Earl said.

Level One meant that we never discussed the plan unless we had at first performed a full security sweep, and anything we wrote down is kept securely locked in our club safe, hidden behind a panel in the wall in the greenhouse. When the panel was shut, you couldn't even tell there was an opening there. It was a perfect spot.

"Okay." Earl said. "The last thing we did was a blast and would have made us more money if it hadn't been stolen out from us, but what happened is over and it's time to move on."

We knew he was really trying to convince himself since he was still upset that the idea was stolen from us.

"What'll it be?" James asked. "Does anyone have any hot ideas?"

That started a rather lively discussion like it always did. Items from agate treasure hunts to UFO summoning all went by the wayside. This time I had been chewing on an idea for a couple of days and I was just waiting for what seemed to be the right moment to bring it up. Finally the inevitable moment of silence came.

"I was thinking it would be really cool to have a person living out a real live detective story." I said, filling the silence.

"Explain please," Cora said.

"Well," I said. "What if we built a detective story that used real places and stores and things in Miles City and people would try to solve the mystery that we design?"

"Oh wow," James said. "I think I love this."

"Explain it a bit more, please." Amie asked.

"Well," I said. "My dad's office is in the Masonic Temple building and you all know how huge that place is. There are a couple of empty offices on the top floor that we could outfit as a detective's office. That's where the story would start, and then we would plant a string of clues that the customer would have to follow to solve the mystery and win."

"What would they win?" Peter asked.

"I don't know that," I said.

"How about something like the 'key to the city'?" Amie suggested. "The mystery could center on something threatening the town and when the person solves it they would be the hero and get a presentation and award."

"I love it," Peter said.

We all did, and the idea brought to a vote carried 6-0 in favor. The rest of the night was spent brainstorming about ideas we could do and deciding who should be in charge of what things. We set a deadline to be ready for 10 days from today. I was in charge of getting permissions for the locations that we wanted to use. The first person I had to convince was my dad, which I did that night at the dinner table.

"What are you guys up to now?" he asked, adding, "Forget it. I don't really want to know. Yes, you can use the office. Just make sure you don't break anything and leave it the way you found it when you're done."

I had our starting point. The next day after school Amie and I started scouting out potential locations and asking permission. Due to the recent theft of our last idea, this time we asked the principles involved to take an oath of secrecy to not reveal our plan to anyone until we were ready to launch. We went to the library and asked Ms. Eliot if it would be okay to have someone come in there occasionally to find a clue that we hid in a book.

"If you keep it quiet, it's ok." she said. Ms. Eliot was a big believer in being quiet in the library.

Of course we stopped by the Collectible store, and then I wanted to go into the Blue Sky Drugstore where Ron Jorgenson worked. Stacy, the pharmacist, was working and said we could use the store as long as we weren't disruptive or didn't break anything. That seemed to be a recurring theme.

We stopped in about 12 stores downtown and all but two of them said that we could use the stores as long as we weren't disruptive or break anything. Stallows Management Company said they needed to get permission from the owner Earlon Stallows, who was on a cruise at the moment and wouldn't be available for another three months, if we wanted to come back then, and the Modern Bakery manager just looked scared and worried until we left. Before we stopped for the day we headed over to the Plaza, which was a shopping center on the west side of town containing a small strip mall with a Buttery's, a large grocery store, a drug store, a department store and some little shops located inside a small inside hallway. My favorite of these was called "The Curio Shoppe", which was owned by a friend of my family. Mark Foster was another friend who we had played with occasionally and might make a great addition to our club. The Curio Shoppe was filled with cool novelty jokes and gifts that I would spend hours laughing at and wanting to buy. I was thrilled when Mark, who happened to be there, said that he insisted that we use his store in our story.

We met the next day and compared notes. I supplied our potential list of locations and Cora started to summarize the story that she and James were writing. Earl and Peter were in charge of narrowing down a potential field of props and tools that we could use to move the story along.

It would run like this. The Private Eye would begin by sitting in the office at the Masonic Temple building. After a few minutes a person would enter and tell them that they need to hire them to find a missing treasure. They have eight hours to follow the clues and find the location or they will lose the treasure to their nasty first cousin on their mother's side. With a series of clues the mystery would be solved when the treasure spot is located alongside a ditch on the edge of Carbon Hill, a local treasure spot for hiking and climbing located on the edge of town.

My job, along with Amie, was to develop some way of indicating when the person was making the right decisions and a way to alert them when they were off target. We decided the best way would be to use a chime when a correct course is decided upon and no sound when a mistake is made. This way a person learns to listen for the chime when they make a decision. If they hear it, they are on the right track. If not, try again.

We scheduled a run through for the next afternoon. Mark Foster agreed to be the subject of the test run to see how things went and help us find out where the trouble spots were.

Mark came to the office in the Masonic Temple building at around 3:45 and said that he was ready. He was wearing a long trench coat and had a magnifying glass in his hand for effect. I asked him where his Sherlock Holmes pipe was and he pulled out a bubble pipe and proceeded to blow a few colored bubbles while muttering "Elementary, my dear Steven. It's right here."

"Nice Sherlock impression." I said. "Now are you ready to do this for real?"

"Of course." He said laughingly, taking off the costume. "What do I do first?"

"That's part of what we're figuring out." I answered. "First, what would you do if this was your office?"

"I'd sit at my desk and read my mail." He answered, sitting down.

"That's what we thought too." I said, handing him a stack of envelopes. "Here's your mail."

The mail was a collection of junk mail ads that we had repackaged in envelopes with Mark's Detective Agency on the address label and the office number and address of the Masonic Temple Building.

"Nice touch," he said appreciatively. "Shall I open them all?"

"Why not?" I answered. "We can't use those envelopes again anyway."

Mark opened the envelopes one by one and briefly noted the contents. They were all unrelated ads that James had found in his parents mail and we had reused. The only envelope that mattered was strategically placed on the bottom of the pile. When Mark got to it, his reaction showed that he believed it was something unique. I made a note of that.

"Now what's this?" he asked, opening it. "A letter, unsigned."

The letter said:

Dear Mark,

I'm sending this to you because I don't know where else to turn. Many years ago someone in my family did something very bad. It involved the theft of a lot of valuables from the Miles City Museum. I think that it's time to return those things to the city of Miles City but I am scared that it will damage my family's reputation and force me to leave the city that I so love that I can't come forward and reveal my identity or the identity of the person who committed this awful crime. That's one of the reasons that I am coming to you. The other is because the person who committed this crime left me the following note which I found just recently while cleaning out some long forgotten spaces in our home. I think you'll understand the second reason I need you after you read it. I hope you'll forgive me for cutting off the last line where he signed it.

The folded note was handprinted on paper that was yellowed with age. You can purchase this at any print store in the special paper department. It sure comes in handy when you are writing a note that you want to look over 30 years old. The note read:

Greetings! I am glad that you have found this note. I placed it here on what I believe will be one of my last night's alive on this earth. I also place it here expecting that it will be found by a family member who will be interested in finding a great treasure. You who are reading this note are that chosen person. The treasure I speak of is real, and although some might argue that it isn't our family's to own, I offer the following. You will be the finder of a hidden treasure and as the finder you will be entitled to keep it. I do add the following caveat. It will not be simple. To make sure that you really do find it and desire to do so, I have taken the liberty of hiding it and leaving a series of clues that you must solve to find the final location. When you do, you can then use the contents as you see fit. Good luck! To get started you need to follow the red in the brown above the apothecary. Good luck!

The other page in the envelope was a copy of a newspaper front page dated from over 25 years ago detailing a theft that occurred in the Miles City Museum and describing how a burglar had entered at night and somehow stolen many valuable gems and pieces of jewelry and old coins and collectibles. The thief was never discovered and the property had never been found. On the page was written in pen 'I'm sure this is where this treasure came from.' And below that it stated 'I so hope you can help get this returned to the museum so my conscience can be clear.' We also had this fake newspaper page printed up.

Mark finished reading everything and said "This looks great! I can't wait to get started. What's an apothecary?"

I had found out from James that an apothecary was an old term for a modern day drugstore. The first clue would be found in the brown brick room above the Miles City Drug Store which had a different pattern of red bricks in the midst which if followed leads to a loose brick that can be removed to find a paper placed inside the opening. Miles City Drug is located inside an old three story brick building that was built over a hundred years ago, like most of the downtown. This gave us lots of really cool spaces to use in our mystery.

The clue above the Drug Store would reveal an old map which we drew from an old book we found at the library. It would be an overlay of the town as it appeared 25 years ago and had a good old fashioned "x" drawn on it right where the town library is. The library was built 40 years ago so the time frame works for the next clue. The line printed on the map in bright red crayon is "The Founding of Miles Book page 23 is where you should look".

James and Earl thought this was really clever since the play on the town name of Miles might temporarily confuse someone into thinking the book was about the founding of Miles City. It was really an old book printed in 1923 of photos taken by Miles Founding called "Photos of Montana." The picture on page 23 was of the ditch at Carbon Hill where we had buried the treasure. We figured that we might want to add a couple of extra steps if these played out too fast, but we wanted to see how Mark worked through it before deciding how to change things.

Mark headed to the Miles City Drug building and was trying to find the right bricked room with the clue. We decided to let him search on his own to see just how difficult it would be to find the right brick. Ten minutes later, Mark came running out of the building holding a paper over his head.

"I found it!" He called out. "I don't understand it, but I found it!"

He unfolded the paper and it was very obvious that this wasn't the map that we had planted but was something completely different. The paper was crispy and very yellowed. The writing was in faded ink written with a flowing cursive style. At the top was written a date, that was very blurred.

"It looks like it's dated June 6th, 1889." I read. "This is not ours."

"But I found it inside a brick." Mark said. "If it's not yours, then what is it?"

"That's a great question." I answered. "I think we need to hold an emergency meeting."

All of the club members were close at hand anyway since this was the test of the Mystery Game. In a few minutes we were all closeted in our club room at the greenhouse with the strange note occupying all of our attentions.

Cora was holding it when Peter asked her to try to read it aloud.

"June 6, 1889," she began. "I am writing this being of sound mind and decaying body. To whoever finds this note will come inheritance of my life on this earth. I am no longer concerned with whether what I have done is right or wrong, legal or illegal, just or unjust. I leave this record to allow for another to benefit from my act with the intercession of the Angel who led you to this letter. If the Angel of fortune leading you now will continue to show you the way, you will be the benefactor of a box of gold which I now bequeath to you. Whence the gold came into my possession is in a manner that would be considered less than noble but the crime committed was by me and the spoils pass to you. You need but to go and retrieve it and enjoy a life of luxury."

Cora continued reading "The gold is under Main in the steam tunnel from the hotel. Where the tunnel starts to cross, step 52 paces and enter the southern crossing. Inside travel for 22 feet and open the hatch. The gold is there."

Cora looked up. "The letter is signed Marcos Phillipe. That's all there is."

For a moment I thought everyone was going to dash out right then and there and head for Main Street to start digging for gold, but calmer heads took over the session as Amie spoke up.

"We need to get a lot more information before we try to get the gold," she said.

"Like what?" I asked.

"We need to find out where the hotel was in 1889," she answered. "We also need to figure out how we are going to get into this tunnel, if it even exists anymore. I would also like to know where this gold came from."

"All great points," Cora agreed. "Let's split up and try to find some answers. Everyone realizes that absolute silence is mandatory on this one, right?"

We all agreed and soon we were divided into teams to gather information.

Amie and I were dispatched to the library and the county historian's office to try to find any information we could about where a gold theft had occurred around 1889. We were also checking if there were any diagrams or maps showing the layout of the town in 1889 and the location of any tunnels that might have existed around that time.

We stopped into the historian's office. She was hunched over a stack of papers and a magnifying glass. Annette Rogstad was her name and she had held this position for what seemed like a long enough time to have an entire section dealing with herself. She was the picture of the stereotypical librarian type with hair in a tight bun and the skinny bifocal glasses. She looked up and frowned until she spotted Amie and said hello.

"Amie. How are you?"

"Fine, Annette. This is Steve. He and I are looking for some information and sure hope that you can help us."

"I'll try," she said. "What kind of information?"

"First off," Amie answered, "can you tell us if there are any records of gold thefts that occurred a long time ago, say before 1889?"

"Hmmm..." Annette answered. "I believe that won't be too hard to find. I have records of almost all major events that happened. Something as major as a gold theft should he noted somewhere. How about if I let you know tomorrow?"

I almost said "NO! I need it today!" But Amie quickly stepped in and said "Tomorrow will be fine, thanks."

"Do you need anything else?" Annette asked.

"Yes, actually," Amie answered. "Do you know if there's a plat of the town the way it was in 1889 including what the buildings and businesses were at that time?"

"Oh yes," Annette answered. "I can get that for you right now."

With that she stood and moved over to a large book and flipped through the pages before coming to the one she was looking for.

"Here it is," she said. "I'll make you a copy of it."

A couple of minutes later we were outside looking over the town as it appeared in 1889.

"This has to be the spot," Amie said. "Here's the Miles City Hotel right where the 530 Grill is located today. The tunnel must go right under Main Street here."

"I wonder if the others had any luck," I said.

Earl and James were both dispatched to the downtown area to see if they were able to get inside any buildings and head into the basements without causing a disruption or being challenged. Cora, Peter and Mark were searching the building above Miles City Drug to see if there were any other bricks with hidden messages inside.

"It looks like Mark found the only other spot in the building with a loose brick and a paper behind it," Peter reported, once we were all back at the Greenhouse. "We looked everywhere and there was nothing else hidden anyplace."

"We found an access to the basement in the hotel," Earl said. "We tried going down but we got challenged right away by an employee who wanted to know what we were doing."

"Telling her you were looking for the airport didn't help things," James said.

"I was surprised. I don't think fast on my feet," Earl said.

"Obviously," James answered.

I told them that Annette would have the gold information for us tomorrow. We decided that we would adjourn then and in the morning head to the library to get that info and then go to the hotel to see if we could get down to see if there are any tunnels in the basement.

The next day we met at the library at 9am. Annette wasn't there yet. She finally came in around 9:25 and spotted us.

"I'm sorry I'm a bit late," she said. "I didn't know you'd be here so early."

"That's okay," Amie said. "Did you have any luck finding out the information for us?"

"I sure did. It turns out that there was a big gold heist right here in Miles City in the year 1889. Someone broke into the Security Bank and blew open a safe with a stick of dynamite. Then they took out a bunch of gold and got clean away. No one was ever caught or charged with the crime and the gold was never found again."

"Until today," Earl said.

"Really?" asked Annette. "You know where it is?"

"We don't really know anything," Amie answered after glancing reproachfully at Earl. "We're just going to spend some time playing prospector."

"Well, good luck," Annette said. "There's a $5000 reward for the return of the gold which is still on the books payable by the Security Bank if the gold is returned."

"When the gold is returned, you mean," corrected Earl.

"Are you certain there's not something you're not telling me?" asked Annette.

"We're certain that there's nothing certain we could tell you," Amie answered.

With that we hustled outside as soon as we could to keep Earl from saying anything else.

"Do you remember our oath to secrecy?" Peter asked once we were outside.

"I do now," Earl answered.

From there we strolled over to the Miles City Hotel and tried to figure out our next plan. We decided to enter the hotel and see if we could get downstairs but Cora suggested going inside in small groups instead of all together.

"If we all go tramping in it will look like a raid," she said. "Let's go in in groups of two or three. Wait a couple of minutes before you enter. Maybe we'll get lucky."

James and Earl went in first since they had been there before. We waited for two minutes and then Mark, Peter, and Amie went inside. Cora and I waited for another two minutes and then we opened the door and entered.

Inside was a huge room with a very high ceiling. There were several old fashioned ceiling fans slowly turning. The room had three large support beams which traveled from floor to ceiling. Beside each one was a large potted fern. At the end of the room was a long counter with a hotel worker standing behind it. In a frantic conversation with the employee was Earl with James standing alongside.

"But I only want the room for about an hour," Earl was saying. "Why should I have to pay for the whole day?"

"That's our policy, sir." answered the rather bored clerk. "We don't rent rooms by the hour, just by the day."

"This is ridiculous," Earl responded. "If you charge $60 for the whole day, then it should cost me $2.50 for one hour."

"Well" James responded. "Technically that would be right if the rate were based on a person staying for an actual period of 24 hours. But, since in reality, most hotel stays are for a period of approximately 12 hours then the hourly rate, if prorated, would be approximately $5.00 per hour."

We learned later that as soon as Earl and James entered the Hotel, the clerk on duty recognized them from the day before and challenged them as to why they were there. Knowing that we would soon also be entering, they quickly decided to engage the clerk in a dialogue to cover our entering the hotel and hopefully allow time for us to search.

We moved through the lobby quickly and quietly and headed into a small hallway towards the side of the room. There was an old elevator there and at the end of it was a door labeled stairs. We entered the door and inside there was a dreary dark cement stair which headed up and down.

"Let's go down," Cora suggested.

We moved down the stairs. There were three turns before we reached the bottom. Another door at the end was labeled "B".

"I assume that stands for basement," I said.

We opened the door which wasn't locked and entered into a dimly lit hallway with several doors opening along each side. At that moment one of them opened and we started to head back to the stairs when we saw Mark come out of the door.

"Hi," he said. "You made it too."

"Yes," I answered. "I think Earl will keep him going for awhile. Have you found anything?"

Amie and Peter entered the hallway.

"Not yet," Peter answered. "We just started looking though. Let's split up and search all the doors."

We each headed into a room. Luckily all of the doors were very old and none of them had a lock on the handle. I headed down towards the end of the hallway and opened the last door on the left side. Inside was absolute darkness. I felt alongside the edge and my hand found a light switch. I flipped it and a single bulb slowly lit in the center of the narrow room. I stepped inside and started moving further towards the rear. The room was only about eight feet wide and very long. I couldn't see the back end clearly and slowly moved further inside. As I got into the center of the room I could start to make out the other end and noticed what appeared to be a small set of steps dropping down towards another door. This one was short and metal with a long bar for a handle that could be lifted up from the hasp to open inwards. Around the door was a semicircle of bricks that definitely appeared to form the shape of a tunnel. I quickly headed back towards the hallway to call the others.

"I think I found it!" I whispered hoarsely.

One by one the others appeared and joined me inside the room crossing to the other side.

"That must be it," Mark said. "Try to open it."

Peter was the first one to put his hand on the opening bar and lift it. It made a squeaking sound but it slowly lifted up over the locking bars. Pulling on the bar the door started to open inwards and reveal a dark opening behind. We really couldn't see anything behind the door and it was at that moment that Cora once again showed her awareness as she pulled out a small but powerful flashlight and snapped on the light.

"More steps," she said, as the light showed a series of concrete steps descending a short ways.

"Shall we go?" she asked, somewhat nervously.

"I think we have to," Peter answered. "We might not get another chance."

With those words prodding us on, we climbed down the stairs in single file and headed into the unknown darkness below. The steps numbered 12 which meant we were quite a ways below street level and could definitely be at a tunnel point. At the bottom of the steps a hallway turning to the left opened and as we looked inside we knew that we were in the right spot. This was the tunnel.

"Now what?" asked Mark.

"We count 52 paces and find the southern opening," answered Cora.

We started counting together with Cora leading the way. The walls were lined with shelves containing what mostly looked to be boxes filled with old metal parts and masonry. We didn't see any openings as we kept moving through the tunnel. When we were approaching 50 Mark pointed a bit further up at what looked to be a small hatch on the south side of the tunnel.

"That must be it!" he exclaimed.

We all agreed and moved to the spot. There was a small two shelf in front of the hatch that we moved out of the way. There were a couple of old pipes that entered alongside the hatch which was secured with a couple of thumb screws that we were able to remove without any problems. We placed the hatch opening along the wall and Cora shone her light inside. The smaller opening looked to go for about 50 feet before coming to an end at a wall of stone. We couldn't see anything along the sides that looked like openings. There were no shelves inside this tunnel but there were some scattered wooden boxes along the floor.

Cora and Mark moved inside while the rest of us waited at the opening. We could hear Cora counting footsteps as she walked along. When she got to 21 she stopped and we saw the light flash along the wall.

"There's a vent here!" she yelled. "It's covered with a grill."

"Can you open it?" Peter asked.

"I think so," she answered.

We could hear a small squeak as she turned the screws and slowly removed the cover. We waited excitedly as she searched inside and suddenly gasped.

"There's a bag here!"

We saw her slide a heavy bag out of the opening and watched as Peter helped her lift it out of the opening and move toward us. Together we lifted it out and set it down before Cora shone the light as we looked inside. There was a metallic flash of golden light as we viewed a pile of gold coins inside.

"We found it!" Mark yelled.

Celebrating for a few minutes we enjoyed the moment before we figured out a way to carry the gold out of the tunnel. It required four of us at a time to lift it so we took turns heading back outside. Luckily the Security Bank was only half a block down from the Hotel so we didn't have too far to travel until we placed the treasure on a desk in the bank and shared our find with the people inside.

Earl, who along with James, joined us as soon as we got the gold outside the hotel, said "we'd like to deposit the $5000 reward please, if we get one of those cool cameras you offer for new accounts."

Chapter Four: The Great Parade Float Contest

Earl got the cool camera. We all got one, actually. The bank was so grateful for us finally closing out that bad chapter in its existence that we got the $5000 reward, seven radios, and an invitation to appear at the next board of directors meeting and dinner as the bank's guests.

So that was pretty cool. Even though we didn't get to keep all the gold, we at least knew that we had found well over a million dollars this time, and getting $5000 wasn't bad either.

We never got back to the Mystery Game. I'm not sure why. I still think it was a pretty good idea and should have made us some money, but I think that's just the way it was getting to be with us. We did something for a little while and then we moved on. This time we moved on to something that moved.

Amie was the one who suggested that we put a float in the town 4th of July parade. Although the prize money for first prize, $200, wasn't even close to our usual goal and that of our club's charter, we still all voted in favor of the idea.

Of course James stated that our float couldn't be just like any other run of the mill parade float – we all knew that ours would have to be different. It sure was.

Earl and James figured that we needed to make everything original from the ground up. The two of them spent several hours at a drawing board while the rest of us were sent out for supplies.

The Miles City Junk Yard was a treasure trove of incredible finds and we used it a lot. We found almost all of the specific automobile parts that James asked us to get there, as well as the platform we would use to build the bottom of the float on.

One of the features Earl and James planned was to have a canister of helium mounted on the platform with tubing leading to 30 separate nozzles. Each nozzle had a small eight inch wheel spoke attached with 30 individual sprocket tips that would have an uninflated balloon attached. A system of turning the wheel spokes will be attached to the wheels of the float ensuring that they turn simultaneously as the float moves through the parade. At regular intervals 30 brightly colored helium balloons will inflate and be sent skyward. The seal was accomplished by using a small heated press which melded the balloon tip together allowing the balloon to hold the gas.

The floats were judged by the people watching the parade. The way it works is to have each person watching the parade given a tennis ball painted with the unique colors of that year's parade. Each float has a basket on it that is designed to hold the tennis balls that the people toss inside if they want that float to be a winner. The parade makes a complete circle down Main Street and Yellowstone Streets which allows each person to see each float twice. The balls are tossed into the baskets and at the end of the parade counted. Whichever float has the most balls is the winner.

We wanted our float to be the most unique one that had ever been in a parade anywhere. Along with the balloons we all decided that we would go with the pop-up book idea. The main platform on the float would open like the top of a box folding away from the center. Each section would house a different part of the story of Miles City as it grew from a small fort to the Cow Capital of the World. As actors, we would be housed in the opening we left above the balloon platform. We would be dressed in three quick change costumes that we could alter in seconds depending on which stage we were on.

The first stage popped up into a fort setting with us dressed as cavalry soldiers and local Indians who were sharing a fishing pole and having a great time. The second stage would then go up in the form of an old western small city with old storefronts bearing the same name as some of the businesses of today that had been around that long. We were dressed as cowboys and merchants. The next stage opened into a more modern version of our town with current buildings and stores. We would be wearing our regular clothes for this one. Then came our big finale.

Peter, who would be riding with James who would be driving the float, would switch a valve and the helium tank would begin filling up an almost lifelike replica of a hot air balloon. We would be raised into the air by a crane, although it would appear that the helium had inflated the balloon to the point of lifting us off of the ground. Once we were high above the heads of the people they would see our signs on the balloon reading "From Oz to Miles City, better than Kansas!" As the 30 brightly colored helium balloons rose up from the float into the sky we would then send forth a shower of candy so that all of the kids would throw their tennis balls our way and the entire float would quickly go in reverse to begin again 50 feet further along the way. It was super cool.

We called it the Animated Floating Float, or AFF for short, and we were pretty sure that no one had ever designed or ridden in anything like it ever before. We were pretty certain that we would win.

For the next two weeks we worked on the float. We used the shed behind the church at Amie's house. Her father said that we could use it. We liked it because it was fairly hidden in the back of the church and it had a strong metal door with good locks. Luckily we had a pretty good bankroll to use to finance the float, and even though it probably doesn't seem to make a lot of sense spending all of that money to win $200 it had become such a fun project that we just didn't care about that. We decided at one meeting that we would make sure to pick the next project based on revenue more than fun.

One day Mark thought he saw Bob and Tracy running into the neighbor's yard but when we went to investigate we didn't find anything and we felt pretty safe with the locks on the shed. We shouldn't have been so trusting.

As parade day got closer, we started putting the finishing touches on the float. James and Earl had it rigged so that the platform sat atop an engine that would be practically invisible and would be really quiet running. Peter and James would ride inside the cab, which was located up front and had an open viewing port so that they could see. The rest of us would ride atop the float in the opening underneath the moving platforms until it was time to begin. We finished all the painting and the final touches on the Friday before the parade. The next day at 11am we needed to be in place by the city park to line up for the parade. We planned on meeting at the shed by 8:00 to make sure we had plenty of time to load up and get into our starting place on time.

I arrived at 7:58 and knew right away that something awful had happened. The doors to the shed were opened and James, Cora and Amie were standing outside with heads hanging down looking very upset.

"What happened?" I asked rushing up.

I didn't have to wait for an answer. As soon as I came to the opening and looked in I saw that everything we had put so much work into was strewn all around the inside of the shed. The platforms were pushed over and the pop-ups were all ripped apart. The helium tank was empty and on its side. The balloons were all pulled off and cut open. Everywhere I looked I saw ruin. Someone had been very thorough in their destruction.

"Oh, my gosh," I said. "It's ruined."

Ruined it was. Absolutely and totally. This float would not float anywhere. As the others arrived, each one looked upon the destruction with shocked and sad eyes at seeing all of the work and money we put in wasted.

"What can we do?" Mark asked.

"Nothing Mark," Cora answered. "There's no way we could fix this in time for the parade."

"It was Tracy and Bob. We saw them," I said.

"I'm sure it was them," Amie answered. "But there's nothing we can do right now that will help us today. I'm afraid this time they beat us."

"No," I said. "There's got to be something we can do."

"Like what?" asked Cora.

"I don't know," I answered. "I just don't want to give up."

"You know what?" Cora said. "I don't either."

"Neither do I," Amie said. "But what options do we have? Everything's ruined."

"Not everything," James said. "The float still drives and it still has a platform."

"What can we do in two hours with a platform that moves?" I asked.

That simple sentence put us in a flurry of idea generation and creativity the likes of which we had never seen before. We were all focused on finding some way of recovering from the attack by Bob and Tracy and making it to the parade on time with an entry that could win. In the end it was a pile of poster board and a set of black markers that provided us with the answer.

Just before 11 we pulled into the city park and watched the curious faces as people looked over our simple unadorned float when they saw us. We took our place and waited for the start of the parade.

When it was our turn to move, we started out and we positioned ourselves along opposite sides of the tennis ball collection basket with our prepared set of posters. Using Peter, Amie and Cora as spotters, Mark and I would hold up the poster most applicable to the people we were driving by to get the best reaction. When we were passing a group of cowboys we held up the poster that read "Cowboys are the best! Throw your tennis ball if you agree!" If we were passing some kids from Custer County High School we held up our "CCHS rocks! Vote yes by tossing your tennis ball!"

Our best sign turned out to be the one that read "Unused tennis ball collection float. Toss now." We got hundreds of votes using that one, most of them on our first pass through. Knowing that there was a huge rivalry between Miles City and its neighbor city Glendive our sign reading "Think Miles City beats Glendive in everything? Toss the tennis ball to say YES!" really scored big.

Earl was scrambling around gathering up the tossed tennis balls and putting them in the overflowing basket in the center. We needed to start holding them in our hands and pockets to keep them from going over the side. Our second time through was even better as the "Unused tennis ball" sign did its magic and brought hundreds more onto our float.

When we reached the end, there wasn't any need to count our totals. We caught a glimpse of Tracy and Bob watching as we were awarded the first prize trophy and check. We collected the highest number of votes in the history of the parade.

Chapter Five: The Tongue River Round-up

We settled into a couple good rounds of rubber band hide and seek after the parade until one day when Mark and Amie were conspicuously absent. During the midst of one particularly exciting round they burst in excitedly.

"Come out, come out, wherever you are!" Mark called. "We need to hold an emergency meeting!"

I don't care what else is ever happening, when you hear the words "emergency meeting" that gets the level of excitement and anticipation way up there. I, along with everyone else, rushed into the clubroom.

"What's so exciting?" Earl asked.

"I got it!" answered Mark. "I have the next idea!"

The only thing we had stated after the parade victory was that our next idea needed to generate some money so this was really exciting. After all, we were called The Millionaires Club and even though we were having a blast with all of the adventures we should be following our charter to make money.

We all listened enthusiastically as Mark explained.

"I was listening to a couple of guys who were talking about what they were going to do this weekend and one of them said that it would be a great day to float down the river. The other guy said that he agreed but that it's too bad it's such a pain to find big inner tubes and to get a ride out to a starting spot. I went 'that's it!' and almost ran right here."

"But first," put in Amie, "he came to me to iron out some pretty huge upfront problems like how to make it work since we're all too young to drive and we don't have any spots along the river where we can start such a business."

"I'm assuming you came up with something?" asked Cora.

"Of course we did," answered Amie. "That's why we're here now."

"Let's hear it," James said excitedly.

"Okay," Mark said. "First, it's obvious that we're talking about the Tongue River and not the Yellowstone, right?"

Miles City originated at the site of where the two rivers met. One was a small, windy, shallow river called the Tongue which joined up with the Yellowstone River, which is a large, wide, fast flowing, deep river. If the average person was going to sit in a river in just an inner tube, almost everyone would agree that the Tongue is the place to do it so you can relax and not worry about drowning. We all agreed that the Tongue was the proper river to use.

"Second," Mark continued. "We had to find the right place."

"I'm wondering how you're going to get around the driving problem," Cora asked. "How will we get people back to their cars after they finish floating?"

"Patience," said Amie. "We'll get to that."

"Right," agreed Mark. "Now if I may continue. I went to Amie to help figure this out, and the first thing she suggested was to get a good map to use. We went to see Annette at the library and she gave us a local property map which shows who owns what and where. It also shows the Tongue River from where it meets up with the Yellowstone to about 25 miles out of town."

We all looked at the map and noted what Mark was saying. The river was clearly drawn along with all of the ranches, farms, and other geographical features.

"Follow the river out from town," Mark said. "See if you notice somewhere where something pretty cool happens."

We were all looking and easing our gaze along the river as it left the city. We noted that it passed through many ranchers' lands as it meandered its way through the countryside. At one place, we noticed that it really wound back on itself several times all on the same patch of land.

"Right there!" James said, pointing at the spot. "Right here at the MCCC Ranch. What does that stand for anyway? The roman numeral 1300?"

"Nope!" Mark answered. "It stands for Miles City Council. That ranch is owned by Bruce Brown, the City Council Chairman!"

"Plus," Amie continued. "That patch of river is on his land for almost three miles with all of the winding. If a person floated the river from one end of Chairman Brown's land to the other, it would take almost five hours to do it."

"Explain this a bit further for me, please," asked James. "How does this make everything ok? Are the points of entry and exit so close together that the people can just walk to the other?"

"No," Mark answered. "Although it isn't very far. Only about a quarter of a mile. They won't have to walk. We'll drive them."

"But," James started to ask. "How can we do that? Oh, wait a minute. It's private land!"

"Yep," Mark answered. "Not only is it on private land, but we'll be driving them using a tractor."

"Of course!" Earl said. "Kids can drive tractors in Montana on private land!"

"Yep," Amie said. "And driving them back on a hay wagon would be more fun anyway. Plus we can tow another small trailer to carry the inner tubes back."

"That's great," I said. "But what if Chairman Brown says no?"

"He won't," Mark said. "He already said yes!"

"You asked him already?" Peter asked.

"Yep," said Mark. "Amie kept telling him that it would be a great way to get his message to the voters who would be enjoying his beautiful land and feeling thankful and indebted to him. By the time she was finished, he was practically begging us to use his land."

The full details were that the float through the area we selected would take just under two hours from start to finish and would include some really great scenery and winding turns. The beginning was right near a field that Chairman Brown said we could use as the main parking area when people arrive. After they finish we could take them back to their cars via a hay wagon that would also be fun to ride. If we got really busy, we could have two tractors running to keep the lines short.

Mark and Amie figured we could run the float on the weekends during the remainder of the summer. They had already gotten quotes on getting the used inner tubes from a tire dealer in the area and also figured we could raise more money selling concessions during the ride.

"There's a spot next to a sand bar that would be a great place to have a snack bar," Amie said. "We think we could really sell some snacks and drinks there."

After everyone digested the facts and a few more questions were answered, a vote was called for. I was certain we would have another unanimous agreement which is what our charter called for to enact an operation, but I was very surprised when James voted 'no'.

"No, James?" Mark asked. "But why?"

"Well," he answered. "It's not because I don't think it's a really great idea. I do. I really do. But there's just something missing. There's something missing that changes it from a really great idea to a Millionaires Club idea. That's what I think it needs."

"Like what?" asked Amie.

"I'm not sure," James said. "But I know that we can come up with it if we try, and if we have to."

Well, since according to the charter, we had to get unanimous support, we all started thinking. After a few minutes, nobody had a great plan and some started to drift out to play rubber band guns. I was one of the last to leave and I was really hoping that someone would come up with something since I thought this was a really great plan.

It was 2 in the morning when I heard my phone ringing. Hurrying to answer it before anyone else in the house was disturbed, I saw that it was Mark calling.

"I have it," he said.

And boy oh boy, he did. When I hung up the phone 10 minutes later, I knew he had come up with a true Millionaires Club idea.

The next afternoon at the greenhouse everyone was waiting for Mark to share the idea with them.

"It came to me last night," he said. "I kept thinking -- what can we do to make this better? How can we add some kind of game or challenge to the river float? Then it occurred to me. What do Montanans like to do? Target shoot. What if we set up a lot of life size targets in differing shapes and sizes along the river, hand out paint ball guns to the floaters and have them target shoot as they move?"

"Wow," James said. "That's a great idea."

We spent the next two hours improvising the new plan. Peter had a friend who played paintball we got in touch with to ask about where we could find some equipment. It turned out that a small company located in Forsyth, a town about 40 miles away, had a paintball company and was happy to rent us some guns for the weekend days.

Amie was in art classes and said that she knew she could get some really great targets in the shape of some unique funny animal shapes like a camelgator – a combination of a camel and an alligator or a rhino constrictor – the front half a rhino and the back a boa constrictor.

We planned on having lots of targets with bulls-eyes on them ranging in size from very big to small to offer some differing levels of challenge. Earl came up with a plan to string a loop of blue fishing line through some trees on either side of the river that allowed us to have some things right above the floaters that would seem to be flying since the blue fishing line would disappear when blended into the sky.

We planned on offering the round-up part of the float for a section that was about 1/3 of a mile long. We would put a wristband on the floaters who had chosen that option and issue them a fully loaded paint gun at the start of the target range and collect the gun at the end.

Cora suggested that we make sure that we kept the different groups separate so that those who were just enjoying a casual float down the river weren't in the midst of those who were target shooting. We all agreed this was a good idea. The price to just float without shooting was only $4. To shoot and float, $24. That allowed us enough money to make a profit after paying for the gun rental and the paintballs.

The next few days were a blast as we set up the route and put in place the targets and other cool things. James rigged up a hose that pulled water from the river and cascaded it down some rocks along one side of the river which created a waterfall. Another hose added a misting effect which sprayed over half of the river as the floaters went by.

We set up the snack shop just after the round-up range ended. We figured it would be a great place for shooters to want to relax with a cold drink and snack while they compared their shooting prowess.

We were able to borrow two tractors and wagons from the local Future Farmers of America at the high school. All they asked in return is to put a couple of posters on the side promoting their chapter while we used them.

We spent two days just taking turns riding the river and practice shooting. We had tons of fun and would add something new each time as we compared notes and shared scores. We were ready to open on Saturday.

The weather was perfect. It was a hot summer day and the people were flocking in to try the latest recreation around. Our only problem was that we kept running out of inner tubes since there were so many people that wanted to float. We were surprised to see that about half of the people just floated and then about half of those went right back and floated again with the round-up option.

I think everything would have continued to go off as smoothly as possible without any odd changes this time except for one evening on the radio with David the C. He was discussing the current affairs of Miles City and his guests included Chairman Brown and Mayor Springer. Right in the midst of an exchange about the water levels in the area lakes, Chairman Brown commented that the levels seemed to be perfect for the newest attraction those Millionaire kids are running.

"That's for sure," David the C agreed. "That's on your land right Chairman?"

"Yes, it is," answered the Chairman.

"So have you floated the round-up yet?" David asked.

"No, no, no," answered the Mayor. "I'm sorry to say that I'm much too busy for that kind of thing."

The Chairman loudly stifled a laugh at that remark.

"What's that?" asked the Mayor. "Do you have something to say Mr. Chairman?"

"Why no, Mr. Mayor," he answered. "I'm just sorry that you won't have a chance to float the river and show your stuff with the target shooting."

"And why is that?" asked David the C.

"Because I know for a fact I could shoot the pants off of him," Chairman Brown answered.

"What?" The Mayor scoffed. "That'll be the day!"

"That sounds like a challenge to me," David the C announced. "Do you accept the challenge Mr. Mayor?"

"You're darn tooting I do. That'll be the day when this upstart whippersnapper shoots better than I do."

"There you have it folks!" David the C recapped. "We have the first annual Miles City shoot-off taking place on the Wild Tongue River Round-up, and I will be there to bring it to you live!"

What followed was a brief period where the day and time was setup and then there were a few other questions about other city matters, but the highlight of the show was definitely the challenge.

The following Saturday at 2 in the afternoon the two combatants arrived ready to show down with each other and settle the matter. We had made some additional preparations including some extra targets. We had also gotten some completely different colored pellets from our supply store so we would be able to easily track the scores of each of them. The Mayor would be using bright orange and Chairman Brown would be shooting with a deep purple.

Both men were all smiles as they got into place and received their tubes ready for the start of the float. The first mile was relaxing and calm as the river slowly meandered through the Chairman's beautiful ranch. Many floaters got to see a variety of wildlife including deer, elk, horses, and more. Laying back and watching the clouds drift by was a great way to enjoy the trip.

When the Mayor and the Chairman got to the beginning of the round-up, Peter and Amie were ready to hand them their fully loaded paint guns. Just over the line we had hung large six foot by six foot posters with a campaign photo likeness of each of them, one on each side of the river. We thought it was a great way to promote the challenge. The two of them thought of them as the first targets.

The moment the posters were unfurled both shooters started blasting away at the other politician's likeness without a moment's hesitation between rounds. Within a period of one minute each challenger had emptied their entire supply of paint pellets and had completely coated the other's picture in dripping wet paint. With maniacal laughter each one fired the last few rounds in a targeted attempt to complete the task and not leave one spot open to view.

The only problem we had now was we were at the very start of the challenge with two people who each had empty guns and the entire course to go through. The final result would be a tie with neither one scoring a hit, although we believed the argument could go on forever as to who had most completely blacked out the other's poster.

It was Cora who came up with the perfect solution.

"Let's give each of them another full gun, and give me about 30 minutes to reset the course with something just a bit more appropriate," she said.

We readied the guns as she and Mark rushed out to put her plan into action. And it was perfect.

Just about 30 minutes later, they returned and announced that the course was ready. Since we load each paint gun with 180 rounds, she and Mark had copied and printed 90 campaign posters of the Mayor and the Chairman and tacked them to our targets along the course. Now the challenge was to see how many of the opponent's posters each could mark while floating the course. If the preliminary round we had just witnessed was any indication, this would be a momentous challenge. As both floaters began the journey, each held their guns at the ready watching for the other's poster.

As soon as they started to come into view the shots began. It looked like it was a really close battle as each shooter placed their every effort into sighting and hitting their chosen targets. The rules stated that you were not allowed to stand up at any time so you couldn't help but float past the target you were shooting at as the river moved you along. Mark and Cora had alternated the placement of targets really well so that they dotted both sides of the river and several were also hanging on the lines overhead. The only worry we had was that the Mayor and the Chairman, in their single focused determination to hit the smiling face of their opponent, would forget that there was another shooter right alongside of them and might mistakenly shoot the other while looking for the next target. Luckily, that didn't happen.

At the end of the round-up both shooter's guns were empty and we collected them. Earl and James had been following along as the match progressed and had already collected all the targets to be ready for scoring. We had selected Scoop Waters from the Miles City Paper to be the scorer so he sat at the table and began marking the targets. Each target was scored with a three point if the paint splat had covered any of the face, a two point if the paint splat missed the face but was all contained within the poster, a one point if there was any paint on the edge of the poster, or a zero point if there was no paint anywhere on the poster.

We could tell that it was really close. Both men had done a really impressive job of shooting as almost all of the posters contained paint. The Mayor was the first one to start autographing his posters and handing them out to the crowd as souvenirs. Chairman Brown started doing the same soon after.

Finally Scoop said that we had a winner.

"Winning by just two points," he announced, "Mayor Springer!"

The Mayor started a jubilant dance and nearly fell into the river as he cavorted alongside the edge jumping wildly up and down before getting tired and collapsing on the ground to take a breath. Chairman Brown came up and in a show of good sportsmanship extended his hand to the Mayor and both shook hands while smiling. I think they enjoyed the fun and had a really good time on the river. We were busy each day from that point through the rest of the summer.

At the end of the summer we all took Mark out and treated him to a hamburger and malt. His idea was a great one. We made almost $10,000 in profit for the run. The Wild Tongue River Floating Round-up had become a permanent draw for Miles City. We were ready to roll it out again the next summer for sure.

Chapter Six: WWBC and the HayMonster!

The Floating Round-up was going along well but after the first two weekends we realized that we had the operations down to a science and had a lot of time on our hands now in the midst of summer. Since the float was only open on Saturday and Sundays during the day we had Monday through Friday to fill. It didn't take long until someone suggested we should come up with something to fill the time.

We held a meeting.

"What can we do that won't clash with our weekend operation and that will generate some cash during the week?" James asked.

That was the opening to another brain storming session where ideas were tossed out that ranged from not good to horrible. After an entire hour of back and forth suggestions it looked like we were going to come up empty.

Earl suggested taking a break to play some rubber band hide and seek and try again in a few minutes. We played a spirited match with teams that ended in a tie when the last two shooters, Earl and Amie, sent rubber bands flying into each other at the exact same time.

"That was cool!" Earl exclaimed when we entered the club room again.

"Did anyone come up with another idea?" James asked. "A good idea?"

At that, no one said anything. We were stumped.

"Can we do anything to increase our profit from the river float?" Cora asked. "Should we add another day or stay open later?"

Both suggestions ended up yielding negative responses. The amount of interested floaters was not high enough to warrant opening on a weekday and we didn't want to stay open too late since the sun going down gets in the way of the shooters vision.

"Maybe we could add more food options?" Peter suggested.

Peter usually could be counted on as the one to see the marketing potential in selling more food or drinks. Probably because his family owns the Hilltop Grill restaurant.

"Hmmm.." Cora said. "What did you have in mind?"

"Well," Peter answered. "We really don't have anything outside of the river, and what we are selling is just snacks. I've always believed that if you put something really wild on a hamburger bun you could sell it to somebody for a profit."

"Like what?" I asked.

"Well," he answered. "One night at the Grill I had this bottle of tender cactus that I tossed onto the grill, heated it, put it on top of a quarter pound patty, added pepper cheese and salsa and called it the 'Outback Burger' and sold 16 of them before I decided to quit for the night."

"Do you think we'd sell a lot of them at the float?" James asked.

"Oh! Oh! Oh!" Peter called out. "I've got it!"

"What?" Six voices asked together.

"Let's not do it at the river on the weekend," he answered. "We're already doing that. Like everything else we do, we need something new and different. We've got a Round-up. Now let's have a Chuckwagon!"

"Like a covered wagon in a wagon train?" Cora asked.

"Kind of," Peter answered. "I was thinking of more like a trail ride to an honest to goodness outdoor old fashioned cowboy cook-out."

"Go on," James prodded, already nodding his head.

"We put people on horses and they head out on a trail that ends at our outdoor cook-out where we serve the wildest hamburgers anyone ever made anywhere."

"I love this," Amie said. "And I've got the perfect name."

We all waited excitedly.

"We call it 'The Wild West Burger Company'," Amie said.

"That's a great name!" Cora said and we all agreed.

The Wild West Burger Company was born.

We spent the next several hours planning and refining the idea. Basically, we were looking for a similar location on someone's land we could use that could provide the horses and the outdoor location for us to set up our cook-out. We assigned the team roles to get to work on.

Peter and I were assigned the task of making sure that our operation was legal and sanitary. We would need to get some city licenses and permits to operate and pass an inspection from a health inspector before opening.

Cora and Mark were picked to find the perfect ranch to work from. Ideally someone with some good horses who had a great spot where we could have our campfire and cook the food for our guests.

Amie and James were assigned to research competition and see what already is out there and the costs and Earl was to start locating suppliers and find out what we'd need to do to get the supplies to make what we need.

Peter and I headed over to the courthouse and visited with the county sanitarian. We learned that we could do what we wanted to as long as we only used disposable utensils since we wouldn't have an authorized system in place to wash dishes. We also learned that we would need to make sure that our food was kept at required temperatures before and after cooking. It was an educational visit. We left with the request that we needed to have a final inspection before we could begin to sell any food to the public.

When we returned to the greenhouse everyone else was already there except for Cora and Mark who were finding the perfect location. We found out later that it was a lot harder than we had anticipated finding the right place. When they finally showed up the next afternoon they told us they had the perfect spot, the Lance G Ranch.

The Lances were a local family that had lived in the area forever. There were many Lances and each of them had a lot of kids and lived on a ranch. The Lance G Ranch was located just a couple of miles out of town along a road called Cemetery Road, since it went past the local town cemetery as it snaked through the small hills outside of town. Cora said it had a great spot for cars to park and people to transfer to horseback.

"They have a little bunkhouse right off of the road," she said. "This will be a great spot to have people park and saddle up for the ride to the cook-out."

"We can have the use of a lot of horses," Mark continued. "They're actually glad because they want the horses to get some daily exercise."

"And as for the spot, I think we'd rather show it to you than tell you," Cora said. "Shall we go?"

We jumped on our bikes and headed out Cemetery Road for the Lance G Ranch. We got there and dropped the bikes. Cora and Mark had obviously let them know we were coming since there were seven horses saddled and ready. We climbed up and followed Mark and Cora as they headed out over the trail toward a grove of trees. The path traveled under an archway of trees and it was like going through a tunnel. After about 35 yards the sky opened again on a landscape of rolling small hills and sage brush. There were rocky outcroppings that painted a perfect picture against the sandy trail. It was a great place. We traveled along for another mile or so until we came around a hill and there was a beautiful clear blue lake in front of us with a grassy shoreline around it. We knew right away that this was the spot. It had to be.

"They said we can put tables along here," Cora said. "They can move them here from their corral. They use them occasionally when they are showing horses."

"The firepit will be right there." Mark pointed to a perfectly rounded circle of stones surrounding a bare patch of dirt. "They've used this spot for bonfires several times and it works great. The trees and hill provide a great shelter against any winds."

We all loved it. The spot was perfect. We moved to the next level of planning and again divided into teams to accomplish specific tasks.

Set-up was assigned to Peter and me. We were in charge of getting all of the equipment we would need and getting it set up where we needed it. We were able to order a lot of the things we needed used and, of course, most of our stuff was made of paper since it had to be disposable.

The most fun we had was going to the supermarket and pulling strange things off of the shelves to try to come up with a new flavor combination that we could make into a specialty burger. We headed up to the Hilltop Grill where they had the equipment we could use to make and sample our concoctions. Over the next several nights we came up with 10 really creative mixes. When we were ready, our menu looked like this:

The Outback Burger- tender cactus, green salsa, and pepper jack cheese sit atop this 1/3 pounder in a delicious flavor sensation.

The Bayonet- A slice of cotto salami with black olives and swiss cheese make this 1/3 pounder a real treat.

The Brit- A dollop of chutney with some banana peppers and a 1/3 pound beef patty complete this sensory delight.

The Inferno- Jalapeno peppers, Cajun salsa, and pepper jack cheese combined with a 1/3 pound patty test your temperance.

The Italiano- zesty tomato sauce, pepperoni, and mozzarella cheese atop a 1/3 pound beef patty bring the taste of Italy to your mouth.

The Antarctica- Our coolest burger puts chilled Wild West Sauce with blueberries on a 1/3 pounder.

The Confectioners- How sweet it is! Honey, marshmallows, and caramelized onions coat a beef patty and sweeten your taste buds.

Say Cheese! - Not 1, or 2, or 3, or 4, but FIVE different cheeses cover this patty in this super cheesy burger.

The Islander- Pineapple and melted cheese make this 1/3 pounder sing "Aloha!"

The Montana- Four strips of bacon, zesty BBQ sauce, and cheese complete this 1/3 pound burger.

All of our burgers are served with lettuce, tomato, onions and pickles on the side, and a handful of crispy delicious potato chips!

It was Earl who caught our big mistake so far, although he came upon it in a backwards way.

"Wouldn't it be fun if we could have the people who order the Confectioner toast their own marshmallow over the campfire?" he asked.

We thought that was a great idea! Cora added "The kids who will mostly order that one will love that idea."

"Kids!" Amie yelled. "We forgot to have a kids menu! We need one!"

That set us back to the drawing board where we came up with a cool menu for kids and another neat idea. We added s'more fixings so those who want to can toast a marshmallow over the fire and make a s'more. We knew the kids would love that as well.

James said "Get the kids and get the parents."

That started another brainstorming session where we refined the kids menu, added marshmallow toasting and a campfire sing-along. Chairman Brown was always looking for another opportunity to sing his collection of folk songs and we had to admit that he was pretty good so we told him he could be the performer for each night he wanted to be there. He chose them all.

From 9 to 9:30PM we now had a campfire sing-along with s'mores and toasted marshmallows featuring the guitar and voice of Chairman Brown.

We opened on a Wednesday night and things went really well. We had some glitches figuring out the best way to cook the burgers over the fire but with the help of the county health inspector we got the kinks worked out.

All in all it appeared that this was going to be a nice easy little money earner for us for the remainder of the summer with no unusual occurrence, if you don't think eating cactus on a hamburger is unusual. This kind doesn't have any prickly things left in it. They've all been removed. Check at the store, you'll find it.

One Friday night, things were going along smoothly when Mayor Springer and his family came out for dinner. Things were fine until Chairman Brown came out with his guitar and started leading the diners with a sing-a-long. It seemed that there was one very loud voice that was singing horribly out of tune. It made the entire set of songs very hard to listen to. Everyone was glad when it ended and the applause when Chairman Brown took his slightly relieved bow was thunderous.

I did notice a look on the Chairman's face as he scanned the crowd and glared just a little bit at the Mayor. A few minutes later he was quietly chatting with Tracy behind a bush. Shortly after that I spotted Tracy as he met with Bob and had a quick conversation. Then Bob walked over to the Mayor and asked him to step aside for a conversation. I hastily hurried into the bushes to where I expected them to go and waited to listen. I overheard Bob telling the Mayor that the Chairman was badmouthing him and he should get even.

"What are you saying?" The Mayor asked Bob.

"Just what I said," Bob answered. "Chairman Brown wants to show you a spot not far from here that he thinks will make a great location shot for the Chamber of Commerce website. But he's afraid you won't want to use it because it's supposedly haunted."

"Haunted? Is he serious?" The Mayor asked.

"Sure," Bob said. "He thinks you will be scared to use it since you probably wouldn't even go with him to look it over."

"I'll go whenever and wherever he goes anytime anyhow!" The Mayor answered. "You tell him to name the time and place and I'll be there. Are you sure you can pull this off? I remember your last fiasco."

"It's a sure thing," Bob answered. "I'll tell him what you said. He already told me that he's heading there tomorrow evening after he sings his 7:00 set. Shall I tell him you'll be going along with him?"

"You're darn tooting I will," answered the Mayor. "Tell him I'll be there!"

The Mayor strutted off. I followed Bob back to where Tracy and the Chairman were standing.

"He's in!" Bob said. "He'll be there for sure!"

"Well," the Chairman said. "I'm not sure I love your idea of scaring the Mayor and filming it to show at the next political function we both attend, but I must admit it sounds like fun. And he shouldn't have been deliberately ruining my singing. What did he ever do to you, anyway?"

"Did you forget what he said about us at Spotted Eagle?" Tracy asked.

"Oh yeah," The Chairman said. "That was pretty funny."

"We don't think so," said Bob.

"Ok, so let me get this straight," The Chairman said. "After my set, we get on the horse wagon and follow the path into the meadow. At the end of the path you'll be there to scare the Mayor and capture it on film."

"Right!" Bob said. "That will teach him."

The three separated soon after and I hurried back to the others to call an emergency meeting.

"This is too good to be true," James said. "We have to take advantage of this."

"But we don't have a lot of time," Earl noted.

"Then we better get busy," Peter said.

We spent the next two hours in an emergency planning session to get our plan in place to wreak havoc on Bob and Tracy's plan to scare the Mayor and capture it on film. After the first 45 minutes Cora and I were sent out with a list of things we needed to get at the hardware store and a request to have our phones on in case we needed to add to it.

The night was spent in a whirlwind of activity for us but we loved every minute. Knowing that we could have some fun with Bob and Tracy and mess up their revenge plan against the Mayor was a perfect formula for fun.

By the end of the night we were back at the greenhouse with a pile of stuff and a solid plan in place. We were set to get to the site early in the morning to get set up.

Peter had figured that Bob and Tracy wouldn't have anything very elaborate planned.

"Probably something like Tracy dressed as a pumpkin or something," he said.

Amie and I went to have a short visit with the Mayor in the morning while the others were in the meadow preparing our plan. When we told the Mayor what the Chairman, Bob and Tracy had planned he was very upset at first.

"Those two blithering idiots again? And Chairman Brown too?" he exclaimed. "Let me at him!"

As he reached to pick up his phone Amie reached out her hand and stopped him.

"Wait," she said. "We have a better idea that we think you'll like."

Later back in the field we all worked the rest of the day making sure everything was in place. We surrounded the spot at the end of the path they would take with white sheets. The sheets were wrapped around uninflated balloons that were attached to a tube connected to a huge cylinder of helium. The effect when we turned on the gas caused the balloon to inflate and slowly float the sheet into the air. When the balloon released itself from the tube it floated up high into the sky with the sheet flapping below and slowly descended back to earth as the gas left the balloon. It was a super cool effect. We capped the tubes with the piece we used on the parade float to stop the gas from coming out once the balloon took off.

We had about 50 sheets laying in the field around the spot and we carefully covered them with a light coating of dirt and grass to camouflage them from view.

The centerpiece of the action was a huge framed monster we made from sewing together seven sheets and coating it with hay we borrowed from the Lance Ranch. Earl and James rigged it so we painted a coat of glue on the cut-out and layered it with bushels of the hay. It stuck and dried to the glue making a cool monster look. For the eyes Earl added two psychedelic lights we found that mixed some really neat colors in flowing patterns of light.

We looped a length of rope through the top of the monster and attached hoops through two places in the top of trees directly in front of the path end. This allowed us to raise the monster up by pulling on the ropes creating an effect of a huge monster rising out of the ground in front of you. Two big speakers placed in the trees made it possible for the monster to give a banshee like howl whenever Peter let it go into the microphone.

The whole thing was powered by a small generator we placed about 200 feet away and shielded to make sure you couldn't hear it running.

We finished getting everything ready by 4:00 and headed out to prepare the restaurant for the nights activities.

The evening rush came and went and the Chairman finished his set of folk songs. The Mayor was there and they both headed over to the horse drawn wagon to follow the path to see the site that the Chairman wanted the Mayor to see. We had noticed Tracy slinking off earlier and Peter followed him to confirm we were right and he would be putting on some costume to try to scare the Mayor.

A couple of minutes later Peter called and told us that Tracy had put on a scarecrow costume and was standing next to a tree limb right where we had planned.

Bob was on the wagon and we were sure that somewhere near him he had a concealed video camera to film the frightening. Little did he know that we had already secured three cameras and microphones to record the event for posterity hidden in the trees surrounding the location.

Bob and the Chairman were exchanging knowing glances thinking that they were putting one over on the Mayor. The Mayor had a sly grin on his face since he was aware of the plan and was expecting Tracy to try to scare him. We watched the wagon pull away and we all got into our places.

It was funny watching Tracy try to stay still as he waited for the wagon to approach. The costume he was wearing wasn't too bad but it didn't compare with what we had planned.

Finally the wagon drew near and we saw Bob reach down and bring out a small video camera. He started filming the Mayor as the wagon neared the scarecrow. Our plan was to wait for Tracy to make the first move and then we would start our response.

Just as the wagon drew near Tracy suddenly jumped up and let out a bloodcurdling scream, rushing at the Mayor and waving his arms. Of course both the Mayor and the Chairman were expecting the scare so neither one so much as lifted an eyebrow at the sudden antics of the scarecrow. They treated it as a potential voter in a crowd who might want a handshake and a smile.

Bob waved the camera around frantically trying to figure out why the Mayor wasn't scared and finding nothing to photograph. Tracy was obviously beginning to tire as his wildly gyrating arms began to droop and his screams started to become hoarse gasps of air.

That's when James threw the switch.

The balloons began to fill and the ghosts rose from beneath the dirt ascending into the sky all around the wagon and its occupants. After a few moments they began to come free from the tubes and the light breeze whooshed them around the meadow in an eerie dance of fabric. The Mayor and the Chairman continued to enjoy the scene with a growing appreciation of what they thought Bob and Tracy had concocted to scare the Mayor. Bob's face was ashen as he was surprised by all of the spectral activity happening around him.

That was the moment when the hay monster rose from the earth. With sounds of a huge earthquake playing over the speakers the ropes lifted the hay monster high into the sky towering over the people in the wagon. With eyes flashing they monster roared out of the ground bellowing at the top of his lungs.

I watched Bob and Tracy visibly start shaking but it finished them off when the monster shouted "Bob and Tracy! I have come for thee!"

Anyone nearby would have seen a camera go sailing into the air and a scarecrow chasing a fast running kid as they both took off in fright after hearing the hay monsters challenge. Meanwhile the Mayor and the Chairman were both sitting and watching the events with amused looks on their faces. They were making sure that nothing that happened would cause them to show any sign of being frightened.

When it was all over we had some terrific video that we showed over and over thanks to the willingness of Skip who agreed to continuously air it on TV for about a week following the event.

We also had a new attraction. The Banshee Meadow was reset and set off for paying visitors every Friday night at 8:00. It was a huge hit with the teenagers who loved to come by and run away screaming just like Bob and Tracy did. The only two who never came back to see it were Bob and Tracy. At least I don't think that they did.

Chapter Seven: The Rattlesnake Round-up.

We had been really busy throughout the summer working the restaurant and the Haunted Meadow. As August turned into September it was time to start shutting down the store and looking ahead to our next challenge.

When we had our meeting Earl spoke up right away and said that he had an idea that he'd been thinking about for awhile and he thought it could be a good idea for the club to pursue.

This sounded interesting and I could tell that we were all intrigued. Everyone was silent as we waited for Earl to explain his idea.

"I spent some time last summer traveling with my family," he said. "We went to some theme parks where you would walk around to see the exhibits. I thought at the time that it was too bad that they needed to have all of the signs directing us to go this way or that way all of the time. It really detracted from the experience."

Earl stopped talking and we all just waited for him to continue. After a few more moments of silence James prodded him.

"And you thought of something that might help?" he asked.

"Yes," Earl answered, coming out of his trance. "I think I did and I think we could make it pretty cheaply and we could market it."

That's the moment the Rattler was begun. Earl's plan was cool. Basically he explained that instead of directing someone with signs in an open area where you wish them to follow a set path or stay inside set limits you use sounds. The more serious the infraction, the more nasty the sound. It sounded really cool and four days later we had a test area set and ready for experiments.

We chose a spot just beyond the Haunted Meadow at Lance Ranch. The area was a mix of trees, bushes, and sage brush piled up against rocky outcroppings and bare dusty areas. Earl's goal was to have a person walk into the midst of the area and by using sound alone, direct them to where he wanted them to go.

I drew the short straw and got to enter the field. I was told to walk forward 150 paces and then turn in a circle 10 times. Then I was told to wander around and see what happens. Earl had a spot marked on the ground with a home base set down. I wouldn't be able to see it until I was practically standing on it.

I did as I was told and I ended up a bit dizzy and alone in the middle of the field. I decided on a direction and started heading that direction. After about 20 paces I heard a loud rattle coming from the bushes directly in front of me. I turned to the right and started that direction and once again traveled for a short while until I heard another loud rattle from directly ahead. I decided to head in the opposite direction and try my luck that way.

This time I was able to travel for quite some time before I came to a spot where two simultaneous rattles started. One directly in front of me and one to my left. Deciding to be a little difficult I reversed my direction and started right back in the direction I had just come from. After stepping that way for only a few steps the rattle started from in front of me leaving me just the one option to go.

In a few more minutes and with just a couple simpler course corrections I heard a shout and looked down to see the home plate at my feet. The test was a success. Earl had steered me right where he wanted me to be without using anything other than a few rattlesnake sounds coming from some speakers strategically hidden around the field. We headed back to the clubhouse to celebrate and discuss our next move.

During that session we refined and improved upon the plan in a few super cool ways. First we added the ability to use a motion detector to trigger the signal to make it easier for someone to utilize it without needing a lot of help to watch where people were walking plus making it less confusing for the worker. With the motion detector if someone steps into the range finder, the noise is triggered and the message is sent.

"Can we do other things than rattlesnake sounds?" Amie asked.

"Of course!" Earl answered. "I can use digital sound and get it to playback when we trigger it. We can even set it to trigger lights or any other electronic system we attach it to."

"Oh! I have a great idea!" Cora shouted. "Can you set each one to play a musical note?"

"Easily," answered Earl.

"We could set them up to play back a song as a person walks or runs by them," she answered. "We could even add some cool lighting and maybe some colored smoke or fog effects."

"Wow!" James said. "That will be fun to do. We have to film it."

That's when we decided that we needed to create a video highlighting some of the possibilities of using the Rattler. We spent the next week doing just that and by the end of the week we had a great three minute video showing me finding my way through the field to the home plate, along with a great clip of Cora running through a set of Rattlers as they played The Star Spangled Banner. Earl was a real patriot. The song added some great firework explosions and smoke effects for the bombs bursting in air and a dramatic red, white and blue colored light display during the last line 'land of the free and the home of the brave'. The last few segments showed some of the different sound, light, and smoke options you could use and how easy it is to change them.

It was a great video and when we finished with it we didn't really want to be done with the Rattler but we didn't know what else we could do except wait for some potential sales.

That's when Amie had a great idea.

"You know, Halloween is coming," she said.

The resulting silence coupled with the excited looks let me know that everyone already wanted to do her idea without even knowing what it was.

"It seems to me," she continued. "That we could use these in a kind of Halloween Maze with some ghosts, witches and goblins."

"We could use the Hay Monster again!" I said. I really liked the Hay Monster.

That started another session of brainstorming. A really good session. At the end of the planning session the idea that we rolled out was to take our Rattlers and Hay Monster and make them the beginning attraction of a Haunted Woods to end all Haunted Woods. We'd make a lot of money and not have to do very much of the work. It went like this.

We would spend the next few days canvassing the city for clubs or merchants that would like to join in the Haunting. The requirement was that each participant would be assigned a path or open area that they would be responsible for 'haunting'. Each merchant would be allowed to add some merchandising or marketing to their location but would need to have their haunting plan submitted and approved in advance. Participants could choose one of three options. Tot Spot, meant to be safe and not scary for parents bringing in very young children. Mellow Monster, intended to frighten, but at a very mild level suitable to grade school children. Black Diamond Demented, designed to be very frightening to all ages.

We planned on having a healthy mix of each with at least three catering to the younger kids and the rest devoted to frightening everyone else. We already had a great spot to use for the Haunted Meadow since the spot we used to scare Bob and Tracy was also located close to a county road so people could drive to where we are and not have to walk very far. Plus, we planned to use the Rattlers and some other effects to make the walk into the meadow a fun and interesting one.

The next day we canvassed the town. We had a lot of interested merchants and the organizations and clubs we contacted almost all wanted to be a part of the action. We planned to be open on the weekends through Halloween and for the four nights before as well. We were charging admission and of course offered snacks and drinks for sale along with some branded merchandise. We were getting pretty good at this.

As an added incentive to the participants we offered a cash prize of $1000 for the 'path' that was voted the best by people attending the Haunted Meadow. We knew that this should help get some increased frightening.

And it did. We actually were in the position of auditioning the ideas before we approved the participants. There were some really great ones. I had to admit I was excited to see some of them myself.

Bob and Tracy were on one team. Bob's uncle Mark was the owner of Annison's Plumbing and Heating and he had apparently chosen Bob and Mark to work on their contribution. We had to approve the plan since their proposal included teleporting the crowd from one spot to another. How they were going to possibly pull that off was a mystery, but since we didn't require the participants to submit their plans in advance, we would just have to wait and see. We all decided to keep our eyes on this one though.

We placed the Rattlers at the edges of the meadow and at the front of each path leading to the separate areas. The Rattlers showed people that they were at the edge of the meadow and also showed people the fright level of each pathway. If it was safe for all ages the Rattler would sound off with a purring sound like a contented kitten. If the path was designed for the younger kids with just a hint of scare quality then the rattler emitted a chicken sound, buck-buck-bacaw! And if it was the scariest, the rattlers would sound out with an eerie bones crackling together sound. It was great.

For the next 10 days the work progressed until we were all set to open on the first Friday night in October. Not that there hadn't been quite a few glitches along the way. We were kept busy helping to solve the problems from minor to major so much that we hadn't been able to keep even half an eye on Bob and Tracy and the Annison's Plumbing team.

That Friday the weather was great and the excitement was high as we saw the crowd growing and the lines starting to get big awaiting our opening. We were already making money selling snacks and souvenirs, mostly Halloween themed items like glow necklaces, lighted eyeglasses, vampire fangs, and more.

After we opened things went smoothly. The Rattlers did a great job directing people and we noticed lots of satisfied smiles as people were leaving. We kept hearing about the great time they had at the Teleportation Booth. Almost everyone was talking about it. It definitely made me curious as to what it was. A kid I knew from school was going about and raving about it so I called after him "Hey! Where's the teleportation booth anyway?"

"You should know!" he answered. "It's your place, isn't it?"

Now I remembered why I didn't like him so much. "Yeah, yeah," I said. "Just tell me, ok?"

"It's Annison's Plumbing," he said. "And it's really cool."

The next day we held a meeting and decided that we needed to check out all the areas and make sure that everyone was delivering what they had promised. I think we all wanted to see what the fuss was all about at the Plumbing booth. As soon as we opened, we designated Peter and Mark to wander over and check it out.

Twenty minutes later they came running up out of breath and excitedly talking a million miles a minute.

"Wait!" James said. "We can't make out a word you're saying! One at a time!"

"It was great!" Mark said. "They moved us from one spot to another to another in just a few seconds and then they made one of us disappear!"

"What?" James asked. "It has to be a trick!"

"If it is, it's the best that I've ever seen," said Peter.

Now we all wanted to see it so we drew straws to determine the order we could go over to see the booth. Cora and I drew the shortest straws so we would be going last. We had the pleasure of seeing each team of two come running up and heaping even more praise upon the wonders of the Plumbers. We were catching comments like "Did you see that tree move?" "Where did that kid go anyway?" "He just disappeared!" "I know! That was amazing!" "Let's go again!"

"Wait!" I yelled to that one. "We get to go once before you get to go twice!"

"Okay, okay. Go take your turn."

Cora and I set off following the Rattlers until they led us to the Plumbers Path. We started down it and noticed that there was a force which seemed to be pushing us back as we tried to move down the path.

"Look!" Cora said. "They're using fans to cause the air flow to go against us."

"Nice touch!" I said. We moved down the pathway and started to read signs warning us to keep out. It was posted as an experimental government installation using radiation and testing diseases. There were dead animals lying alongside the path.

"Fake," Cora said. But I noticed her voice was slightly shaky. It was an effective display.

"Yeah," I said. I didn't want to say more in case my voice was shaky too.

Towards the end of the path there were two red cones alongside each side of the path with red and blue flashing lights and a robotic voice repeating warning messages.

"Warning! You are in a highly radioactive quarantined area. Leave immediately and proceed to the nearest medical facility to be treated for radiation poisoning! You have less than 30 minutes."

The message repeated itself in Spanish, French, Russian and Chinese. I had to admit it was effective. Right beyond the flashing warning lights was the remains of a gate system that looked like something had crashed through it and broken it down.

I had to admit it was effective and somewhat frightening. After we passed the gate there was more signs of damaged furnishings. It was amazing what they had done with some small amounts of debris to give off the appearance of a damaged industrial complex. The close proximity of the surrounding trees helped cover the background and made it much easier to design.

We came to an opening in the trees that had a wall built of large white bricks with some damaged spots in the center. There was a large door with an armed guard holding a rifle and wearing a bio-hazard suit next to it. He was counting off numbers as he let us pass. We entered into the room inside which appeared to be an open reception area with white-washed walls and a desk. There was a series of fluorescent bulbs that were all burned out except for one which flickered.

I looked very hard and could tell that the walls were probably plywood sheets that had been carefully and cleverly painted to look like the inside of a government lab building. The lowlight helped to mask the reality and add to the effect.

Another scientist in a bio suit directed eight of us into another opening. We stepped into a small room and were told by a loudspeaker that we were going to be decontaminated. But then another voice spoke and explained something different.

"Tell them the truth!" he urged.

"Stay out of this!" the first voice commanded.

"They have a right to know!" the second voice said.

"Where they're going they don't need to know." First voice.

"They at least need to know that one of them won't be coming back!" Second voice.

"That's the luck of the draw. And we need to take that loss." First voice.

"Hold on!" First voice. "3-2-1-".

The door had closed and there was a shaking motion and a loud humming sound. Then there was a crash and part of the wall opened up to reveal that we were somewhere in the depths of space. There were some beautiful stars and moons surrounding a large bluish planet and as we looked a small comet passed by the window. It was great.

The wall closed and again we felt the motion and the humming noise. A few seconds later the wall opened again and we saw that we were rushing at an incredible rate of speed through some kind of blurry tube.

"Wormhole!" said one guy who was wearing a blue baseball cap.

The wall closed again and the motion and the humming started again. Seconds later the wall opened and there was a deep blue orb in the center of the view. The orb pulsated slowly and then started to speak.

"Earthlings," it said in a mechanical sounding low voice. "You have come to pay us your debt to correct the obscene damage you have caused on your planet. We will now choose one of you to remain here as to ensure that your race does no more experimenting in this area. Stand still while we choose."

A few seconds went by and then the voice stated "We have chosen. Come now!"

There was a bright flash followed by a couple seconds of darkness and then the low light was enough to allow us to look around again. The orb was still there but the guy in the baseball cap wasn't. On the floor where he had stood was his cap. He was nowhere to be seen.

"Go now!" the orb ordered. "Return to your planet and disturb the cosmos no more!"

The wall closed again and we felt the motion and the humming again before everything stopped again and the door opened revealing a scientist without the bio suit on.

"You did it!" he said. "The world owes you a great big thank you. But you can't tell anyone what happened here ever. Now leave this place and do not return!"

We were directed to exit on a different pathway than the one we walked in on and came out into the meadow area.

"That was great!" Cora said.

"Yeah," I said. "I have to agree."

We headed back to our friends and spent the next few hours trying to decide how they had done it. We were already convinced that we would be handing them the thousand dollars the next day.

And we did. Amie and James made the presentation in a meeting with all of the participants' right before we opened. No one even contested that we hadn't made the right choice. The only bad part of it was that Tracy and Bob were the ones that we had to give the check to. As they received it I asked Tracy if he wanted to share with us just how they had pulled off the disappearance.

"No," he said. "I think we'll keep that a secret."

"The toughest part that I want to know how you pulled off getting one of us who were riding along to disappear so quickly and not have us aware of it," I said.

"Yep," he answered. "That is the hard part. I think we'll keep that a secret too."

"Okay, fine," I said. "But I can't help notice that you do have that nice blue baseball cap on today."

With a slight blush, Tracy took the check and walked away.

The End!
