Chapter 11
Eleven
There is a pleasure in the pathless woods, there is a rapture on the lonely shore.
—Lord Byron, British poet
The sky in front of Cadillac Mountain was a deep cobalt, the kind of pre-dawn hue that held its breath before the sun exhaled light across the earth.
Behind Scout, the world was still cloaked in pitch-black, like the stage before the show began.
Ahead, the first whisper of light began to tease the horizon, casting a silvery glow over the landscape.
People dotted the granite summit, some bundled in blankets, others with coffee cups steaming in their hands, all facing east to greet the sun. It reminded Scout of a rock concert—only quieter, more reverent, and very chilly.
But unlike the others, she wasn’t here before dawn to just watch the sun emerge on the eastern seaboard.
She and Chase had a gold cache on their minds, but they each had their own idea about the meaning of this clue: “The first light finds my secret where sky meets stone, atop the highest peak that greets the dawn before all others.” They agreed to split up to look.
Chase had drilled down on “the highest peak,” so he was combing the summit of Cadillac.
Scout kept in mind Naki’s advice—to go below the summit and think of what this area might’ve looked like in 1852.
She hiked about halfway down the hillside to watch where the first rays would strike the granite boulders.
Happily, it was a gradual decline all the way to the shoreline.
As Scout made her way down the hill, it suddenly occurred to her that the first rays of the sun would hit this hill at different points throughout the year.
So if the shipwreck occurred in October, and the keeper had died within the month, and if the keeper’s wife had hidden the gold before winter hit, that would narrow down the section of the hill to search.
She turned around to look off in the distance to the ocean, mentally adjusting for the seasons, then she shifted to the far left of the hillside, moving carefully in the dark.
“I hope I’m right,” she said, wishing Naki were here to help.
She heard a text ping on her phone and pulled it out of her pocket to read it.
Chase
I feel like I’m in church, waiting for the pastor to say, “Let there be light.”
Scout
God’s first spoken words.
The very thought took her breath away. The words of Genesis seemed suddenly alive in this moment. The first command of creation—light—powerful enough to dispel chaos and darkness! Just awe-inspiring. Her “cup runneth over” kind of wonder.
And then her thoughts drifted to Naki, to his preaching in church on this summer morning. Imagine that—a man of few words, with a whole lot to say. What topic would he preach on? Who would be in the service? Many . . . or few? Would that wife or partner of his be there?
Chase
Show’s about to start. Get ready to hunt for gold. Not entirely sure what I’m looking for, but I’m looking!
Scout smiled. Chase was fun. Easy to be with.
Here it comes.
Scout slipped her phone into her pocket and turned off her flashlight.
Slowly, the first light of dawn emerged, sending rays against the granite like a match on kindling. Her gaze swept the hillside, back and forth—then she saw it. Several narrow crevices, like stripes, in one boulder. Unique, memorable, yet easy to miss.
“There,” she whispered, her pulse quickening.
She scrambled forward, slipping slightly on the slick granite, her knee catching the edge of a rock.
Wincing, she pushed on. By the time she reached the boulder, the sunlight had expanded over the entire hillside.
If she had guessed wrong and one of these crevices didn’t have the gold, she’d have to return tomorrow and try again. And maybe the next day and the next.
Crevice by crevice, she reached her hand deep into the cold boulder, glad she had remembered gloves.
Two cracks were too small, five were way too large, but then .
. . in the eighth one, the tips of her fingers brushed against the rough edge of something.
She ran her fingers alongside it and felt one sharp corner, then another.
“Gotcha,” she whispered. Like the others, the box was wedged in tightly, and her arm was nearly swallowed by the crevice as she worked to loosen it.
Minutes dragged by, her shoulder aching from the angle, her glove catching on the edges of the stone.
Every few minutes, she switched hands. Finally, she felt the box start to give way.
“Did you find it?” Chase’s voice startled her, and she glanced up to see him bounding toward her, his eyes wide with excitement.
“I think so,” she said. It took more wiggling, more easing, but with a final tug, she pulled the box free and sat back against the rock, panting and triumphant.
He reached for it, but she held the brass box close to her chest as if it might vanish. “Wait! Too crowded.”
Chase looked around, clearly impatient but reluctantly nodding as a few hikers walked near them.
By now, sunlight flooded the summit, and the crowd had started to thin out.
It was like the end of a concert, people packing up their blankets and heading back to their cars or down the trails, the show over.
For a long while, they sat in silence, watching the sky shift from pink and gold to pale blue as the sun climbed higher. Scout could feel Chase fidgeting beside her, his knee bouncing in anticipation, but she wasn’t ready yet. The moment felt too big, too heavy to rush.
Finally, when she felt confident that no hikers were passing by them, she set the box on the ground between them. Chase leaned in, his eyes gleaming with childlike curiosity. She worked the latch on the lid slowly, the way she’d seen Naki do it, her breath catching as the contents came into view.
Chase let out a low whistle.
Inside was a sack, tied tightly at the top. Scout’s fingers trembled as she untied the knot and reached inside. The weight of the gold was unmistakable—cool, solid, and impossibly real.
She held up one of the coins, its surface catching the sunlight and glinting in her hand. “Found it,” she said, her voice barely above a whisper.
They both stared at the sack for a moment, the gravity of their discovery sinking in. Chase let out a breathless laugh, running a hand through his hair. “Scout, you are something special.” He leaned over and gave her a kiss on the cheek.
The warmth of his lips startled her, and she turned to him, eyes wide. Before she could react, he closed the gap, his hand brushing her face as he kissed her.
For a moment, the world narrowed to just that—his lips on hers, the warm sun spreading over the land, the distant crash of the waves against the rocks.
He rested his forehead lightly against hers. “Let’s grab some breakfast before we tackle the next clue. We’ll need all the fuel we can get—this next one’s a doozy.” With a quick smile, he rose to his feet and offered her a hand, pulling her up before heading to the narrow path.
She lingered for half a second, brushing the dirt off her pants, her thoughts trailing behind him. She’d wondered what kissing Chase would feel like, and now she had her answer.
Maisie had made a plan. This morning, before meeting up with Frankie, she’d called the garbage company to find the weekly route in which they emptied dumpsters.
With that information, and after borrowing a pair of hip boots from Pops’s closet, she and Frankie decided to start dumpster diving behind the coffee shop and fan out through the streets of Bar Harbor.
Logic said the envelope would have to be in the top quarter of the dumpster, since Enzo said he had tossed it out within the last thirty-six hours.
Maisie peered over the edge of the dumpster.
Frankie wouldn’t let her get in it, which she thought was very chivalrous of him.
He was up to his elbows in a heap of crumpled paper and half-eaten food, scowling fiercely.
The guilt gnawed at her again—taking the envelope from Pops’s office, Chase stealing it, then Enzo stealing it from Chase before tossing it out without a second thought.
She could still see Enzo’s face in her mind, grinning, saying he tossed out the envelope because it was worthless.
It was worth a lot, Maisie wanted to scream at him.
But she didn’t, because that would only make him happy.
Frankie was muttering away inside the dumpster. He popped up and tossed out a greasy pizza box. “I will never eat pizza again.” He disappeared, then popped his head up again. “Every single box means a tree had to sacrifice its life.”
Maisie’s eyes went round. “Every single box?”
He was on a rant. “Every time someone uses a paper product, a tree dies somewhere. And don’t even get me started on napkins. The sheer amount of napkins is obscene.” He pushed a few out of the way with a huff. “We could probably wipe up the entire ocean with the napkins people throw away.”
Okay. So he was in an exaggerating rant. Maisie grinned, though she could hear the edge in his voice. “You know what Pops would call you? He’d say you’re ‘bleeding green.’”
Frankie let out a breath and shifted his position, kicking aside some pizza boxes. “It’s not funny, Maisie. We throw away too much stuff in this country. I mean, look at all this good food!”
Maisie peered over the dumpster’s edge. “How do you even know what’s good food? Sure looks like garbage to me.”
“Wrong. There is good food in here. Leftovers, like, gourmet stuff.” He held up a takeout container, wrinkled and a little soggy, but still very much intact.
“Look at this. Who gets food this fancy and throws it away? What kind of person . . . ?” He trailed off, shaking his head in disbelief.
“But that’s the reality, right? Meanwhile, in other parts of the world, people are starving, and we’re tossing out food that could feed families for days. ”