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“It had a week's worth of cash. Almost forty thousand dollars.”

Mr. Costello's cell phone rang. He listened, then flipped it shut. “The police are waiting in the office. This is my fault. I should have put the money in the bank every day. I was so busy worrying about
making
money that I forgot about keeping it safe.”

He clapped me on the shoulder. “You're doing a great job, Clay. Just keep the Boa going, and don't let this get to you.”

But it had already gotten to me, big-time. I couldn't get Aggie's frightened face out of my mind.

Mr. Costello waved at Judd to let the next raft go. Then he strode away, Janice hurrying after him.

“Help! Help me, Clay!”

I'd been staring toward the office, where the police were questioning Mr. Costello. I wrenched my gaze back to the landing pool. “
Aggie?
”

But it was those moronic girls, giggling at me from a raft.

“You need help, all right,” I growled. “
Mental
help.”

This just set them off more. They headed straight back to the Boa lineup. Great. First Aggie, now them. Why did I attract the goofballs?

Janice wasn't a goofball though. With Janice around, working here was worthwhile. Someday, when this robbery stuff was cleared up, I'd like to explain to Janice how distracting I found her. I grinned at the thought—and an elderly couple walking by beamed at me.

My good humor was short-lived though. I thought about Aggie again. If she was involved in the theft, someone had forced her into it. And I was pretty sure I knew who.

Lemme tell you about lynxes
, Judd had boasted.
They're in control at all
times
.

Judd, I thought. Judd had masterminded the robbery.

I wanted to march right up to the launch platform and have it out with him. Really have it out, this time. Pound it out of him—

Calm down, Clay. This is exactly what gets you into trouble.

In any case, I couldn't stop the ride yet again for another confrontation.

I heaved deep breaths. Mom thought this job, with meeting the public all day, would make me more tolerant. I could at least
try
. I managed to smile at the next rafters who splashed down—even though I'd heard their complaints loud and clear through the tube. Seems the chlorine level was too high for them.

The sun rose higher and burned in the sky. More and more people lined up for the Boa. Forget the thrills. They just wanted a refreshing soak. Some show-offy college kids dove off the raft into the landing pool. I was too hot, too preoccupied with the robbery to tell them off.

“Clay, Clay—!”

The gigglers again.

“Give it a break,” I snapped.

Then I saw that one of them was in the water. She wasn't giggling. She was choking. Her arms flailed—and she sank.

Jeez, I hadn't even been watching. I dove in, grabbing her under the chin. Using my free arm, I plowed to the pool steps. I dragged her onto the platform.

She wasn't breathing.

I pressed my hands on her chest to force the water out of her lungs.

Come on, I thought. Come on…

One of her eyes opened. Her braces glinted. A sly smile flashed over her face.

She was faking.

Furious, I jumped up. I let loose my bottled-up rage about Judd. I yelled, “You think drowning is
funny
, moron? What's next, you set yourself on fire for laughs? Harness your braces to a moving train? You are such a LOSER.”

The girl's face was crumpling, but I was too mad to care, too out of control. I blasted on.

“Next time you set one fat foot in this water park, I'll have you thrown out. No, better. I'll throw you out myself, down the rocky hill.”

The day ticked along. I noticed fewer people laughing. Some stared at me. Maybe they'd heard my outburst at the giggler. Or maybe it wasn't that at all. Maybe people sensed the unease that had crept like a fog into the water park. There was a feeling of something gone very, very wrong.

Finally I couldn't stand it anymore. I grabbed the phone linking the landing pool with the top of the ride.

“Yeah?” Judd barked.

“Aggie's getting blamed for the robbery,” I said.

“What robbery?”

In theory, Judd wouldn't have heard about the robbery. But his tone just now, his pretend ignorance, was as phony as the plastic Boa mouth.

“You were in on it, Judd. I think you planned it,” I said. “The police are in Mr. Costello's office. If you're smart, you'll go talk to them before they come after you.”

“I dunno anything about a robbery. Oh, wait, yeah, I do know something.”

“What?” I asked.

“I know that it's fun watching you squirm, champ.”

Judd pushed off another raft. A fresh round of yells echoed through the Boa's mouth.

Judd was messing with me. Again, my impulse was to throttle the guy.

I had to calm down. My coach always said not to panic in a crisis. Stop, rest and think. Cool your brain off so it can work again.

Think
.

Okay, I told myself. There's been a robbery. Aggie's the suspect. Judd's involved up to his skittering eyeballs.

Confronting Judd was useless. He'd just jeer at me with cryptic remarks about a lynx. That wasn't proof. I couldn't take that to the police.

All I could do was tell them about Aggie being scared of someone called the Lynx.

Wait a minute.
Lynx
. The lynx
mask
. In my mind, I saw the leering plastic fangs as Judd spied on Brad and me through the control-room window.

The mask would have Judd's fingerprints—heck, his
face
prints— on it.

The mask would be proof that Judd was Aggie's Lynx.

I needed to get the mask—but how?

Judd had been wearing it when he scrambled up Grouse to the top of the Boa. When I'd tried to drag Judd behind the bamboo screen later, he'd resisted.

He didn't want me to see behind the screen—
because that's where he'd
stashed the mask.

Chapter Five

I punched in the office number.

“Safari Splash.” Janice sounded anxious.

“It's Clay. How's it going with the police? Have they found Aggie?”

Janice faded her voice to a whisper. “No. They've been to Aggie's house, but she's not there. Her parents don't know anything. But this detective who's here now, Detective Mulligan—”

“Mulligan? Like the stew?” I said.

“It's not funny, Clay. Detective Mulligan is horrible. He says Dad could have stolen the money himself. Brad's near tears, which only puts Dad more on edge. My poor bro isn't very good at coping.”

“How could your dad be a suspect?
It's his money!
”

“Detective Mulligan says owners sometimes steal from their companies, then file an insurance claim. It's a way of doubling profits.”

“Like your dad would do that,” I said in disgust.

I thought of Brad, worried and upset, annoying his dad without meaning to.

I said, “Hey, Janice? Let's get Brad out of wrath range. Send him over here. I've got something for him to do.”

At the end of every day, I stopped water flowing through the pipes into the launch pool. I drained both launch and landing pools. Once they were empty, I turned the water-control wheel on full blast. At the top of the ride, Judd poured in cleanser.

It was the shock-and-awe approach to sanitation. The sudsy blast flushed out every flip-flop that had come loose on the wild ride, every food wrapper, every wad of gum that some jerk had spat into the foam. The Boa belched it all into the landing pool. Then I had to drain the pool and scoop up all the garbage.

While the Boa was being cleaned, Judd walked down the sandy path underneath to check for cracks or dents in the tube.

It took Judd about twenty minutes to descend the length of the tube and then climb back up.

In those twenty minutes, I was going to hunt for the mask.

Brad's eyes widened behind his thick glasses when I told him my plan. “I dunno if Mulligan would approve. He might start yelling.”

“Mulligan won't yell once he realizes the mask's significance. The mask connects Judd to Aggie. This is where you come in, Brad. You can help me.”

Brad nodded. He wiped a tissue over his forehead.

I led Brad into the control room, where I twisted the wheel all the way to the right.

“All you have to do is guard the landing pool till I get back. The park's closed, but people hang around. Make sure no hotshots dive in while the water's flooding down and no little kids toddle up and fall in.”

Brad looked nervous, and, in a shy way, pleased. “I'll stand guard, Clay. I won't let you down.”

I clapped him on the shoulder. “If I'm not back in twenty, turn the wheel off. After that point, water will overflow into the drains. That'll mean a lot more cleanup, plus it'd be a huge waste of water.”

I stepped out of the control room. I watched Judd pour cleanser into the launching pool, then jump down to the path under the tube. He was starting his inspection.

Still, I hesitated. I was asking a lot of Brad. I might get him into trouble. “Are you sure you're okay with this? I'm breaking the rules by leaving my post.”

He managed a wobbly grin. “Don't worry. I'm okay.”

“Good guy.”

I started outside the control-room window where Judd, wearing his lynx mask, had spied on Brad and me. From there it was an easy jump to the fir-needle-carpeted slope.

As water thundered down through the tube, I jogged up the slope, breathing in the scent of the Douglas firs.

At some point I would come parallel with Judd as he worked his way down. About halfway up, I slowed. I walked carefully, squinting deep into the trees as I looked for him.

Then—

Through the firs, I saw Judd. Head tipped back, he was examining the tube.

His cell phone rang, startling both of us.

Pulling the phone out of a back pocket, Judd barked, “Yeah?”

This was a chance to edge past Judd, up the slope, but his next words arrested me.

“Huh?…
Aggie?
…You're at the top
again
? But that wasn't the plan. I thought you were going to…Yeah, okay. I get it, Aggie. Or should that be,
Naggie
? Nag, nag, nag.”

Aggie was at the top of the ride.

Judd said, “Sure, everything's under control. I'll see you once I finish checking the Boa. My
last
check, I'm happy to say. No more Boa for this boy. A Lynx triumph!” He snickered.

Yeah, everything's under control—if you're a thief, I thought. But I'm going to reach Aggie before you do. Whatever Aggie's done, I'll convince her to come clean with Mr. Costello.

Judd snickered some more into the phone, calling her Naggie again. I tiptoed past Judd and ran the rest of the way.

I glanced around the launch platform. The water rushing into the pool gleamed diamond-bright in the slanting sun. Soon this part of the mountain would be shady.

I stepped behind the bamboo screen. Just the usual stuff there—cleanser, locker, towels, hamper, freezer, Red Cross kit.

No sign of Aggie.

I felt Aggie's presence though. I could see her face, pale and pleading.
Please,
Clay…
I could feel her need for help. Maybe that's why she'd been so clingy earlier. She'd been guilty and frightened about her part in the robbery.

Maybe Aggie had spotted me approaching. She might be hiding. “I'm on your side,” I called.

I surveyed the forest, but no answer came back. The sun was disappearing. The firs were inking together, turning the mountain black.

I had the peculiar sensation of not being alone, and yet being very, very alone.

And in danger. I had a strong urge to scramble back down the hill.

But I had to find the mask.

And maybe, while I was looking, Aggie would muster the nerve to come forward.

I opened the locker. Judd's knapsack lay inside. I had a qualm about going into someone else's belongings. It was the same as trespassing.

But Judd hadn't felt any qualms about ripping off Mr. Costello.

I reached for the knapsack.

Then I saw I didn't need to trespass, after all. Behind the knapsack, jammed in a locker, was the lynx mask.

I grabbed it by the tip. I'd watched enough cop shows to know about preserving fingerprints.

Water stopped gushing out of the pipes. It had been twenty minutes. Brad had kept his word and shut it off.

In the sudden quiet, I heard a breeze whistle through the firs. Or was that a whisper floating through them?

“
Clay…Clay…
”

I squinted into the shadows. “Aggie? Don't be scared. We'll sort this out.”

Behind me, the floorboard creaked.

“Aggie?” I began to turn.

Something rammed my skull. Staggering, I reached for the wall. But it spun away from me like a Ferris wheel on steroids.

Smash
. I got hit again. I glimpsed two golden specks of evening sun, then— Blackout.

Chapter Six

“Clay, where are you?”

It was Bradley Costello's voice, faint and scared.

I struggled to open my eyelids. They were heavier than planet Earth. Just trying to open them sent pain shooting through my head.

I was slumped beside the locker. How did I get here? Trying to remember hurt.

Oh, yeah. Someone had slammed me.

I forced myself up. An object clanged from my hand to the ground. I squinted at it. A wrench. It multiplied into a dozen wrenches, doing a ring-around-the-rosy.

I heard footsteps, frantic, pounding. To the right of the tube, racing down the Boa stairs, was Judd.

It was Judd who'd bashed me on the head.

“
Clay!
” Panting, Brad scrambled up through the trees. He tried to hoist himself onto the platform, then fell back. I didn't care about Brad's dorkiness—I'd never been so glad to see anyone.