by Penny Warner
Cody and M.E. were excited to find they would be together. They found their tent, dragged their suitcases and sleeping bags inside, and unloaded their gear. When they were done, they met up with Quinn and Luke at the amphitheater, nestled under some trees.
“This place is awesome,” Cody whispered to Luke, while Ms. Stad began reciting the history of the area. “It smells like pine trees. And our tent is so cozy.”
Luke whispered back, “I know. I feel like I’m in the middle of the frontier. I can’t wait till we start the hike.”
Cody noticed Ms. Stad had grown quiet. She looked up to see her teacher staring at her. Busted! Cody made a zip-the-lip gesture and Ms. Stad nodded, then went on with her talk.
“You’ll be following trail signs Mrs. Van Tassell and the other parent volunteers set out yesterday when they came to set up the camp. The signs will lead you to the mission museum. They’re much like the ones used by trailblazers and Indians years ago. There will be three kinds of signs to watch for: stone signs, also known as stone talk. These are stones placed in special positions that indicate which direction to go. There are also twig signs, which are small branches that have been arranged in a specific way, and grass signs, which are handfuls of grass tied together—they also show where to go.”
“What about smoke signals?” a kid named Spencer asked.
Ms. Stad smiled. “Good question, Spencer. The Plains Indians and Ojibwas did use smoke signals to communicate across long distances, but for us to use them now would be too dangerous, since they might cause an out-of-control fire. We’re going to keep communicating simple and just use stones, twigs, and grass. Now, here’s a special card with a list of symbols you’ll find along the trail.”
Ms. Stad and the other adults began handing out small cards printed with symbols and their meanings. Cody looked at hers and immediately started to memorize the codes.
After they all received their code cards, Ms. Stad called the kids to attention. “On the front are the stone, pebble, twig, and grass codes. On the back you’ll find more symbols: one that means ‘danger’ and one that means ‘hidden message.’ If you find a hidden message, write it down but don’t disturb it for the next group. The team that figures out the answers to the hidden messages will get to make the first s’mores tonight at campfire.”
A cheer went up from the students. Cody turned the card over and found the additional symbols and translations. Underneath were the numbers 1 through 4, with lines next to each number.
“How cool!” Cody said to the others. “This is perfect for us. It’s all in code! And Luke’s always going on those orienteering trips. It should be easy for him.”
Ms. Stad raised two fingers, the sign for “Quiet!” and everyone hushed. “You’ll be going in groups of four, leaving every three minutes. The trail begins with a rock set on top of another rock, so keep an eye out for that first. Remember, stay with your buddies and do not leave the trail. There’s a lot of poison oak around, so be careful. And we don’t want you getting lost, so if you think you’re in trouble, just call out for an adult. There will always be someone nearby.”
The Code Busters gathered their backpacks filled with water, their notebooks, and cell phones. Cody figured if they did get lost, she could always use a cell phone app, like the air horn app, to attract attention, even if there was no service. The kids got in line, excited to start the journey. They were the fifth group.
“I hope we find all the hidden messages along the way,” M.E. said while they waited their turn.
“I’m sure we will,” Quinn said.
“I wonder what the messages will say,” Luke said, picking up a long stick that lay on the ground nearby.
Cody said nothing, but she hoped that when they found the hidden messages they could crack the final code. After all, they were Code Busters. How would it look if they couldn’t solve it!
There are the stacked rocks,” Quinn called out when their group reached the starting point. He was pointing to two rocks, one on top of the other, a few feet in the distance. “The first trail marker! Let’s go!”
The small group headed down the pine-needle-covered path, bordered on either side by pine and cypress trees. Cody heard birds cawing overhead and could smell the salty air of the ocean mixed with the woodsy scent. Finally! They were off on their adventure!
“Watch out for poison oak!” M.E. called, bringing up the rear of their single-file line. “I got it last year when my family went camping. I was covered in calamine lotion for a week.”
Cody knew what to look for—a leaf with three arcs on each side, shiny, and either pink, red, yellow, or green. Although she’d never had poison oak, a friend back home had gotten it once when she fell into a creek bed. Even worse, she had broken both arms and had to wear casts over the poison oak! Cody couldn’t think of a worse form of torture.
After hiking over the uneven terrain, the group soon came upon a split in the trail. Luckily, there was another trail marker—this one a V shape made from pebbles, with the tip pointing to the right. Cody thought how easy it would have been for someone—like Matt the Brat—to change the direction of the pebbles and get the Code Busters lost. Luckily, parent volunteers were posted along the route to make sure the kids were safe. Cody spotted one of the parents sitting on a bench a few feet ahead, holding a clipboard. Next to her was a miniature lighthouse made of wood and painted red and white. Cody marked the location on her map.
“Look! A hidden message!” Quinn called out.
Sure enough, Cody spotted a square made from twigs, lying on the ground ahead of them. Inside were six pebbles. Outside were two more twigs pointing to the right. Quinn stood at the edge of the message, facing the direction indicated by the V-shaped twigs. He walked six paces, his steps stiff and deliberate, and stopped by a hollow log that lay beneath a tree.
“You found it!” Luke said, catching up with Quinn.
Quinn bent over to reach into the log.
“Stop!” M.E. yelled. “There could be a snake in there!”
Quinn pulled his hand back.
M.E. was right, Cody thought. It was not a good idea to go sticking your hand into a log when you couldn’t see what was inside—even if the snake was not poisonous, and even if you had a snake kit, which they did. She knelt down and studied the log, then looked up at the tree branches above it. Hovering just over their heads, skewered on a branch, was a piece of green paper, nearly camouflaged by the leaves around it.
“There it is!” Cody said, rising.
Quinn stood up. The kids looked at the paper. It contained a drawing that resembled a bottle of soda pop.
Cody glanced at M.E. Quinn looked at Luke. They all frowned.
“What do you think it’s supposed to mean?” M.E. said.
“A bottle of soda pop?” Luke added. “It makes no sense. Are we supposed to search for an actual bottle of soda? Are we supposed to drink some soda? I don’t get it.” He lifted his New Orleans Saints cap and scratched his head.
“I have no clue,” said Cody. “Maybe we’re supposed to write down ‘soda pop’ and unscramble it, like an anagram.
M.E. jotted down the words and tried to rearrange them. She came up with:
sad poop (Everyone laughed.)
popas od (They laughed again because it sounded like, “papa was odd.”)
sopadop (Which made no sense even if it was “soap a dope,” but it was still funny.)
spodapo (Which made no sense at all and wasn’t even funny.)
“Just write down ‘soda pop’ for now and we’ll see what comes next. Maybe it will make more sense then,” said Quinn.
Cody jotted down the clue in her notebook. The kids continued following the trail markers while keeping an eye out for other hidden messages. Cody knew there had to be at least three more, because there were four lines to be filled in on the card. They had to stay alert to the other signs, too, so they didn’t miss any and go the wrong way. Cody recorded all the symbols they found on their route,
and soon her notebook page was full.
Code Buster’s Key and Solution found on this page, this page.
Suddenly, Cody spotted another square with some pebbles inside and two twigs outside. “Guys, another message!” she announced.
Quinn, Luke, and M.E. gathered around the square.
“Eight pebbles inside this time,” Quinn said, after counting them. “That means eight paces.”
“The arrow is pointing that way,” said Luke, gesturing to the left.
“Can I try to find the message this time?” M.E. asked. The others nodded and made way for her to begin her paces. Her legs were shorter than the other kids’, and Cody was a little concerned her steps might be off a pace when she finished. Taking that into account, Cody scanned the area where M.E. stopped.
“The message should be here somewhere,” M.E. said, looking up at a tree that towered over her. The others glanced around, too, until finally Quinn said, “There! I see it—on that big rock! The message is written in chalk.”
Sure enough, Cody saw the message that Quinn had indicated. This time it was a drawing of an animal.
“A duck?” M.E. asked, blinking her eyes.
“A goose?” Cody added, noting the longer neck.
“Maybe it’s a swan,” Quinn added.
“Or a turkey?” asked Luke, grinning.
Cody smiled at him. “I think you’re the turkey,” she said playfully.
“All right, so what do we have so far?” Quinn turned over the card. In the space underneath where he’d written “soda pop,” he jotted down “duck-goose-swan?”
“Soda pop duck goose swan,” Luke repeated. He said it again faster, then slower. Finally, he shrugged. “Dude, I got nothing. Figuring out the path is easy, but this part of the puzzle is hard. You guys solve it yet?”
The others shook their heads. Cody was finding this trail puzzle to be more difficult than she’d expected. She wondered how the other students were doing. As a Code Buster it wasn’t getting the first s’mores that she really cared about—it was solving this puzzle!
“Let’s keep going,” Quinn said, noting the next trail marker. They waved to the parent volunteer as they passed by and continued along the path, being careful to follow the instructions and keep away from poison oak. Along the way they spotted a tower and marked it on the map. They’d been walking for nearly ten minutes, and Cody wondered how much farther they needed to go before arriving at the “building” shown on the map. She thought about getting out her cell phone and using Google Maps to look at the topography, but decided that was cheating. Besides, following the route markers was more fun. And they had at least two more clues to go.
Five minutes later Luke spotted another hidden-message symbol. This one led to a tree where they found a little rubber ducky hidden at the back.
“A rubber ducky?” M.E. said. “Seriously?”
“Well, it’s definitely not a goose or a swan,” Quinn said.
“Or a turkey,” Luke added.
Cody picked up the rubber duck and turned it over. Written on the bottom in black marker were the letters “CK.”
“Look,” she said, “the two letters have a red circle around them, with a line drawn through.”
“Ooookaaaay,” Luke said. “So what does that mean?”
“Maybe it’s a rebus,” Cody said. She loved rebus puzzles, where pictures stood for words, like a picture of a sheep—a ewe—meant “you.” Sometimes the puzzles added or subtracted letters from the picture words. For example, if there was a picture of some meat, minus the letter T, that could mean “mea” or “me.”
“You mean duck without the ‘c-k’?” Quinn asked. “That would be du …”
“Or ‘duh’!” said Luke, laughing.
“Well, it doesn’t make much sense, but let’s write it down,” Quinn said. “Soda pop, duck, goose, swan, duck without the c-k, duh.”
The puzzle was beginning to drive Cody crazy. Nothing she’d ever worked on was this hard. What was Ms. Stad trying to do? Not let anyone have s’mores?
They continued on their journey quietly, lost in thought. Cody went over all the clues in her mind but still couldn’t come up with a solution. She checked the list with the four blank lines. They still needed one more part of the puzzle before they could really try to decipher it.
Just after she found a pond and marked it on the map, Luke spotted the next hidden-message symbol. It led to a nearby hole in the ground with a small sign stuck in the dirt. It read, “Who lives here?” with an arrow pointing to the hole.
Cody bit her lip, trying to come up with all the animals that lived in holes.
“It has to be some kind of burrowing animal,” M.E. said.
“Duh,” Quinn said. “There are about a million animals who live underground.”
“Besides Bugs Bunny?” Luke asked, grinning.
Cody shook her head at his lame joke.
M.E. began listing burrowing animals: “Well, there are rabbits, chipmunks, moles, gophers, groundhogs …”
“Wait!” Cody said, noticing something on the other side of the sign. “There’s a picture on the back.” The Code Busters peered behind it and saw a drawing of a small slender animal. It was about a foot long, with reddish brown fur, a white belly, and a long tail.
“Oh,” M.E. said. “That’s a weasel.”
Cody bet she was right. M.E. really knew her animals.
“You’re sure?” Luke asked. “Looks like a rat to me.”
“You can tell by the white belly,” M.E. said. “And they burrow.”
Cody sat down on a nearby rock and wrote down “weasel” on the last space on her card.
She read over the answers they’d filled in, then announced, “Guys! I know! I know the answer to the puzzle!”
Code Buster’s Solution found on this page.
Another nursery rhyme?” Luke asked, rolling his eyes. “What are we, kindergartners?”
Cody laughed. But then, Luke always made her laugh. She thought he should be a stand-up comic when he grew up. But she knew he had other plans. With his strength and fearlessness, he would no doubt end up in some kind of professional sport—like Olympic skateboarding. Either that, or become a stuntman.
“Just write it down for now,” Quinn said, busily jotting the title into his own Code Busters notebook. “I’m sure it will be important later.”
The others did the same, then closed up their notebooks, stuffed them into their backpacks, and continued down the path. After a few more yards, M.E. spotted another one of the parent chaperones and alerted her friends.
“You made it!” Mrs. Vamvouris, Spencer’s mom, said. “You reached the end of the trail! Good job! We’re meeting over at the courtyard by the mission to wait for the others. You’ll find snacks and drinks there.” She pointed across the street, where other students who had completed the trek were gathered.
“Cool,” M.E. said. “I’m starving. I hope they have something good.”
As the four Code Busters headed for the courtyard, Cody looked at the historic mission. While she expected to see a small decaying building, worn by weather and time, the Carmel Mission seemed to be in perfect condition, and quite beautiful. She spotted a sign that read, MISSION SAN CARLOS BORROMÉO DEL RÍO CARMELO—the official name of the mission. Another sign pointed to other buildings on the grounds, including the Junipero Serra School, the Basilica Church, and several museums.
The tall, round church inside the courtyard was the most eye-catching. The white adobe building featured two towers, a dome, and several crosses at the top of the highest peaks. To Cody, the mission didn’t look as if it was more than two hundred years old! She couldn’t wait to see inside.
The kids found a seat in the courtyard and enjoyed their boxed juices and trail mix. All except Quinn. He was too busy reciting the nursery rhyme under his breath and trying to figure out what it meant.
“All around the mulberry bush,
The monkey chased the weasel;
&nbs
p; The monkey thought ’twas all in fun,
Pop! goes the weasel.”
“That’s not how it goes,” M.E. said, when Quinn was finished. “I learned it like this.”
“All around the cobbler’s house,
The monkey chased the people.
The monkey stopped to pull up his sock,
Pop! goes the weasel.”
“You’re both right,” Cody said, looking at her cell phone. “I did a search for the rhyme, and there are lots of versions. Here’s another one.”
“All around the chicken coop,
The possum chased the weasel.
The possum stopped to scratch his nose,
Pop! goes the weasel.”
“Chicken coop? Possum? Never heard it that way before,” Luke said.
“Here’s another one,” Cody said.
“Half a pound of tuppenny rice,
Half a pound of treacle.
Mix it up and make it nice,
Pop! goes the weasel.”
“And another,” she continued.
“A penny for a spool of thread,
A penny for a needle—
That’s the way the money goes,
Pop! goes the weasel.”
“How come there are so many versions?” Quinn asked, scrunching up his nose and looking confused. “How are we supposed to figure this puzzle out if one rhyme has a chicken coop and another one has treacle—whatever that is.”
Cody didn’t have time to look up the word treacle. Ms. Stad was waving two fingers in the air, trying to get the students’ attention. Slowly, they stopped their conversations and settled down.
“Welcome to Mission San Carlos Borroméo del Río Carmelo,” Ms. Stad said. “Congratulations on finishing the hike! Hopefully, you found the hidden clues and figured out the secret message.”
Quinn raised his hand. “We figured it out, but we still don’t understand it!”
Ms. Stad gave a knowing smile. “Just keep it in mind as you continue on your adventure. Now it’s time for another piece of the puzzle. Our parent volunteers will hand you a paper with some pirate words and phrases. See if you can figure out what they mean before we begin our tour of the mission.”