The Fossil Hunter of Sydney Mines

by Jo Ann Yhard

  Mai grabbed another wipe from her pack and tackled the purple trail. “There it is. Zoom in.”

  “The other side!” Fred said, as nothing but magnified floor tile came into view. He reached over to touch the keypad. “Here, let me—”

  “Back off, Freddo.” Jeeter elbowed him away. “I got it.”

  Suddenly, a crumpled envelope came into view. Only the first two lines of the address were visible:

  “It can’t be,” Grace whispered.

  “What’s wrong?” asked Jeeter.

  Fred and Mai looked at each other, eyes wide. Both spoke at the same time.

  “This is going to be trouble!”

  Chapter

  3

  “GRACE, IT’S 9:30,” MAI SAID. “EARTH TO GRACE—CURFEW?”

  Curfew. “Crap, I gotta go!” Grace grabbed her backpack and ran for the stairs. “I’ll keep my walkie-talkie on. Call me later!” she called over her shoulder.

  Grace raced through the streets. She used every shortcut she knew and flew into the driveway in record time. The windows of the hundred-year-old house her parents had inherited from her grandmother were still dark and the driveway was empty.

  Phew! That was close, she thought. Dumping her pack inside the back door, she flicked on the light. The kitchen wasn’t empty.

  Her mother sat at the island, her hands wrapped around a steaming mug. The smell of fresh ground beans filled the air. Uh-oh. Her mother never drank coffee past five o’clock. And sitting in the dark? Well, that couldn’t be a good sign.

  “Grace Elizabeth, there you are,” her mother said, granite eyes freezing Grace on the spot.

  Both names—double uh-oh. This was worse than she thought. “Sorry I’m late. I had a flat tire and—”

  “So,” her mother interrupted. Her red manicured nails were tapping rapidly against her mug. “All ready for the math test tomorrow?”

  “Math test? Umm…yeah,” Grace said. She’d almost forgotten her alibi. “We got through all the review questions and—”

  “Stop before you dig yourself any deeper!” Her mother banged her mug on the counter and coffee sloshed over the rim. “Jessica called looking for you. You remember Jessica, your study partner?” She waved Grace’s note in the air. “Where were you, really?”

  “Mom, it’s not what you think.”

  “And what am I thinking?” She glanced at the discarded backpack by the door. “You’d better not have been traipsing around in those sinkholes again! They’re dangerous. I thought we were past the daredevil behaviour…and the lying.”

  “Mom, I’m sorry. We weren’t doing anything wrong, I swear…. We were just—” Grace looked at her mom’s pinched face and was surprised to see a glint of grey hair at her temples. She looked older all of a sudden.

  “You were just what?”

  Grace couldn’t quite swallow. Her throat felt like there was a boulder in it. She couldn’t tell her mom about the note, not yet.

  “You’ve always been adventurous, like your father.” Her mother sighed and ran a hand through her shoulder-length hair. “I never really agreed with him taking you hunting for those bloody fossils, crawling over cliffs and digging in caves—ever since you could walk, practically.” She sighed again. “I should have insisted that you stayed in ballet…but you were such a tomboy.”

  “I hated ballet,” Grace whispered, “and the pink tights. All those girls with the same perfect hair and perfect nails.” Grace pressed her lips together and looked down at her stubby fingers and chewed-off nails. It was the same old argument.

  Her mother was staring at her own manicured fingertips. “Forget the ballet. I’m sorry I mentioned it.” She grabbed a cloth and started viciously wiping up the spilled coffee. “You were so much more reckless after your father…. But your sessions with Dr. Solomon were helping. I thought things were getting better.”

  They stood staring at each other, her mother’s last words hanging between them. Grace opened her mouth to speak and then closed it again. Her mother wouldn’t care that this time was different. She’d just have to prove it.

  “Go to bed, Grace,” her mother said, finally breaking the silence. “We’ll talk about it in the morning.”

  Grace trudged upstairs, dragging her pack behind her. She flopped onto the bed and stared at the ceiling, where a collage of star charts looked like a window up to the universe. It didn’t have its normal calming effect. Restless, her eyes wandered around her room, finally stopping on the collection of fossil books her dad had bought her.

  Memories of the fossil-hunting trips she and her dad had taken all over Nova Scotia—to places like Parrsboro, Joggins, and Blue Beach—flashed like a slide show in her head. Scaling cliffs, wading through river currents, and hiking over rough terrain…. No! Stop it! She forced herself to look away and the images faded from her mind. She was getting good at this.

  Repression. Her therapist, Dr. Solomon, loved the word. He’d say it slowly, letting it roll off his tongue. Sometimes he’d add a chin stroke for good measure. He always looked pleased when he did this, like he’d discovered the Caramilk secret or something.

  Grace tried to focus her whirling brain and sort out all the facts spinning around inside her head. Her dad had said he was going to check out some new sites around Point Aconi the day he disappeared, March fifth. Because the winter had been so mild, with hardly any snow, he had been able to keep doing his fieldwork right through the winter.

  Point Aconi was about a fifteen-minute drive from Sydney Mines. The coal seam and fossil cliffs there were at the very tip of the point, beneath the lighthouse. The area was riddled with bootleg coal mines. No one lived there now, not since a gigantic sinkhole had swallowed most of the road five years ago. The government had relocated everyone who lived there and that’s when a company had first tried to lease the land for strip mining. Her dad had always hoped the government would ban the mining and have Point Aconi declared a heritage site because of the wealth of fossils there.

  But her dad’s strip mining protests hadn’t seemed to work. The strip mining deals, including the one for Point Aconi, had looked like they were going to be approved. Grace’s dad had said he’d have to move fast to collect as many fossils as he could from the area because they would be destroyed when the mining started.

  Several new sinkholes had formed out at Point Aconi in the months before the accident, creating entry points into another bootleg mining tunnel system. Because the tunnels followed the coal seams, there were almost always exposed fossils to be found, either scattered on the ground or visible in the walls. But Grace’s dad hadn’t let her go fossil-hunting with him on Saturdays like she usually did. He’d said it was too dangerous with the wet weather—that the ground was less stable than ever.

  He had shown her the area on her map, which was an exact copy of the one he used. She’d always updated hers just like he did, writing in new sinkholes and fossil sites as he’d found them.

  Maybe something did happen out there that day, Grace thought to herself. But they had found his car crashed into the ocean far away from Point Aconi. And someone at the fossil museum had said he’d returned to the office after he’d visited Point Aconi that day.

  But now with the note, new doubts bloomed inside her. What if Rick Stanley is involved? Grace wondered. Maybe he had been the one that said her dad had returned to the museum. He could have been lying to cover his tracks.

  The steps creaked as Grace’s mother climbed the stairs. Grace waited for the familiar sound of the television. On many nights since the accident, Grace had woken up and heard it blaring. On these nights, she’d tiptoe into her parents’ room and find her mom asleep, clutching her dad’s picture. She’d stand there, watching her mother’s tear-stained face as she slept and wondering what she was dreaming about.

  Eventually, she’d shut off the television and tiptoe out. It was pretty much a ritual between them now, one they never discussed—like everything else.

  Curious when she didn�
�t hear the television, Grace padded down the hardwood floor of the hall in her sock feet. Light spilled from the open bedroom doorway. Her mother sat on the bed, facing away from her.

  “Mom, what are you doing?”

  “Why on earth are you still up?” her mother replied, hastily wiping fresh tears from her cheeks. She stuffed something in a box and put it on the top shelf of the closet.

  “What’s that?”

  Grace’s mother met her eyes briefly. “Just some old bills,” she said. She turned on the television and climbed into bed. The blue light flickered eerily on her expressionless face. “You should be asleep.”

  She didn’t look at Grace again.

  Repression. There’s that word again, Grace thought. Her mother was getting as good at it as she was. Maybe she should go see Dr. Solomon.

  Returning to her room, Grace crawled under her covers, craving the escape of sleep.

  KCHHHH! There was a familiar crackle from her backpack.

  “Grace, come in,” Fred’s whispered voice sounded through the radio. “Are you there?”

  Grace grabbed her walkie-talkie. “I’m here,” she said. The walkie-talkies she and her friends had bought to communicate while exploring underground were also good for secret chats.

  “What’s the damage?” Mai chimed in.

  “She was really ticked. ‘We’ll talk in the morning,’ she said. That gives her more time to think up a punishment.”

  “Well, if she grounds you she can’t watch you all the time,” Fred said. “She works late.”

  “You’re forgetting her spy next door, Snoopy Stuckless,” Grace said. “But don’t worry. I have a plan.”

  Chapter

  4

  GRACE STARED AT HER CLOCK. IT WAS ONE-THIRTY IN THE MORNING. Endless questions were spinning around in her head—questions with no answers.

  Finally, she couldn’t take it any longer. She had to talk to someone. It was way too late to call Mai or Fred—they’d be asleep for sure.

  “Jeeter?” Grace whispered into her walkie-talkie. “Are you awake?” She waited.

  A few weeks ago, she and Jeeter had started chatting on their walkie-talkies late at night when she couldn’t sleep. He always answered her call, no matter how late it was.

  “I’m here,” his voice echoed back. “Trouble sleeping again?”

  “Yeah.”

  “Another bad dream?”

  “Uh-huh,” she sniffed, unexpected tears flooding her eyes. “My dad was calling for me, but I couldn’t find him.” She couldn’t believe she’d said it. She’d never told anyone what she saw in her dreams. But Jeeter understood. He’d told her before that he had bad dreams, too, since his mom had died.

  “It’s all right, Grace,” he said. “No luck with the wave machine?”

  “It’s not helping.”

  “Okay. Tell me one of your stories, then. What about that trip you and your dad took to Parrsboro? You know, when he got that nickname, Old Fossil.”

  “Again?” She smiled through her tears. The story was one of her favourites, too.

  “It’s a funny story.”

  “Okay.” Grace sighed and closed her eyes, snuggling back into her pillow. She recounted the days when she and her dad had gone on amazing adventures under sunny skies…and finally drifted off to sleep.

  “Now Grace, remember what I told you. Stay as far away from the cliff as it is high,” her dad said.

  Grace looked up at the towering cliff above them. “Why?”

  “So if there is an avalanche or any rocks fall, you won’t be under them.”

  Grace grinned. “Good tip, Dad. But all the fossils are over there!” She pointed to a pile of broken shale in a carved-out piece of the cliff face.

  “Yes, that tends to be a problem,” he said. “Let me worry about that, okay?” He smiled, ruffling her hair.

  They were on a fossil tour in Parrsboro. Several tourists were in the group. Grace watched a tall lady trying to walk along the rocky shore in flip-flops. Two small kids were poking sticks at a dead jellyfish. These tourists weren’t real fossil hunters, not like Grace and her dad.

  “Excuse me,” an older lady with a British accent said as she approached them.

  “Good afternoon,” Grace’s dad said.

  “You’re the spitting image of my granddaughter, Lily,” she said, beaming at Grace. “I just had to come over and say hello. Are you having a nice time with your grandfather?”

  Grace’s mouth fell open. Grandfather?

  The lady turned to Grace’s dad. “I would have loved to have my grandchildren with me, as well, but they’re back in England.”

  “He’s not my grandfather. He’s my dad!” Grace said, giggling.

  The lady’s eyes widened. She stared at Grace’s dad’s grey beard and hair. “Oh, pardon me!” she said, her cheeks red.

  “Understandable mistake,” Grace’s dad said. “I think of myself as an old fossil most of the time.”

  The lady apologized again and hurried off, obviously embarrassed.

  “My word, that was funny!” Grace’s dad exploded, doubling over with laughter. “Your mom would get a kick out of that, wouldn’t she?”

  Grace held her aching ribs and nodded.

  Her dad started hobbling around, pretending he couldn’t walk properly. “Give an old fellow a hand would you, young miss?” he asked in his best old-man voice.

  “Give it up, Dad!”

  “My word! I’ve got an ache in my back! I think my knee is giving out!”

  They laughed hysterically the rest of the day.

  That night they stayed at the Fundy Geological Museum as part of an overnight program. As they nestled in their sleeping bags, surrounded by dinosaurs, her dad whispered to her. “I’m so grateful we share this, Grace—this love of fossils. You don’t know how much it means to me.”

  Grace heard the emotion in his voice and felt a lump in her throat. “Me too, Dad,” she whispered back. “I love you.”

  Grace opened her eyes. She could swear she’d heard a cry. It must have wakened her. She lay there, listening for sounds in the deep quiet of the night. But it was dead silent. It must have been her own cry, she realized. She could still hear it, echoing in her head from her dream.

  “I really miss you, Dad,” she murmured into the dark.

  Chapter

  5

  GRACE STARED DOWN AT HER BOWL OF SUGAR-OS, WAITING FOR the verdict. Her mother had sighed five times, glared three times, and was sure to speak at any moment.

  “Grace—”

  Here it comes, Grace thought. “Umm, Mom, what happened to the car?” she asked, trying to delay the inevitable. “It wasn’t in the driveway last night.”

  “The car? Oh, it broke down on me while I was coming home from work. I just had that thing in for servicing last week!” she said, looking puzzled. “Rick Stanley was kind enough to give me a lift home. Lucky for me he happened to be driving by. Anyway, he was asking how we’re doing. I invited him over for dinner.”

  “Why do you want him over here?”

  “Rick’s been a friend of your father’s since they were children. He’s been calling and wanting to come over and check on us for ages, but I just haven’t been up to it. He has such wonderful stories about your father.” She sighed and stared off into space.

  “Mom?”

  “Hmm? Oh, right, we were talking about you.” Her mother poured a cup of coffee from the steaming carafe. “I thought about this all night, Grace. I’m going give you one more day of freedom, if you promise to behave. But starting tomorrow you’re to come straight home after school. No detours and no going out.”

  Grace sat still, stunned. No going out? Did she say no going out?

  “This is for your own good,” her mother continued, wrapping her hands around the Old Fossil mug that Grace had made for her father. “I can’t be worrying about you all the time, out doing goodness knows what, especially now that I have more night shifts at the ferry terminal…not to me
ntion my manicure customers.”

  “Mom, no way!” Grace’s spoon splattered into her cereal bowl. “I’ve got important stuff to do! It’s not fair!”

  “Fair? You think this is a debate? And what important stuff are you talking about? You’re only thirteen, for heaven’s sake.” Her mother started to walk away, then turned back. Her face was grave. “I’m warning you, Grace,” she said, tapping a brochure on the fridge as she left.

  Grace was furious as she biked to school. Her mother was one extreme or the other lately. Grace never knew what she’d face. Sometimes her mom would get really upset and overreact as if she were some kind of army sergeant, like now. Other times, she’d be the total opposite, all gushy and gooey. Grace usually hated the gushy-gooey mood more; it felt fake. But it would have been better this morning—gushy-gooey mom would do anything she wanted.

  “What are you going to do, Grace?” Mai typed away on the keyboard as they huddled around the computer monitor in class. They were supposed to be researching the tar ponds cleanup for a school project.

  “I don’t know. I’m grounded starting tomorrow. I wish we could go to Point Aconi today after school. But it would take too long to get there and my mom’s not working tonight.”

  “But if you’re not home tomorrow after school, you’re gonna be toast,” Fred piped in. “We’d be gone until dark.”

  “I’ve got to find out what’s going on,” Grace whispered. “I mean, think about it. The fossil museum is where Dad worked, and its name just happens to be on the envelope that some mystery guy left by my locker. Rick Stanley still works there. I never liked him all that much—my dad was always loaning him money.” She wrinkled her nose at the memory. “My mom doesn’t know about that, though. She thinks he’s nice.”

  “Shhhh,” Mai hushed. “Here comes Mr. Grange.”

  “And have we learned anything about the tar ponds and the cleanup project?” Mr. Grange asked. “Or are you three too busy chatting?”

  “No, Mr. Grange,” Mai said. “We were working on it.”