Finally both boys knelt as Larry invited the Lord Jesus into his heart.
And then, for the first time, Danny Orlis saw clearly why it was that the Lord had led him to go to school in the Colorado mountain community.
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Danny Orlis and the Angle Inlet Mystery
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About the Book:
Danny Orlis was already excited about having his twin cousins come for the summer. While on the way to pick them up he overhears a conversation that promises to give them a special adventure during their time together. Buried treasure, clues from an old Indian chief and an old map all add to the mystery. They soon discover they are not the only ones searching for the treasure. Because of Danny's faithful witness for the Lord, the boys come up with some better ideas about the use of so much money, should they find it. By the time the adventure is over, they have found a far greater treasure than they had ever imagined.
Chapter One
Danny’s News
DANNY ORLIS, with his dog Laddie by his side, walked slowly to the corner. Danny looked up the highway for a glimpse of the International Falls Bus which should have pulled into Warroad, Minnesota an hour before.
"They'll be along in a minute, Laddie," he said to the mixed collie and shepherd dog beside him. His voice was tense with excitement. "They'll be along in a minute," he said again.
He could hardly wait to tell them what he had overheard coming out on the boat from American Point. He could tell them the thing that had sent the blood rushing to his cheeks and caused his spine to tingle with excitement, the thing that had kept him awake for half the night and even now set his heart to pounding. Treasure! And hidden in his own Angle Inlet territory! It was enough to make him excited. He looked up the street again, then turned and walked slowly toward the hotel. If only the twins would come!
Danny Orlis was not especially tall for all of his twelve years, but he was lean and wiry, strong as a hickory sapling and quick as a deer that inhabited his native Northwest Angle in Northern Minnesota. His face was burned brown from long months out of doors in the sun and rain. His eyes had already taken on a sharp, alert look, and he carried himself with the easy grace of one who could walk or swim all day.
There was a dull rumble up the street, and Danny turned quickly to see the bus braking to a stop. Bob and Mike Lance were the first ones off. They took a step or two out onto the sidewalk, stopped, and looked nervously about. Danny would have known them anywhere.
"Hi," he called to them.
"Hi, yourself," Mike said.
Bob only grunted.
"Boy, I thought you two were never going to get here," Danny said as he picked up one of their suitcases and led them down the wide street toward the dock on Lake of the Woods. "The boat is due to sail at 8 o'clock. If we miss it we'll have to stay until tomorrow morning."
"That wouldn't be so bad," Bob said. "Even staying in this dump of a town would be better than going out in the—the wilderness where we're headed."
"Oh, you'll like it out at Angle Inlet," Danny said quickly. It was all he could do to keep from telling his secret now—but it wasn't safe out here on the street. Better wait until they were safely out on the boat, headed across the Lake of the Woods toward Oak and Flag Islands and Angle Inlet. "We've got the best fishing in the country and all sorts of big game."
"You can have them," Bob said. "I'll take St. Paul."
"Oh, don't pay any attention to him," Mike said, laughing. "He's just mad because Mom got sick and we had to come up here to the Northwest Angle to spend the summer with you."
"We could've stayed at home," Bob went on, "where we could have some fun. Why, I'll bet they don't even have a show out where you live, Dan."
"A show?" Danny echoed. "Why, we don't have any roads or electricity or towns out on the Angle. I guess we don't have any shows." Then he added, "Of course I wouldn't go to them if we did have."
"You wouldn't go to a show?" Bob repeated. "Why not?"
"Well, you see," Danny told him, hoisting the suitcase into the lower deck of the boat, the Bert Steele, "I'm a Christian, and I feel it's better not to go to shows. There's so much drinking and gambling and sin in them."
"I never heard of such a thing as not going to shows," Bob said as he scrambled into the fisheries' boat after his brother. "But I might have expected that from a hayseed."
"What do you mean by being a Christian?" Mike asked.
"I mean that I've confessed my sins before God and put my trust in Jesus Christ to save me," Danny said, sitting down on the corner of a box of tools. "And because I'm a Christian I try to live as close to the way Jesus would want me to live as I possibly can."
"A Christian!" Bob snorted. "Sissy stuff."
"Aw, cut it out, Bob, will you?" Mike said. He was the taller of the twins, blond and good-natured, where Bob was dark-headed and sour.
"I've got a secret I want to let you in on," Danny whispered as they stood together at the ladder that led up to the top deck; "but we've got to be sure that we're alone before I can tell you."
Mike's eyes sparkled with excitement, but Bob was unimpressed. "What are you going to do?" he asked, "tell us that you know where an old mother rabbit has her nest?"
"You wait and see," Dan told him.
They climbed up the ladder and went to the back of the deck where they found a private corner away from the other passengers.
"Now what was this secret you were going to tell us?" Mike whispered.
"Well, I—" Danny began. But just then the captain of the Bert Steele called to him.
"Say, Danny, would you come down and move these suitcases for me? I've got a load of lumber and a couple of outboard motors that go out to Oak."
"I'll be back in just a minute," he said to the twins.
"I'Il go," Bob said, getting quickly to his feet. "It's our stuff anyway."
Before Danny could protest, Bob had climbed down the ladder to the lower deck where the fish and freight were hauled.
"I wonder what came over him?" Mike said.
In a few minutes Danny heard his dog growl. "I wonder what's wrong with Laddie?" he asked.
"Sounds like he's got someone cornered," Mike said.
Laddie growled again, deep down in his throat. "It sure does sound like he's got someone cornered," Danny said, getting to his feet and starting toward the ladder. "He doesn't usually act like that."
Just then Bob screamed. "Danny! Get him off!" he cried. "Danny! Danny! He's killing me! Get me loose! Get me loose!"
Danny ran and descended the ladder to the lower deck. There was Laddie holding Bob's hand between his teeth. The hair on the back of his neck was ruffed, and his long sharp teeth were bared. His jaws were trembling, and he was still growling.
"Get me loose, Danny!" Bob cried. "He's killing me!"
"Laddie!" Danny ordered sharply. "Laddie Boy. Come!"
The big dog looked at him appealingly, then loosed his hold on the frightened Bob and moved obediently to Danny's side.
"What's the matter, fella?" Danny spoke sternly to his dog.
"He tried to kill me. That's what he did. He tried to kill me."
"And if he'd been my dog," Captain Anderson put in, "I believe I'd have let him go. I saw how you kicked him in the face as you went by him."
Danny turned to his cousin, his eyes blazing. Bob took a step or two backwards, his face flushing.
"Don't you ever do that again," Danny said softly. "Don't you ever lay hands on my dog again."
Without saying a word Bob whirled and went back to the top deck. For several minutes he sat there rubbing his hand that Laddie had clamped down on. The dog's teeth hadn't broken the skin, but there were deep tooth marks that would be black and blue the next morning.
The big boat backed slowly away from the docks, turned and began to make her way slowly out of the harbor. Th
ere was a brisk wind blowing, and long, deep-troughed waves were rolling across the lake as the boat headed for Buffalo Point.
For a while the boys said nothing. Whenever Danny would look at Bob, the city boy would turn away. There were several other passengers, fishermen or summer residents going out to the resort spots of the Lake of the Woods, but they gathered in the seats at the front of the boat, leaving the boys almost alone.
Finally Mike said, "Now what is that secret you were going to tell us?"
Danny leaned forward and lowered his voice. "On the way out on the boat last night I was almost asleep in the cabin when a couple of men came in and started to talk; I just couldn't help hearing what they said."
"Yes, yes, go on." Mike leaned forward until his head nearly touched Danny's. Even Bob moved in a little.
"The story goes back a long time ago, back to 1735 or so," Danny said softly, "to the time when old Fort Charles was manned by French soldiers, and the Dawson Trail from Angle Inlet to Winnipeg was being used."
"What's all that got to do with it?" Bob asked impatiently.
"Keep your shirt on, will you?" Mike exclaimed. "How do you expect Danny to tell us when you keep interrupting all the time?"
"Well, he starts to tell us what he heard a couple of guys say, and then he switches to a history lesson," Bob replied, scowling darkly. "What I can't figure out is, what's that got to do with it?"
"It has a lot to do with it," Danny went on, his voice in a hoarse whisper. "There was a lot of travel on the Lake of the Woods at that time. Men traveled over the Great Lakes to the northwest corner of Lake Superior, and canoed across to the Lake of the Woods, and then went across country on the old Dawson Trail to Winnipeg. A lot of furs and gold traveled that route, and the Indians used to raid it every so often." He stopped a moment and looked around. "Those fellows said that there was one traveler about that time named Du Bois with an iron chest filled with gold coins—a whole fortune in them!"
Mike sucked in his breath sharply and moved a bit closer to Danny.
"This guy got as far as Fort Charles or Angle Inlet," Dan continued, "when word came of a terrible Indian uprising and massacre on the Dawson Trail. This Monsieur Du Bois got scared and buried his money!"
"On the Angle?" Mike asked excitedly.
"On the Angle or one of the islands, somewhere close by," Danny went on. "It couldn't have been far away because the Indians were so wild and hostile and Du Bois was so scared of them he wouldn't have gone far away, gold or no gold."
"Yes, but why didn't he come back and get it?" Bob asked.
"He was in a party that got ambushed and killed two days out of Winnipeg," Danny replied. "So his gold is still up here waiting for someone to come along and dig it up."
"That's right," Mike agreed, "but there's an awful lot of country it could be in. Finding it would be like finding a dime in a mountain of quarters."
"These fellows talked like they were looking for a map, or part of one. I heard them say that Du Bois had left a map to the treasure."
"Oh, boy," Bob exclaimed, his eyes shining. "Oh, boy! A real honest buried treasure!"
"S-s-sh," Danny put a warning finger to his cousin's lips.
"Do you suppose there's any chance of us f-finding it?" Bob asked.
"We sure can look," Mike said.
Bob sighed deeply. "Boy, what wouldn't I do with my share if we find it? I'd buy me a hundred comic books and drink six dozen sodas and see fifty cowboy shows—" He stopped and turned to Danny, and said sneeringly, "Oh, excuse me. You don't go to movies, do you?"
"That's right," Dan grinned good-naturedly. "I don't go to movies or read comic books, either. Some of them are just about as bad as shows." He started to say more, but stopped abruptly. Two men were coming up the ladder from the lower deck. He grasped Mike's arm with a trembling hand. "It's them!" he said hoarsely. "I sure didn't expect to see them again. It's them!
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Danny Orlis Goes to School Page 8