The Scavenger

I sat on the floor with the big metal box in front of me. I opened the latch, then the lid.

There was a note on top that read, “Collect Your Prize.” I moved it out of the way and then I just sat there, smiling.

It was full of cash.

I counted it. I counted it again.

$20,000.00

I opened the little black book, eager for my dad’s approval.

“I knew you could do it. Now I know that you might think that you’re looking at a sizable prize right now but let me tell you something, it ain’t nothin. Not yet. That was just a tester round. Ready for the real game? Turn the page.”

I felt the thin worn paper between my fingers. I smiled, the page already turning...

We had always been poor. The kinda poor that made it easier to fall into bad ways as my dad would say.

Those bad ways would end up getting him killed.

A few days after the funeral there was a knock at the door. I already knew who it was.

I opened it to two of my dad’s “business” partners, Chris Jones and Duane Green.

Chris was a well built man with a thick gray beard and eyes that looked like they were made out of crystal.

He so closely resembled Santa Clause that everyone in town just called him Kringle, though he couldn’t be further from the type. My dad claimed he once beat a man to death for spilling a drink on his favorite boots.

Duane was not known for much other than for keeping to himself. He was a towering giant of a man who wasn’t one for conversation. When he finally did speak it was always slow and calm and barely above a whisper.

My dad said that Duane was in charge of making “arrangements.” I wasn’t completely sure what that job title entailed but I had a sneaking suspicion that it had something to do with the crematorium he owned and operated.

“Oh hey,” Was all I could manage. I wasn’t pleased to see them and they could tell.

“So Kid, did you find it yet?”

Kringle wasn’t humoring me with small talk anymore and that wasn’t a great sign.

“Uh...No, I haven’t. I’m sorry guys. I’ve gone through all of his stuff and I haven’t seen it anywhere.”

The pair of them just stared at me. An uncomfortable silence settled in before Kringle chose to speak again.

He leaned in close and spoke so calmly that it sent shivers down my spine.

“Listen Miles, that book wasn’t just your old man's. It was meant for ALL of us. The sooner you find it, the better off we’ll all be.”

He leaned back and looked at me with an intensity that I’m sure was meant to make me squirm, but I didn’t.

I gave him my most clueless look and promised to keep looking.

Duane just nodded slowly in the background.

I closed the door and felt for my back pocket. Still there.

“Idiots,” I thought. They never bothered to get to know me while my dad was alive. If they had, they would know that I wasn’t some dumb kid anymore and that I was actually one step ahead of them. They’d figure that out soon.

My dad gave me the notebook a couple of days before he left on the business trip that got him killed. He always left it behind if he thought that things might go sideways.

I pulled out the crumpled black book. All of my dad’s secrets were in it and he left it to ME, no one else.

I opened to the first page and a grin spread over my face.

It was in code. The same secret code we used to communicate when I was a kid.

One year on my 8th birthday my dad couldn’t afford a present for me. So he created a scavenger hunt using some of the old toys that I already had and hid them all around the neighborhood. Then he made an elaborate map with different code words leading me to where they were. By the end of the day, we were giddy with laughter from all of the fun we had. It was one of my favorite memories.

I read over the first page again.

“In the event that I die:

Step 1: Hide this book

-Don’t trust Kringle or Duane. Their traitors. (see step 3)

Step 2: Get deposit #1. Follow our scavenger hunt code.”

My dad was in charge of the “deposits” which were hidden all over town. Nobody knew where they were except for my dad and his notebook. He wrote all the locations in code so that no one would be able to find them except for him… and me.

It was his insurance policy. “Can’t kill the man who knows where all the cash is,” he’d say. But apparently, you can.

I traced the words with my finger. I read on.

“What to Pack: Gopher tooth + board slapper”

I needed a measuring tape and a shovel. Check.

“ Go down to the field of death and avoid the night eyes. Find the love of my life.”

My stomach was tightening. My dad had an old basset hound named Julia that he referred to as the “love of his life.” “The field of death” was an empty dirt lot behind the house where we had buried her… over 10 years ago.

We didn’t mark the grave because we didn’t want anyone to know that we were technically illegally dumping, so I would just have to try my best to remember where she was buried.

“Night eyes'' was just my dad's way of saying, bystanders. They always came out of nowhere he said.

Late that night I jumped the back fence to the empty dirt field. I played over in my mind the words my dad had written down.

“ She lays 7 hares diagonally from the corner. Find the spot. Be a gopher.”

7 hares = 14 feet. As a kid, I thought that every hare measured exactly 2 feet from ear to toe after a hunting trip where both my dad and I each bagged a 2 footer. I was obviously wrong but my dad thought it was hilarious. From then on we measured everything in hares.

I pulled out the measuring tape and measured 14 feet diagonally from the corner fence.

I grabbed the shovel and just as my dad said, I became a gopher.

I dug down about 3 feet or 2 ½ hares before I hit a thud.

I looked down. The original cardboard box we had put Julia in was long gone. Now there were just a pile of old bones, an old rotten dog collar, and a metal box.

I patted the old dog skull, grabbed the box, and lugged it to the side of the grave.

I quickly shoveled back in all the dirt.

“Head back to the castle before collecting your prize.”

Translation - Don’t open it till you get back to the house.

Just as I stood to turn, a flashlight fell on me. I tried to cover my eyes but I was already expecting this.

“Well, well. Guess you did get ahold of that old notebook after all huh?” It was Kringle. Duane stood silently behind him.

I gave them a shocked look, then I smiled.

These weren’t the “night eyes” I was worried about. Oh, no. In this reference, I was to make sure there were no witnesses.

That’s because step 3 was about to take place.

“Step 3: Turn in the traitors. Avoid the night eyes.

Before step 2 - call Uncle Chad and tell ‘em you need help trimming the fat. He owes me one. He and his guys will take care of the vultures.”

Kringle and Duane both heard the approaching car engine and stopped in their tracks. As soon as they saw the headlights come on, they knew they were in trouble.

The last face they would ever see would be mine.

My face... With the crazy smile, my dad was notorious for. The one that I was told made me into a spitting image of him. The one that would make them regret the day they betrayed my dad.