Waypoint: Cache Quest Oregon by Shauna Rice-Schober[thriller] Page B

stops, they finally arrived at the entrance to the Crater Lake National Monument; Lacey rolled down her window and paid the fee to a park ranger, then asked,
    “Are you familiar with an old man that lives here?”
    “Yeah, did you want to see it?” he answered.
    “Um, yeah so he just goes by ‘Old Man’?”
    “Oh no, it’s not a person, it’s a petrified log that floats upright around the lake. It bobs in and out of the water. Yeah it has floated around the lake for the last hundred years, at least. We believe that it could be an original tree from when Mt. Mazama erupted over seventy seven hundred years ago.”
    “It moves?” Lacey looked at Ben with concern.
    “Well there is nowhere for it to go, there are no creeks or rivers that run into the lake. The lava sealed the bottom of the lake when the mountain erupted, so it is like a huge bowl, the only current is from the wind. The water is clean and the water is cold, but that is really because the lake is nineteen hundred fifty—eight feet deep. That clean, cold water has helped preserve the log.” The ranger looked at them trying to anticipate their next question.
    “How cold?” Ben asked.
    The ranger smiled, “the average temperature is thirty eight degrees. Yeah, you’d get hypothermia if you tried swimming in it.”
    “Okay, thanks.” Lacey said as she taped the permit to her windshield, then drove into the park. “What if the log isn’t in the right place?” She asked Ben as they drove up the narrow road that lead to the lake.
    “We’ll figure it out.” Ben said as he sat up high to see the lake in the distance. They pulled into a parking spot by the main lodge and went to the railed lookout. In the middle of the vast blue lake was a small island. Lacey looked at a sign,
    “Hey, looks like a boat tour is gonna start soon, wanna go?” Ben looked at his aunt, nodded then followed her to the lodge to sign up.

     
    Ben and Lacey took a seat in the back of the large tour boat that floated the lake, they wanted to be able to hear, but also didn’t want to be noticed. They both looked around the lake, trying to spot the “old man.”
    The tour guide was giving explanations of how the lake was created and that it was the seventh deepest lake in the world, and then said, “Now let me tell you a story about an old man.” Everyone was caught by surprise and giggled, thinking it must be some sort of a lead up to a joke. The guide pointed with his left hand and said, “If you look out this way you will see a log, do you see it?” He waited confirming everyone was looking. “This log has been floating upright for over a hundred years, it’s a Hemlock log and no one knows why it hasn’t rolled to its side. It usually floats all around the lake, but for some reason lately it has been in the exact same spot. We have all made our own assumptions as to why it hasn’t moved, but we’ll find out shortly, because divers are going to explore the log tomorrow morning.”
    “How long has it been since it’s moved?” Lacey asked loudly.
    “About one month.” the guide responded. “Any more questions?” he asked the crowd. “Okay then if there are no other questions we will go to Wizard Island; this island is a cinder cone, literally a growing mountain, because of the continued volcanic activity in this huge caldera that was formed by the volcano all those years ago.” He looked around, no one was paying attention to him, everyone was making small talk with one another as to why the “Old Man” hadn’t moved in a month, only Ben and Lacey knew the truth.

14
     
    B en kicked a rock into the bright blue water and watched the ripples advance into the lake. He stared once again at the “Old Man” it was about fifty feet offshore of Wizard Island, and just as the tour guide stated, it remained completely still.
    Lacey stepped next to him, “So I talked with the tour guide, there is another tour coming out in about an hour and a half, he said we