Valley of the Scarecrow by Gord Rollo Page A

smoldering beneath the surface for years. She needed to shake him out of his reverie and put a smile back on his face.
    “Just had an idea, Gramps. A good one too. Wouldn’tit be cool if we found that gold you mentioned earlier? We could get that theater all fixed up the way you remember it and I could finally open up my restaurant. You could come have supper there every—”
    “Don’t you dare, Kelly Ann Tucker!” Malcolm shouted, jumping to his feet and pointing a trembling finger in her startled face. “Don’t even let that terrible thought inside your head, you hear?”
    In all the twenty-two years of her life, this was the first time Kelly could remember her grandfather ever raising his voice at her and for a moment it startled her into silence, completely taken by surprise. If she’d hoped to settle the old man down and cheer him up, she was doing a piss-poor job of it—she’d never seen him this upset and frazzled before. Could it be he was starting to lose his grip on sanity, finally beginning that downward spiral so many elderly men and women seem to take in the last few years of their lives? It didn’t seem likely; not her Gramps, but man he was certainly acting awfully weird.
    “Promise you won’t do it, Kelly. Promise me.”
    “Do what? I didn’t mean to—”
    “Don’t play games with me, girl. I’m serious. Nothing good will ever come of this. You can’t try to find Miller’s Grove. Not ever. Don’t go looking for that gold.”
    “But why? If that old preacher really did hide a treasure there, why shouldn’t we go look for it? Seems crazy not to. In fact, if you’re so sure of your story, I’m surprised you haven’t looked for it yourself.”
    The air seemed to deflate out of Malcolm’s balloon, his anger leaking away in a deep sigh. He sat back down on his chair, looking tired, his eyes filled with fear.
    “You don’t think I’ve thought about it? You don’t think I’ve lain awake some nights dreaming about getting my hands on that gold?”
    “Why didn’t you then? And if not you, someone else from the Grove at least. If the gold’s real, surely someone would have searched for it by now.”
    “It’s blood money, Kelly. Joshua Miller sold his soul for that stash. Sold all our souls maybe. It’s not just gold either. Paper money wasn’t worth squat back in the Depression, but things like gold, silver, diamonds, jewels, those never lose their worth. He took any and all of it. Whatever profits our bewitched crops produced, he took control of and stored it away. While the rest of the country was starving and out of work, our little community flourished. When other farmers’ crops dried up and withered to dust, our fields grew lush and green and our profits went up and up.”
    “Sounds like all the more reason to look for it.”
    “Listen. While my father was alive he forbid me to even speak of the Grove, never mind Joshua Miller or his treasure, but I remember the day he died clear as a bell. It was 1969 and I was forty-three years old. A full-grown man, but for the first time in my life I finally felt free. Angus Tucker was a good father and a good man but he was as strict as they come. I never dreamt of disobeying him, but once he was gone I couldn’t help but think some of the same things that are rattling around your head right now. I can remember standing at his grave site watching them toss shovelfuls of dirt on top of his casket, but all I was thinking about was going back to the Grove and maybe digging a few holes of my own. It was a terrible thing to be thinking at my own father’s funeral, but that’s the truth of it.”
    “Then why didn’t you ever go do it?”
    “Who said I didn’t?”
    “You looked for the gold? Wow! What happened?”
    “Nothing. I chickened out. Took me six years, but Iwent back to the Grove in 1975, thinking maybe I’d check out the old village in the woods. Joshua’s house was two or three times the size of the rest of our cabins