Emma and Jacob both slept on the short flight to the East Coast. As soon as the trio landed in Halifax, they went to an information desk to find out how to get to Peggy’s Cove. It turned out it was only an hour away—but there was no public transportation out to the tourist attraction. They were too young to rent a car, and most taxis wouldn’t take the long trip. The information employee helped them call around to tour companies, to see if any were leaving soon. Most of them left in the morning, but they found one that would take them out to the lighthouse and then cruise back to Halifax Harbour by boat to take in the sunset. Jacob nervously handed over his credit card again, worrying about when he would hit the limit, but it went through.
Half an hour later, they were on a tour bus on their way to Peggy’s Cove.
Around four o’clock, the bus drove through the small town of Peggy’s Cove and pulled into the lighthouse’s busy parking lot. The trio got out and looked around. There were people everywhere—most of them had come by car, but there were a few other tour buses, too. There was a pretty, white-washed old building with an Information Center inside, and a huge rocky area that people were climbing across to reach the lighthouse. There was a path, too, but Max took off over the rocks. Jacob and Emma followed, laughing.
They reached the lighthouse and took a moment to look at the beautiful view. Atlantic waves crashed against the rock cliff, and the sea stretched out to the horizon. Seabirds flew above them and the smell of salt was in the air. It was incredible.
“What now? The map didn’t have any clues about what to look for,” Emma said.
Jacob looked around. “There—” He pointed at a sign that had information for tourists. “Maybe that can tell us which parts of the lighthouse are original, so we know what to look for.”
Max ran ahead to read the sign. By the time Emma and Jacob got there, Max was looking at them in horror. “Guys…”
“What’s wrong?” Emma asked.
“The lighthouse was replaced in 1914,” Max told them.
“What?! No!” Jacob quickly re-read what Max had just looked over. “Wait! It says the old wooden lighthouse was used as the keeper's dwelling! It should…” He stopped, and took a stumbling step away from the sign .
“It fell apart during a hurricane in the 50s,” Max told Emma. “It’s gone.”
“But…” Emma looked around, helplessly. “There must be something…”
“The clue is gone,” Jacob said. “We came all this way…for nothing.”
It was a quiet boat ride back to Halifax. Max fell asleep, and Emma rested her head on Jacob’s shoulder. It should have been a romantic ride. The sun was close to setting, and the ocean was a thousand shades of red, yellow, orange, and blue. The breeze over the water was cool but not cold, and Halifax’s harbour was full of buildings. Their windows glowed with light, warm and inviting. But Jacob was angry and depressed. He couldn’t believe they had come all this way with nothing to show for it.
Jacob took out the map and looked at it again. Why had Galt chosen to hide the clue in a wooden lighthouse? He had no way of knowing that Peggy’s Cove would become so popular with tourists.
Jacob, who was staring down at the map, suddenly let go of Emma’s hand. He lifted the map up… “Defender. Stars. Ships. Oh my god, it’s the Citadel!” he yelled. A few heads turned their way, and Max woke up, blinking and looking around in confusion.
“What’s the Citadel?” Emma asked.
“I couldn’t figure out why Galt would hide the clue at the lighthouse. From what we read when we were there, it wasn’t a popular or famous attraction in this time. And it was made of wood! He had to know there was a chance it wouldn't be there by the time Lucy was old enough to go and get the treasure”. We know ‘new home’ is Nova Scotia. We thought ‘defender, the deep, and high above’ was the lighthouse. But the Citadel is all of those things, too. It’s a fort, built on a hill, that defends from land and sea. And the final clue, ‘star!’ I thought that meant nighttime, when the lighthouse would be lit. But the Citadel is shaped like a star.”
Emma stared at the clues and then up at the Citadel. They could just see it peeking up from the nearby hill. “Jacob—I think you’re right!” she said, excited. “This could be it!”
“The Citadel is huge,” Emma said, worried. “We have to narrow down our search before we get in there.”
“La Citadelle est immense,” dit Emma, inquiète. “Nous devons affiner nôtre recherche avant d’y entrer.”
“Look at where he’s written defender,” Jacob said, showing them the clue again. “It’s right outside one of the lines of the X that marks the Citadel. I bet that means it’s hidden somewhere along the outside of the fort, where the defenders would have stood.”
Emma considered that. She went from map to map on her phone. “See this path that goes all around the outside of the fort? This map labels it as the musket gallery. That would have been a good place for defenders to stand—and it’s on the outside, just like the clue shows.”
“That’s still a pretty long tunnel,” Max said, worried.
“We had to look at every panel on every wall in the library,” Jacob reminded him. “We can look over one musket gallery.”
“Okay. We’ll start the tour with everyone else, and then slip away when they head inside,” Emma said. The group agreed, and Jacob left to pay their bill.
The Citadel was a huge stone fortress built right into the top of the hill. To reach it, they had to walk across a drawbridge over a large dry moat. Modern safety railings kept them from falling ten feet or so into the ditch. In front of them, was a huge double door had a castle gate that stood open. As they walked over, Emma nudged Jacob and pointed to their left. They could see a section of the musket gallery—wooden stairs led up to the tunnel, and rifle holes were cut out all along the wall. That was where they would have to make their way—and without being spotted.
La Citadelle était une immense forteresse de pierre construite en haut d’une colline. Pour y arriver, ils durent traverser un pont-levis au dessus d’une large douve asséchée. Des rampes de protection modernes les empêchaient de tomber de quelques mètres dans le fossé. En face d’eux, il y avait une immense double porte grande ouverte sur le château. Alors qu’ils marchaient, Emma poussa Jacob et lui indiqua leur gauche. Ils pouvaient voir une partie de la galerie des mousquets—des escaliers en bois menaient au tunnel, et des orifices avaient été percés tout le long du mur. C’est là qu’ils devaient aller—et sans être repérés.
At the front gate, they waited with the other tourists who were taking the ghost tour. The tour guide met them not long after, dressed in full historical clothes, including a tiny round red hat. He was a friendly man with a big, dramatic voice that carried well. He started out by giving them a little bit of the history of the Fort as they walked through the causeway into the large open area in its centre. “In the late 1940s,” he said, “a lot of people in the Halifax business community wanted to tear the fort down and turn it into parking for their businesses. Luckily for us, and the history of this place, they failed to do that. In the 1990s, the city restored the fort back to its 1869 appearance.”
“Restored?” Jacob whispered. “Does that mean it’s all new?”
They all stared at the guide, nervous now.
The guide continued. “They broke down the walls, adding wiring and waterproofing, and then put them back together—restoring every single stone to its original location. And they must have restored the ghosts back to their places, too, because we have all kinds of local hauntings!”
Max shivered and looked around. “Ghosts?”
“Don’t worry,” Emma said. “Even if they’re real, they won’t hurt us. We’re not here to ruin their fort. Just take a little something away with us. And if they put all the stones back where they found them…hopefully, Galt’s puzzle is still hiding right where he left it.”
“Ne vous inquiétez pas.” Dit Emma. “Même s’ils sont réels, ils ne nous blesseront pas. Nôtre but n’est pas de détruire leur fort. Juste d’en emporter un petit bout avec nous. Et s’ils ont remis toutes les pierres là où ils les ont trouvées…j’espère que l’énigme de Galt est toujours cachée là où il l’a laissée.”
The guide was still talking. “If you look closely at the walls, you can see coins in the mortar showing the date the wall was rebuilt. Now if you follow me through here, we’re going to start our tour in…the dungeons! Prisoners were kept here, and it’s…”
The tour group followed the guide through the door into the keep: a wide-open parade square. There was a large building right in front of them, and small tunnels called sally ports leading away, back through the main wall toward the musket gallery. As the rest of the group went toward the central building, the trio hung back by the wall. When no one was looking, they slipped through the sally port just to the left of the gate and back to the outside of the wall.
Max was the first one to find the narrow wooden staircase that led up to the musket gallery. They went through a small door and came out in a pitch-black tunnel. After some fumbling, Emma and Jacob both took out their cell phones and turned on their flashlights. In the blinding white light, they could see that the floor was packed dirt. The walls were made of stone, and the little rifle holes didn’t let in much light at all.
Max fut le premier à trouver l'étroit escalier en bois qui menait à la galerie des mousquets. Ils franchirent une petite porte et se retrouvèrent dans un tunnel plongé dans l'obscurité totale. Après avoir tâtonné un moment, Emma et Jacob sortirent leurs téléphones portables et allumèrent leurs lampes torches. Dans la lumière blanche aveuglante, ils purent voir que le sol était recouvert de terre battue. Les murs étaient en pierre et les petites meurtrières ne laissaient pas entrer beaucoup de lumière.
Carefully, the three kids started to look over the walls. “Look for carvings, like last time,” Jacob said.
“Here’s one!” Emma said. Then she shook her head. “It just says Jones 1883.”
“Hundred-year-old graffiti!” Max said. “That’s cool!”
“Cool,” Jacob agreed, “but not what we’re looking for.” He took a step back to get a better look at the wall. “Hang on…is it my imagination, or are there four different coloured stones in the wall?”
Emma and Max both stood up and looked. The wall was made of mortared stone, uneven enough that small differences in the stones weren’t obvious right away. But now that they were looking at it closely, it was clear that a small patch of wall, about ten feet long, had more different kinds of stones than the other sections did.
“I don’t see a pattern,” Max said.
“Is it making an image?” Jacob asked. “Or maybe a map of where the next clue is?”
“Four different kinds…” Quickly, Emma counted the stones. “These three are a bit lighter than normal, these five are darker. These two have sort of white lines in them, and these six have carved marks. Three, five, two, six. Could it be a combination?”
They all looked around, but there was no combination lock or place to put the numbers in.
Ils regardèrent tout autour, mais il n’y avait ni serrure à combinaison, ni endroit pour y rentrer des chiffres.
“Wait!” Jacob said, excited. “Galt wanted to make sure that Lucy worked with him on the clues. He might have made sure this clue needed two people to unlock.
“Attendez!” dit Jacob excité. “Galt voulait être sûr que Lucy travaillerait avec lui sur les indices. Il avait dû s’assurer qu’il faudrait deux personnes pour déverrouiller cet indice.”
Four numbers, four hands! Emma, try gently pushing on the third and fifth stone.” Jacob pointed, and Emma raced over. She had to stretch her arms out, but she could just reach. Jacob went to the other wall and put his hands on the second and sixth stones. As his hand came down on the final stone, a low grinding noise filled the air.
They looked down and saw that one of the stones at the bottom of the wall had sunk a few inches into the wall. It revealed a tiny hole….with a piece of paper inside!
Ils baissèrent les yeux et virent qu’une des pierres à la base du mur s’était enfoncée de quelques centimètres. Y apparaissait un petit orifice…avec un bout de papier dedans!
Jacob grabbed the paper. As he let go of the stones, the opening quickly shut, hiding the now-empty hole.
Jacob attrapa le papier. Alors qu’il relachait les pierres, l’ouverture se referma vite, cachant le trou désormais vide.
“We did it!” Emma said. She and Max high-fived as Jacob opened the paper and read it over.
He handed it to Emma. “What do you think?” he asked.
“I think,” a woman’s voice said, “that you’re going to give that paper to me.”
They all turned around at once. A woman was standing in front of them. She was tall, with messy brown hair and thin eyebrows. She was wearing black pants and a grey sweater…and she was holding a gun, pointed right at Jacob.
“You,” he said. It was definitely the same woman who had followed them from Toronto. She had gotten the clue from the cameras after all. He wonderedwho she was and how she had accessed cameras at the Parliament buildings.
“Me. And that’s my clue.” She pointed the gun at Emma.
Jacob stepped between them, his hands outstretched to show that he wasn’t a threat. “Who are you? Why are you doing this?
The woman’s face twisted into a hard, ugly shape. “This treasure is my birthright. Your dad tried to steal it—to keep it for himself. Now you’re going to hand it over.”
Le visage de la femme se tordit d’une façon dure, et laide. « Ce trésor est mon héritage. Ton père a essayé de le voler—pour le garder. Maintenant tu vas me donner cette note. »
“And then what? You kill us?”Jacob asked.
“I don’t want to fire this gun if I don’t have to,” the woman said. “It’ll bring a lot of attention. Your girlfriend gives me the clue, and I let you all walk away.”
“Je ne veux pas utiliser ce pistolet si j’ai le choix,” dit la femme. “Cela attirerait trop l’attention. Ta petite copine me donne l’indice, et je vous laisse tous partir.”
Jacob clenched his hand into a fist.
Emma put a hand on his arm. She was scared, but she nodded. She trusted him to do whatever he needed to do.
“He wasn’t reasonable,” the woman said. “Are you going to be?”
“Give it to her,” Jacob told Emma.
“What? Are you sure?” Emma asked him quietly.
“It’s just money. It isn’t worth getting shot over,” Jacob said. He squeezed her hand, as if to say… trust me. Emma nodded. Motioning Max to stay behind Jacob, just in case, she edged in front of him and held out the paper, staying as far back from the woman as she could. The woman took it and thumbed it open, looking over it to make sure Emma hadn’t swapped it out. Her smile when she saw the paper was quick and cruel.
“Stay out of my way,” she warned the group. “I see you again…I shoot first and talk never.”
She turned and left, only putting the gun away when she was almost in sight of the building. Jacob sagged against the wall, and Emma hugged Max tight, making sure he was okay.
“That…wasn’t fun,” Max admitted. He sounded shaky, but otherwise okay.
“I can’t believe she got the clue,” Emma said. “Isn’t there anything we can do to stop her? Call the police? Call the guards? We’re in a fort, are there still guards?”
“We don’t have to.” Jacob turned toward his girlfriend, and with surprise she saw that he was smiling.
“What do you mean?” Emma asked.
“I already read the paper,” he reminded her. “I know exactly what we need to find the final clue.”
