Page 17 of The Catcher (High Peaks Murder, Mystery and Crime Thrillers #5)

A s Noah slowly regained consciousness on Saturday morning, the soft rays of the morning sun filtered through the curtains, casting a relaxing glow in his bedroom. The gentle light illuminated the room with a golden hue, highlighting the cabin’s rustic charm.

“Mia, Ethan, get that!” he mumbled to a phone ringing.

He couldn’t tell at that moment that it was beside him.

Through slitted eyes, his bedroom came into focus.

Adorned in shades of earthy greens and warm browns, it exuded a sense of tranquility that belied the chaos of his current state.

With its plush comforter and assortment of throw pillows, the king-sized bed beckoned him back to sleep, offering a brief respite from the throbbing ache in his head.

Through half-closed eyelids, Noah caught glimpses of the early morning light dancing on the surface of High Peaks Lake just beyond his window. The tranquil waters shimmered in the sunlight, mirroring the serene blue sky above.

It was supposed to be his day off.

Despite the peaceful surroundings, Noah couldn’t shake the pounding headache that plagued him. He groaned, reaching out blindly for his phone as it rang incessantly on the bedside table. In his half-asleep stupor, he fumbled, knocking it to the floor with a loud clatter.

Cursing under his breath, Noah rolled out of bed, his movements sluggish and uncoordinated. He stumbled across the room, the hardwood floor cool beneath his bare feet, and retrieved his phone before answering it with a groggy, “Ugh, yeah?”

“It’s Declan. We hit gold,” came the excited voice on the other end of the line.

Noah blinked, trying to clear the fog from his mind. “Come again?” he asked, struggling to focus.

“The geocache that was thrown out. They found it early this morning. I’m down at the landfill,” Porter explained eagerly. Noah’s mind slowly began to clear, the urgency of the situation cutting through the fog of his hangover.

“All right. Um. I’ll be there in twenty,” Noah replied before hanging up. He stumbled out of his bedroom, wishing the world would swallow him whole to end his misery.

“You know your phone was ringing multiple times,” Ethan remarked as Noah passed him on the way to the bathroom .

“I’m well aware, son,” Noah grumbled, too focused on his pounding headache to muster any patience.

After relieving himself and showering, Noah slipped into some fresh clothes and headed downstairs to the kitchen, where Ethan was waiting.

“How did it go last night? No parties, I hope, or are you just good at cleaning up?” Noah asked, trying to sound casual despite the pain pulsing through his head. He got a bottle of water from the fridge to take with him. He unscrewed the top and tossed back two Tylenol to ease the pain.

“It was quiet. Hey, Dad, I’ve been thinking that maybe I could visit grandfather next weekend,” Ethan said tentatively.

“We talked about that,” Noah reminded him, his mind preoccupied with the search for his keys.

“I know. But it’s been several months. I want to see him,” Ethan insisted.

“And you will, once he’s honest about his dealings with the Ashfords,” Noah replied, frustration creeping into his voice as he continued to search for his keys. “Where the hell did I put my keys?” he muttered, increasingly agitated by his inability to find them.

“So he’s being punished for his relationship with them, but you get to spend the evening with one?”

“What?” Noah asked.

“I saw her last night. Natalie Ashford. She dropped you off here.”

“That’s not the same.”

“No? Is she going to move in? ”

“No, son. Look,” he said, holding one eye tight from the pain, “can we talk about this later? I have to get going. Do you know where my keys are?”

“Probably with your vehicle. She dropped you off, right?”

A faint memory returned to him from the night before: a conversation with her, being driven home by one of her drivers. “Oh, man.”

“She said you could collect it in the morning.”

“I need it now.”

Noah hurried outside and made his way over to Ed’s place. “Ed, Hey! Wake up. Are you there?” he asked, drumming on the door. The door flew open to reveal the old timer standing in nothing more than a pair of off-colored Y-fronts.

Noah lifted his forearm to block the view. “Oh, Ed. How about you throw something on?”

“How about you stop telling me what to do in my house? Now, what do you want? Fishing doesn’t start for another hour. You are still coming, right?”

Noah squeezed the bridge of his nose. “Oh. That. No. I can’t. I have to go to work.”

“Geesh. You’re just like your brother. So you woke me up and screwed up my Saturday too?”

“No. I need to use your truck.”

“Where’s yours?”

“At someone’s house. Look, I don’t have time to explain. Can I get your keys?”

Ed grumbled and went back inside, returning with the keys. “You are a pushy little bastard. You get one scratch on that, and I’m charging you.”

“Yeah, because it’s real new,” he said, turning toward a 1979 Chevy truck that looked like it had been through a meat grinder.

How it even ran was a mystery in and of itself.

Noah had told Ed he should get a new one, but he said he was thinking about driving it until the wheels fell off.

The trouble was that the wheels had already fallen off multiple times.

He just kept replacing them and kept forgetting he’d done so.

As Noah approached the North Elba Sanitary Landfill, the sight that greeted him was far from pleasant.

The landfill, situated just off Dump Lane, was a sprawling expanse of trucks moving back and forth, hauling loads of garbage.

Piles of refuse dotted the landscape, towering over the surrounding area like mountains of waste.

Several outbuildings stood at the landfill’s perimeter, their weather-beaten exteriors blending into the industrial landscape. Industrial dumpers rumbled nearby, their mechanical arms lifting and dumping loads of trash with mechanical precision.

However, the most noteworthy aspect of the landfill was the smell. A noxious odor hung heavy in the air, assaulting Noah’s senses. It was a combination of rotting food, decaying matter, and chemicals, creating an overpowering stench that made his stomach churn.

If it weren’t for the fact that he was already battling a hangover, Noah might have cared about the curious looks he received from the other officers when he pulled up in Ed’s truck. But at that moment, all he could focus on was the task.

As he exited the vehicle, the door groaned in protest from its prolonged rest. McKenzie, one of the officers on the scene, greeted him with a smirk.

“Killing two birds with one stone, Sutherland?” McKenzie teased, elbowing one of his colleagues who joined in on the joke.

Noah arched an eyebrow in confusion. “What?”

McKenzie nodded towards Ed’s truck. “That shit heap. You’re leaving it here, right?”

A small chuckle escaped Noah’s lips. “Very funny. Where’s Porter?” he inquired, eager to get to the heart of the matter.

“Oh, you know him,” McKenzie replied with a grin. “Salivating over the find. He’s like a kid on Christmas. I had to practically pry that damn thing out of his hands. He was planning on opening it if you didn’t arrive soon.”

“Who found it?”

“Myself and one of the volunteers,” a trooper said, motioning toward a group of more than fifty people, many of whom were from Adirondack Mountain Rescue and others from the community wishing to help.

They walked the short distance to where Porter was conferring with DEC plain-clothes officers, some Adirondack sheriff’s deputies, and High Peaks local cops.

“Well done. You should probably head home. Take a shower. ”

“Planning on it, sir. But first, I want to see what all the fuss is about.”

“You and I both.”

They were gathered outside a small shed used by landfill staff. “Here he is,” Porter said, turning toward him. “Thought you would never get here.”

“Truck had a little trouble,” he said. He wasn’t lying. He had only gotten a few miles down the road when it started having a coughing fit. Fortunately, he was able to glide into a gas station and fill up. Ed had left the tank on almost empty.

Porter gestured to the large imitation rock that had been used up on Whiteface Mountain. Below it was a cover and a numbered padlock.

“The code was a simple math-based puzzle based on the date when the summit was dedicated by Franklin Roosevelt in 1929 and opened by him in 1935.”

“All right, let’s do this.”

Porter opened the bottom of the fake rock. Inside was a shard of a blue and white porcelain tile, a baseball mitt keyring, a quarter, and a log book. His brow furrowed. “That’s it?”

Noah slapped on a pair of blue latex gloves and picked out each item, taking a closer look at them.

“In the last geocache, there was a faucet, a lock of hair, and a key. The key opened the gadget we found nearby but didn’t indicate what it was for.

In both instances, our perp hijacked someone else’s geocache, turning a traditional into a multi.

He can’t control the geocache page information as it belongs to someone else, but he expects us to figure it out. ”

“Well, then, what’s all this supposed to mean?”

Noah held the items in his hands. “We know this geocache is a traditional. That’s what the original owner set it up as.

That’s why the logbook is there. There isn’t meant to be another waypoint.

” Noah took out the logbook from a small plastic bag and thumbed through it.

As expected, there were dates and signatures except for the last entry, which gave a recent date, two days ago, and said: “I enjoyed the view.”

“I enjoyed the view,” Noah muttered repeatedly as he looked at the items. “We need to go. Now.”

“Where?”

“Back to the summit.”

“Why?”

“That’s where this geocache was. What else is on the summit?”

“Nothing.”

“Wrong. The old coin-operated binoculars.” He held up the 25-cent coin. “I enjoyed the view. That’s what it said. He wants us to look through one to find the coordinates to the third stage.”

Out of breath and with his adrenaline pumping, Noah and the team of law enforcement officers rushed to the summit of Whiteface Mountain, their vehicles skidding to a halt as they reached their destination.

The brisk mountain air whipped around them, invigorating as they embarked on their urgent mission .

As they reached the summit, Noah approached the row of silver coin-operated binoculars permanently mounted on sturdy stalks.

His eyes darted from one to the next, searching for any sign of the elusive clue they sought.

Each pair of binoculars stood sentinel-like against the backdrop of the sprawling landscape, its lenses gleaming in the sunlight.

“Which one?” Porter asked.

“I assume the closest to where the geocache was, but it could be any of them,” Noah replied, his mind racing as he approached the nearest pair of binoculars and inserted the coin.

With a quick twist of the handle, the viewfinder sprang to life, revealing the breathtaking panorama of High Peaks Lake and the surrounding islands. Noah’s heart raced as he scanned the landscape, searching for any hint or clue that might lead them closer to their goal.

“Anything?” Porter inquired, his eyes scanning the horizon alongside Noah’s.

Noah shrugged, his frustration mounting as he continued to swivel the viewer. “What do you want us to see?” he muttered quietly, his brow furrowed in concentration.

Turning to face the other officers, Noah noticed Porter fishing into his pocket, retrieving a handful of coins.

With a quick nod, he distributed the coins among the group, each officer taking their place at a different pair of binoculars.

With a collective sense of determination, they peered through the lenses, their eyes scanning the vast expanse of the Adirondacks for any clue .

Suddenly, one of the officers called out to Noah. “Sutherland! Over here.”

Noah hurried over to the viewer, his curiosity piqued. Although it had been marked OUT OF ORDER, the officer gestured for him to take a look regardless.

“But it’s supposed to be out of order,” Noah protested.

He peered through the viewer anyway and saw something that appeared blurry at first — a scrap of paper attached to the other side. It was small, almost invisible, and its text was difficult to decipher.

“What is it?” Porter asked, peering over Noah’s shoulder. “What do you see?”

“I don’t know. One second.”

Noah pulled away from the viewer and adjusted the dial labeled TURN TO CLEAR VISION. As soon as he did, the text became focused, revealing a cryptic riddle.

“What does it say?” Porter pressed, his curiosity mounting.

“It’s a riddle,” Noah replied, his brow furrowed in concentration.

In a realm of knowledge and learning’s creed, where young minds flourish and dreams take seed. Seek the right path with precise coordinates, and look through my windows to see futures and fate. What am I?

“Windows and fate?” Porter echoed, perplexed.

Noah reread the riddle, his mind racing as he tried to understand it.

“Fate?” He stepped back and looked at the viewer and the message: OUT OF ORDER.

He tried to shift the viewer, but it was locked in place.

He ran his hand around it and felt something blunt.

He took a closer look and noted that someone had jammed in a piece of metal to prevent the viewer from swiveling.

“He wanted to make sure no one touched this.”

Suddenly, a realization dawned on him, and he stepped back from the viewer, his eyes widening in understanding as he rotated the dial to push out the focus from a scrap of paper. That’s when he saw the building. That’s when it all made sense.

“Sonofabitch! It’s the high school,” he exclaimed.