The Mystery at Rustlers Fort

    Cousins Phil McKenny and Buzz Fletcher are spending the summer camping at the grand canyon with the Fletcher family. Mr. Fletcher, or Chief as everyone calls him, is a college professor who spends every summer out in the wilderness doing field research on a selected animal. This year he is researching mountain lions.

    They will be staying at an isolated new deluxe campsite which has a fancy outdoor oven and running water on site. It's important that Chief camps here because after it's been used consistently by tourist the mountain lions will stop frequenting the area.

    The site is already being occupied by Mr. and Mrs. Post but the park ranger informs Chief that he has a letter for them which is calling them back home. Chief is suppose to deliver the letter which will free up the campsite for him and his family.

    Upon receiving the letter Mr. Post becomes angry. Although he admits the letter requires him to leave he still refuses to give up the campsite. He attempts to have his wife remain there while he is gone but she refuses to remain in the wilderness alone.

    After they leave the family sets up camp over the next few days including making a temporary shower behind the trees and bushes of the campsite. 

    Mr. Post later shows back up. He's in a better mood now and says he had to leave because his jewelry store was robbed. He's back for a short fishing trip and has come to the campsite to get his tackle box which he claims to have left behind however the box has not been seen and can not be found.

    Mr. Post tells the children about an old fort near camp which had been used by horse rustlers 50 years ago. The kids later venture over to it and see the back of a mysterious man in a suit as he's sneaking off through the tress. Phil notices that the location of the fort overlooks their camp and wonders if the man could have been spying on the family. 

    Once the three arrive back at the camp they see the same man in a suit talking to Chief. Phil and Buzz remark the man looks like a dinosaur and that becomes their name for him. Chief explains the man said he came just to look at the new campsite. Once the kids tell him about the man possibly spying on their camp Chief decides to tell the park ranger about him and ask to have a Private Road sign placed so no one else comes along and disturbed them.

    But he forgets when the ranger comes by that evening with a baby mountain lion for Buzz's little sister, Kitsy. The lion is an orphan and the ranger needs someone to bottle feed it every few hours. But Kitsy will have to return the lion at the end of the summer so it can eventually be released back into the park. Kitsy is excited and takes to her role as mother immediately and names the lion Oliver.

    Later that evening a group of teenagers show up asking for help getting their car out of a rut down the road. The whole family goes except for Kitsy who has to stay with the lion. When the family returns they find the little girl hiding under the picnic table with Oliver. She says that she was in the tent getting ready for bed when a man appeared behind the tent looking around by the shower. Kitsy turned on the water faucet, which is located in the middle of camp, to scare the man off then hid. Chief is eager to suggest what Kitsy really saw was a deer but she insists it was man.

    Buzz and Phil are directed to go fill up the deep ruts in the road the next day so no one else gets stuck and Buzz notices the piles of dirt on the side of the road indicating someone purposely dug the holes. Chief talks to the ranger about the goings-on at the camp but the ranger insists they're over reacting. He does however give them a Private sign to put on the road.

    One day the boys head with Chief into the woods where they help him rig up a camera trap to take a picture of an notorious mountain lion named Three Toes. While out there they find the body of a missing dog and Chief says something looks suspicious about it. 

    That evening everyone, including Oliver, drive out to an observation point of the grand canyon. When they pull back into their campsite it's dark but they can see a shadowy figure moving away. They assume its Lulubelle, a curious deer that keeps wondering into their camp. They soon notice that Chief's watch is missing from the table where he placed it which gets Phil wondering if it really was Lulubelle they saw fleeing.

    The next morning the boys and Chief go check the camera trap and see it's gone off. They then continue through the wilderness and observe some squirrels before going behind their camp to look for a pack rats nest which is where Chief thinks his watch has gone. He is right and the watch is found. 

    

    When they come back into camp Mrs. Fletcher is worried and says she and Kitsy had returned to camp earlier to find an intruder trashing Buzz and Phil's tent. Two men's boot prints are in the ground under where the tent had been secured. Chief insists it was just Lulubelle and Amy quickly goes along with this even though she clearly doesn't believe it. Kitsy insists several times it was a man and not a deer but Chief gaslights her.

    The whole family is going into town the next day so the boys decide to set up a camera trap to catch any prowlers. In town the boys secretly purchase a Geiger counter before the family goes and visits Mr. Post at his jewelry store. When leaving Buzz and Phil see the dinosaur staring at them from the window of the restaurant across the street. They tell Chief but he doesn't believe them. 

    Back at camp they find their camera trap has gone off. Chief is annoyed with them but the three go to the Park Rangers house to develop the film and find it was the Ranger himself who had stopped at the camp for a drink of water. That night Kitsy pulls them aside to tell them she still is firm in her conviction that a man had been prowling around their camp the other day and not a deer.

    The next day the boys go with Chief to study some bats and when they return to camp Mrs. Fletcher says they have had two visitors. First Mrs. Post came to bring them groceries but her car stalled down the road so Amy and Kitsy walked to pick them up. When they returned they found the dinosaur lurking about. He talks to them and says he's planning on building a motel in town and uses this excuse to pump Amy for information about what they're doing there.

    The next day the garbage man shows up baring a note for Chief from the park ranger. It's asking for him to come see him that afternoon. Chief is annoyed because this means he will miss a whole day of field work. However the ranger shows up soon and claims he never sent a note. The two men decide to go to the ranger station and ask the garbage man where the note had come from. 

    While they're gone Buzz and Phil discover foot tracks in the woods just outside their camp, both coming and going. They follow them all around the outside of their camp and it's clear someone had been there spying on them. They decide to walk up the road and meet Chief on his way back and tell him about their discovery. 

    After they do Chief explains that the garbage man claims the note had been left in his truck and he didn't know who it came from. Him and the rangers now believe something strange is going on so they've decided to have a man keep an eye on the campground. Chief also decides to postpone his field work until the situation clears up so that he can be around to protect his wife and daughter is something else happens. 

    Since he won't need the boys help he arranges for them to take a two day trip at Phantom Ranch; a resort ranch located in the Grand Canyon. Although they want to stick around camp and help with detective work they know this trip will be a good chance to use their Geiger counter.

    Not long into their hike the next day the Geiger counter goes off indicating they've found ore. They debate on going back to camp to tell Chief but decide he'd be mad at them, both for purchasing the Geiger counter and for the wasted money on ranch reservations. They decide to continue with their trip. They stop at a river to eat their lunch when a man approaches them. He's noticed their Geiger counter and informs them prospecting is not allowed in the park and they could get in trouble if a ranger sees it. He also informs them you have to be 21 to register a mine claim. The boys are quite disappointed both over losing their just discovered claim and having spent the money on a Geiger counter they can't use. They're moody for the rest of the hike. 

    When they get to the ranch they go for a swim in the pool and end up spotting the dinosaur which worries them. After dinner they encounter him on a bridge where he asks if the family is still at the camp grounds. They say yes and quickly flee back to their cabin. The next morning when they're returning from breakfast they spy the dinosaur in their cabin going through their backpacks. Once he's left they grab their things and flee back to camp as fast as possible.

    After spending a whole day resting back at camp Chief, Buzz, Phil, and Kitsy all go to bat cave 20 miles away. There they will catch and tag bats, then the park ranger will take them in cages to Amy back at camp who will release them. Chief and the kids will be spending the night in the cave and check the bats in the morning to see if the tagged ones have found their way home, this testing their homing ability. 

    Once there Buzz realizes he forgot to pack their food supply so Chief sends Phil and Kitsy back to camp for the night with the park ranger. They have him drop them and the bats off by the shortcut that leads past rustlers fort to their camp. The cousins stop at the fort and get a drink of water from the spring inside the building when someone closes the door and piles rocks up against it locking them in.

    Phil and Kitsy write help notes on postal stamps Phil has in his wallet then stick them to the bats and release them hoping they will find their way back to the cave and Chief will see. There plan works and Chief and Buzz show up the next morning before they all rush to camp to check on Mrs. Fletcher. She says camp was unbothered during the night, most likely due to her falling asleep with the lantern on.

    Chief is furious about what was done to the kids and wants to go immediately to the ranger station and have the police alerted but Amy suggest he wait and the two sit down to talk about moving camps first. While they are doing this Phil and Buzz go lay down in the tent and Buzz absentmindedly plays with the Geiger counter and is surprised to get a positive reading from below the middle of their tent.

    Just then the park ranger shows up saying he's had news that the lost dog Chief found in the woods had rabies (which explains what Chief said was suspicious). This means Three Toes also has rabies and it is no longer safe for the family to stay in the area. They immediately start packing up and the boys subtly dig up the ground after disassembling their tent. Buried in the ground they find Mr. Posts missing tackle box and inside is an array of jewelry, including watches with radium dials which is what triggered the Geiger counter.

    Once everything is packed up the ranger asks Chief to go out in the woods with him to try and find Three Toes but Chief insists he's not skilled with a gun and Phil goes instead since he's on his schools rifle team. Kitsy, who has been sitting playing with her mothers binoculars, announces that she's just seen Mr. Post in the woods. The ranger and Phil then dash over to warn him about the lion but he flees from them. Suddenly Phil realizes that it was Post who had robbed his own store and hid the jewelry in camp. This explains why he was so angry about leaving it and why someone was always sneaking around; he was trying to recover the valuables. 

    While fleeing Mr. Post comes upon the lion who Phil and the ranger shoot just as it's leaping upon the criminal. The two then start to bring the man back to the rangers truck at gunpoint when Buzz comes running saying they've captured the dinosaur. When driving out of camp Buzz spotted the man up by the fort so Chief and Buzz snuck up on him by the shortcut and trapped him in the fort while Amy and Kitsy drive into town for a policeman. 

    Once they get to the fort everyone begins to talk and it comes out that the dinosaur is a detective for Mr. Post's insurance company. Knowing that the robbery was an inside job he's been trailing Post to the camping spot for weeks. Seeing him be friendly with the family caused suspicion that they were in on it and that's why he followed the boys down the canyon. Post confesses to his crime and the book ends.

- Phil wants to buy a Geiger counter with the allowance his parents give him but Chief not only tells him he's not allowed to but he forbids him from even talking about it.

- Phil remarks that he likes that they all sleep in the clothes they wore for that day. I assume they're wearing jeans and sleeping in jeans is very uncomfortable. Why not just toss on a pair of sweats for the night.

- The trip to Phantom Ranch is fourteen miles each way. They're walking it two days in a row, how exhausting!

- Phantom Ranch is real and still exists. I'm unsure if the pool is still around though as I could find no modern photos of it and no mention. From what I read they didn't start requiring reservations until 1961 but Chief says the boys have to have reservations and this was published in 1957. Also you now have to make reservations 15 months in advance and you only can do that if you win the reservation lottery.

- When the boys reach Phantom Ranch a man working there asked if they're the two boys that have reservations there for the night and Phil gets suspicious, wondering how does this man know so much about them. Phil's not the brightest.

- I'm not sure why Post was so eager to reclaim the tackle box with the stolen jewelry. Surely it would be safer hidden than it would be in his possession. And he wouldn't be able to sell it while the robbery is still being investigated.

    Overall this book is good. It's a fun setting, eventful enough to keep the reader interested, and the details of the grand canyon are extremely accurate which is great. It was more fun to read the first time when I didn't know the ending. I only remembered half of it this time so it was still fun but I'm not sure how it would be on a third reading when I remember it all.