Eddie started to turn back to rowing, when the flash of sun on metal caught his eye. He knew at once that one of the men was carrying that metal cylinder which he had seen yesterday evening in the shack, and which he had puzzled over so long. He would like to have stayed and gotten another look at it; that is, if the two men were coming out to fish over the sand bar again. Yet Teena’s warning about getting away seemed the wiser move. Eddie bent to the oars.
Less than an hour later he guided the boat onto the narrow beach at Cedar Point.
“Phew!” he said, mopping the sweat from his forehead. “That’s a lot of rowing.”
“It was a swell ride, Eddie,” Teena said. “I’ll row back if you want.”
“You’re a girl,” Eddie said importantly, which seemed to close the subject about Teena doing the rowing. But Teena did help him drag the boat up onto the beach beyond the high-water mark.
“Now to find some uranium,” Eddie said, picking up the Geiger counter. Before starting inland to explore the point, however, he shaded his eyes and looked back across the bay. In the far distance he could barely make out Anderson’s Landing. Quite a few boats dotted the bay in between. Directly in line between Cedar Point and Anderson’s Landing was the light strip of water marking the submerged sand bar. There was only one boat over the sand bar.
“Those two fellows are fishing in that same place again today,” Eddie said. “They don’t seem to learn, do they?”
“Let’s not worry about them,” Teena said. “Let’s start prospecting. We promised to be home by four. It’s a long trip back.”
The wind-swept point offered difficult hiking. Fallen trees and tangles of underbrush slowed their progress. They had to keep on the lookout for poison ivy.
“If leaves there are three, leave it be,” Eddie said, remembering the familiar warning. They gave wide berth to the irritating vine whenever they saw it.