The Missing Treasure

My best friend Dan and I were always up for adventures. We had known each other since we were 10 when we lived next door to each other on Fourth Street. Now that we were both in eleventh grade, we did everything together. Dan was the funny one and I was the smart one, and we made a really good team.

One day Dan came up to me and asked, “Do you want to go on an adventure?”

I asked him, “What is the adventure?”

He told me that it was about a missing treasure and he told me this story, “One night at a museum, a golden eagle sculpture went missing. Everybody wanted to find it for the reward.” Dan said to me, “Do you really think that is true?”

“When did it say that happened, Dan?”

“Umm, 1990,” he answered.

I said, “You know what? If you can find more stuff about it, I will think about helping because I have a job, and I’m usually tired after work. So we will see.”

“That’s what you think? I’m going to find it!” Dan replied.

“Well, come and get me when, or if, you even find a clue.”

The next day, I asked my friend, “Dan, have you found anything out about it?”

“Yeah, actually, I did. It said that whoever took it left five clues in artworks that, if you put them together, will make a map, and there have been two parts that have been found and are owned by a man in the next town.”

Now I was interested. “Well, let’s start this treasure hunt by trying to get a hold of that man. Do you have his phone number?”

Dan answered, “Yes, I’ll call him.” And he did. “Ok. I got a hold of that man, and he said he would give us his piece for fifty dollars, but he gave the other piece he had to his friend, Bill.”

“Ok, let’s split the price,” I agreed.

“Wow, he was really nice about it,” Dan said.

“Yeah, he was. Well, we better get a hold of the other person.” Dan and I found the phone number of his friend who had the next clue. I made the phone call and let Dan know. “Ok, I got a hold of him, and he is not planning on selling it or anything, so we will have to try to get it somehow.”

Dan said, “Yeah, we will see if we can. It would suck if we can’t.”

I agreed, “Yeah, it would.”

“Ready to look for the other pieces?” Dan asked me.

Before I was done talking with Dan, my cell phone rang. I answered it because it was Bill. He reconsidered and decided to give us a challenge. I told Dan all about it.

“Yeah, about that… Bill told me he would make a deal. Whoever could find the most pieces would get all of them, and I accepted the challenge.” I was thinking this would be even more of an adventure.

“Oh really?” Dan asked.

“Yeah. So we better get looking for them.”

Dan answered, “Ok, let’s go and start looking. Where should we start?”

I suggested that we split up and start looking for the other three pieces on our own. We could cover more ground that way.

“Ok. I will go to the museum,” Dan said.

“Yeah. That sounds like a good idea. I’ll check online to see if any are for sale,” I told him. After searching on our own for four hours, I called Dan and asked, “Have you had any luck?”

“Yeah, I found a piece at the museum. I talked to them about it, and they said we could bring any other pieces of the map that we had and put them together here at the museum.”

This was great news. I was excited to tell him that I had found the other two pieces! I had found that this dude tried to collect all of the pieces and had no luck. So he said he would sell the two he had to me for two hundred dollars, and I bought it. I thought I should get them as soon as possible, so I paid for them and put the two map pieces in my car. I figured Dan could pay me half later.

I picked up Dan from the museum and we put all three pieces in a box. “Ok. Let’s go to Bill’s house and break the news to him that we won the challenge!”

“Yeah, let’s go!” I said excitedly.

We jumped in my car and I drove to the next town where Bill lived. When we got to the door and knocked, Bill answered.

Dan said, “Hey, we have four of the five pieces! We won the challenge we agreed on.”

Bill was so surprised. “How did you get them so fast? I have been trying to get all of them for twenty years. Where did you look?”

Dan shared, “We looked online and found two pieces, and there was also one piece at the museum.”

“Oh, that makes sense. Here, my piece of the map is yours,” Bill said.

“Thank you,” we both answered at the same time.

“Let’s go to the museum and put this all together,” said Dan.

Back at the museum, we laid our four pieces on a table. The guy from the museum handed me the final piece that had always been there, and we started connecting the artwork map pieces together. We weren’t sure how to get started.

Dan said, “Now, how should we do this?”

“I think it’s supposed to go like this,” I replied.

The map pieces looked ancient, yellow with old black ink. The corners were dull. Dan and I easily found the edges and then the rest fell into place. The big picture was an art piece with a hidden map inside.

“Yeah, there we go. Now that we got it put together, let’s go find the missing golden eagle.”

I said, “Ok, the map shows the eagle should be buried in the park at the edge of town.” A five minute drive got us to the park. I got the shovels from the trunk of my car.

“Well, let’s start digging,” Dan said.

“I don’t see it anywhere.”

“Just keep digging,” he replied.

“There’s a cop!” I shouted.

The cop approached us. “Hey boys, what are you doing?”

“We’re digging for the missing golden eagle,” Dan said.

“Well, stop! Fill those holes back in and go home. You’re lucky I don’t bring you to the station.”

“Ok, we will,” I said. I turned to Dan and whispered, “I can’t believe there was a cop that caught us.”

“Let’s just stop trying,” Dan said.

“You know what? Let’s just try later tonight.”

Dan answered, “Yeah, that sounds like it will work. Let’s go to your house for a couple of hours.”

After four hours, we went back to the park. This time, we had dressed in black clothes. “Ok, it’s 11 pm. Are you ready to start digging again?” Dan asked.

“Yeah, let’s start.”

After one hour, we hit a little chest in the ground. I reached down and grabbed it. I found a wooden chest with rusty bars around it. The bars around the wood were holding it together, but there was no lock on it. It looked like it was 70 years old. We were feeling so excited that we found it!

Dan and I hit the chest with our shovels and busted it open. Inside was the golden eagle statue in perfect condition. We put it in a different box and took it to the museum. Once we got there, we brought it in and got the reward. It was a once-in-a-lifetime art adventure!