Having dug up space around a box buried in the dirt, Archie discovers a piece of paper attached to the back of the box.
The paper says the following:
C - SOFIELD HEADSTONE - CORNER AVE. D & E
They read the note, and gradually come to the same conclusion of what it refers to.
"Yeah, that's what I was thinking too," Hank said.
Of course Hank, Archie's Yes-Man, was thinking the same thing Archie was. We've already established that Billy and Hank are not allowed independent thoughts.
"Yeah, that's right," Billy answered.
"And there's only one cemetery in town, right?" Archie asked.
"Yeah, that would be Riverwood cemetery," Billy answered.
"Then the place must be Riverwood cemetery," Archie reasoned.
Archie's reasoning consists of repeating what Billy said right after he says it. In other words, he just steals Billy's idea as his own. Billy, your job as a Yes-Man is to stand aside and let Archie do all the work; don't you know that? You're not supposed to come up with original thoughts!
"Well, Avenue D and E, those are streets," Archie said. "So they must be streets in the cemetery."
That typo is in the original. And I didn't know graveyards had streets! The graveyards I've been to must be very different from the ones that exist in Riverwood, New Jersey. You know, the fictional Riverwood.
"They must have them," Archie said. "Otherwise, people would get lost in there, wouldn't they? Besides, what else could it mean?"
Because people get lost in cemeteries. And they have streets with names. But since this book doesn't take place in the real world, watch as Archie turns out to be right.
Archie figures out what Sofield must be the name of a dead person in a grave, labeled "Sofield". But Hank wants to know what "C" stands for.
Hey! Billy's not supposed to outshine Archie! I'm realizing that Archie's friends have far more personality than Amanda's two friends, Janet and Cindy, who literally have no lines of dialog whatsoever in the entire book. Although saying that Archie's friends have far more personality isn't saying much, considering the "competition".
Billy thinks that maybe, since the buried box has a combination lock on it, that the "C" stands for "combination", and that the combination for the lock is written on the Sofield headstone, which is located at the corner of Avenue D and E of what must be the largest graveyard in the world.
Hey, Hank being the voice of reason? Since when was there any Sane Man in this story?
Don't worry though; the insane rules of the Archie Reynolds universe will prove Hank wrong and Archie right.
Naturally, because Archie said it, it's true.
But why would whoever buried the box put a combination lock on it in the first place, if it's frigging buried in the dirt in the first place? I'd imagine they assumed no-one would find it if they went to that effort to hide it. Why hide it and then put a combination lock on it? And if you're going to do both of those things to protect the contents of the box, why put a very obvious clue as to where to find the combination on a sheet of paper stuck to the back? That means that whoever finds the box is guaranteed to find the combination and open it. After all, three twelve-year-olds are about to do just that.
Why don't they just memorize the combination, write it down multiple places, etc.? Then they wouldn't need to hide it somewhere and remind themselves where the combination is. Honestly, the box is going to get even stupider later on, believe me. It won't so much open plot holes (if anything, this book does in fact plug up its plot surprisingly tight), as it raises questions about what kind of Idiot Plot we are reading.
And as you'll recall, an Idiot Plot is a plot that can only proceed if everyone in the story - both good and bad - acts like an idiot. And you are going to see, later on, examples of both sides taking turns carrying the Idiot Ball.
I'll give them credit for that at least. They don't want whoever hid the box to discover that they found it, lest those people hide it somewhere else. Wait, that's not their motivation? Instead, they hid the box only so that other people won't find it? What other people? A much smarter reason to hide the box in its original spot is so that its original owner doesn't realize it's been discovered. But that motivation is never given or even hinted at!
Amazing. Even when these kids do something smart, they do it for a dumb reason.
The kids then wander through the tunnel back the way they came, and come across the side entrance for the second tunnel. They walk through that.
It's totally ritualized. They have to do things in that order.
"Well, I guess this is the end of the tunnel," Archie said.
Does that look familiar? It's almost like I'd read that line in the previous chapter.
Hold on. Let me reread the previous chapter and see if I can find - oh, there it is:
"Well, I guess this is the end of the tunnel," Archie said.
Holy shit. No seriously. Holy shit. Almost literally the exact same wording, the exact same thing happens like ten pages apart. It happens on chapter 7, then chapter 8. Seriously, reread both those passages, and look for differences. I've highlighted the similarities. You'll find far more similarities than differences. Lemme count:
- "Proceeding" in chapter 7 is replaced with "advancing" in chapter 8.
- "About thirty feet" in chapter 7 becomes "some twenty yards" in chapter 8.
- "Something large directly in front of them" which turns out to be a "red brick wall" in chapter 7 is replaced with "a large dirt wall directly in front of them" in chapter 8.
- Instead of "encompassing" the entire height and width of the tunnel, like in chapter 7, the wall "covered" it in chapter 8.
- Ooh! Ooh! Here's a big one! In chapter 7, they reach the wall after "where they had last stopped." In chapter 8, they reach the wall after "where they had started"!
I think I counted all the major differences. It's otherwise the same frigging passage of writing used in two chapters in a row! When I first read this, I thought it was a misprint! But now, it's actually the author repeating himself almost verbatim. Mind. Blown.
Then they shine their flashlights around and discover a ladder.
"I don't get it," Hank said. "What's a ladder doing here?"
I have no idea. You think it might be used for climbing up and down? After discovering an opening in the ceiling,
Genius minds. The future leaders of America.
Archie climbs up the ladder, sees that it leads to a trapdoor, and finds out that the trapdoor is locked.
Three guesses what happens next.
Of course Billy and Hank take turns climbing up to the trapdoor and failing to open it.
"Yeah, I know what you mean," Archie said. "These tunnels are kind of like the fun house at the amusement park. You don't know what you're going to find next."
That's a rather strange analogy.
Once they get back out of the tunnel, the kids talk about the tunnel, where it might lead, and who might have built it.
Okay, this is really stupid for one major reason: when walking through the tunnels, Archie and the other two kept remarking on how recently built the tunnels had clearly been, commenting on the wooden beams being fresh, and there being no dirt falling from the ceiling. They clearly knew the tunnels were recent. Therefore, someone built them, and obviously used the ladders, and had buried the box, probably recently. They'd have to be idiots not to pick up on that considering that they obviously remarked only one chapter ago that the tunnels were clearly new. Wait. They are idiots, obviously. It's the only way to advance the plot.
And the chapter ends.
Billyhank hive mind dialog count: 7
Crushing something on someone's head count: 4½
Total victory celebration length: 30 minutes
Comments
- Burglars rob house, find safe and clue.
- Burglars tape clue to safe.
- Burglars hide stolen safe in their hideout, and go hunt for a street corner (or simply more houses for now).
