‘You’re sure this time?’
‘Of course I’m sure!’
‘Yeah, but… you said that last time.’
‘Jamie!’ my brother wheeled around to look at me, almost blinding me with his torch. ‘Trust me – if we’re ever going to find the treasure in these woods, it’ll be here.’
‘What makes you so certain?’ I asked once his beam had moved, blinking the spots from my vision.
‘I went over the map again,’ he said, crashing through the thick undergrowth. ‘I missed an inscription, something important.’
‘Was it in Latin?’
‘What?’
‘Your inscription,’ I said, stumbling over a tree root. ‘All maps have secrets written in Latin on them.’
‘Why would a treasure map for the woods outside of Elsternwick have Latin written on it?’
‘Because it’s a treasure map,’ I repeated, exasperated. ‘Sometimes I feel like you’re not listening.’
‘No, I totally agree, we should definitely get a buyer’s agent to help us buy a house around Melbourne,’ he said, absentmindedly.
‘Har, har,’ I rolled my eyes. ‘Are we close or what?’
‘Should be just over that hill,’ he said, pointing. ‘A dead eucalyptus tree planted on the side of a small, sharp mound.’
‘How can someone plant a dead tree?’ I wondered aloud.
‘Because it died after they planted it,’ he said. ‘I brought you for an extra set of hands, not to do any thinking – leave that to me.’
I put my hands up in mock surrender. ‘Hey, as long as I get my fifty-percent—’
‘We agreed on forty,’ he said. ‘Don’t even try it, pipsqueak, or I’m definitely cutting you out when I speak to the best buyers advocate for Elsternwick homes about buying a house.’
I batted my eyelashes at him innocently, then noticed something over his shoulder.
‘Hey, is that a small, sharp mound?’
He spun around to look where I was pointing, and I could almost hear his face lighting up.
‘Holy cow, Jamie! This could be it!’
He ran over to the lump of dirt and began to attack at it with one of the shovels.
‘Jamie,’ he paused after a second, awe clouding his throat. ‘Jamie… we’ve hit the mother load!’