On August 12, 1996, the Sunday edition of the Chesapeake Herald ran this quarter page, advertisement in the Community Events section:

Attention Berlin residents! I buried a case containing two million dollars somewhere in town. If you can find the money, you can keep it. Here is your clue:

Come hear the last echo of the Panther roar and he will tell you help you find the door.

Berlin, Maryland was much more interesting that day.

Parker

“You wanna make out?”

Kissing Danny was a better lesson in tradeoffs than anything in an Econ textbook. Everything he gained with solid tongue technique, he lost with his rancid halitosis. Parker had a hard time saying no because one day she’d have to explain to Danny that she only started hooking up with him to make Aaron Reed jealous. If that conversation happened, she’d also have to explain to herself why she’d continued to stick around so long after accomplishing her goal. Danny blinked owlishly behind his almost-hip, thick framed specs.

“Did you hear about the treasure?” she asked, leaning away to grab the paper from the floor of his room. His room. Jesus, they were alone in his room on a Sunday! Relationship stuff.

“What treasure?” She handed Danny the advertisement and chewed a strand of her turquoise locks. Green last year had been a failure; it looked like her hair had boogers.

“Some rich guy buried a bunch of money for anyone to find,” she said. “Let’s go look!”

“Sounds like bullshit,” replied Danny, as expected. He believed that the government put microphones in cereal boxes prizes. He believed that his mom listened to their conversations with a glass against the door (she did). He believed that Santa was a hoax before he knew how to read. His David Bowie poster smirked at Parker and told her, “Give up and pucker up.”

“WXMS thinks it’s real. They talked about it on air all this morning,” she added, hoping that mentioning his favorite alt. rock station would buy her more credibility. Danny shrugged.

Anything to get out of his room. “If it doesn’t pan out we can make out all night.”

Danny laced up his Vans. Parker checked that she had her precautionary mint gum.

They went to go find two million dollars.

Otto

“Watch your head, Otto,” blue shirt Billy was saying as he pushed Otto into the backseat of the police cruiser. Why was Otto here? Public urination or intoxication? Otto has trouble remembering. Hard to remember about things you don’t care about. Last time he wasn’t actually drunk, but they didn’t have a name for what he was, so the police chose ‘intoxication.’ Social Services made him go to alcoholics’ therapy where he met guys with swollen, wet noses and bloodshot eyes. Alcohol was turning them into dogs! Otto giggled and tried to ignore the humid stink of sweat/puke/piss/himself boiling in the backseat.

“I’m sorry if that dark leather is hot, bud. Try sitting on the newspaper, I guess.”

Otto liked blue shirt Billy so he smiled at him, but didn’t move. The heat on the back of his thighs was quite nice. He did however take great pride in turning to look at the newspaper. They called Otto ‘simple’ and ‘slow’ but he liked to read. That’s why they had arrested him! He’d wanted to read all the cute signatures on a little girl’s cast. Her mom hadn’t.

He scanned the Community events page (comm-une-it-tee he read) and immediately saw the treasure posting. Two million dollars! Jiminy-Crickets! Think of all the books he could buy with two million. No one arrested millionaires for reading.

“Do you want two million dollars?” Otto yelled. “You seen that ad in Community Events? I know the clue. I know who the Panther is and we can go talk to him now. It’s very easy for me.”

Billy pulled the cruiser onto the shoulder. Flat, yellow Maryland spilled out to the horizon. “Don’t be a bother, Otto. We’ll be there soon.”

“I know the first clue,” Otto said. “A million for you, a million for me.” He tried to be as reasonable as a homeless man in a rummaged janitor’s coverall embroidered Hernando could be.

In the rear view mirror, Otto could see Billy apologize, but he only heard the metal clang-bang of the cell doors and the sharp nose-burn of the bleached tile waiting for him. He knew it was bad to be homeless, but he liked his den by the quarry much better than any jail.

Principal Montgomery

Principal Carl Montgomery was blotting a coffee stain on his Dilbert tie when he realized not only was it Sunday, it was a Sunday in August, and he wasn’t late for school. He wasn’t late for anything. On the television, a plastic-toothed weatherman warned of an impending thunderstorm. Principal Montgomery tossed his newspaper at his bronzed face.

The paper bounced off and spread across his carpet like dandelion fluff.

Nothing was scarier than summer. Out the bay window of Montgomery’s ranch house, he could see the darkened windows of Berlin Municipal High. Inside, empty hallways snaked in circles, still echoing the student’s footsteps. If they didn’t invent a hibernation pill for school teachers, Montgomery would have to start therapy. He knew what it was like for soldiers to come back from a tour of duty and find the world apathetic, unchanged, and far too free to accept their rigid routine. Reveille at 5am. Morning announcements. Meetings. Paperwork. What the hell was on the schedule for Principal Montgomery, Berlin Company, Anne Arundel Battalion today?

Sighing, he collected the strewn newspaper and noticed the ad in Community Events.

“Panther?” he thought. “Berlin Panthers?” Before Berlin Municipal became the Vikings in 1962, they were the Panthers. They had no stadium, so they played their games in the bull-dozed field by MacArthur Pond. There were no bleachers, but there was a tall hill where Montgomery and his friends would sit and watch and give a Panther roar whenever they scored a touchdown. That was the answer – the old football field. If all the clues were that easy, he’d have two million dollars before the end of the miserable day!

While the weatherman droned about the dangers of gale force winds (Stay indoors Eastern Shore!), Principal Montgomery clambered into the sticker-festooned, beige Ford Taurus that all principals are required to buy. He drove off listening to Cream and never glanced at the school receding in the mirror.

Parker

The concussive helicopter rotors swallowed the farm boy’s proposition. Parker dropped her bike in the grass and walked closer to the pick-up truck. “Hey gurl, you wanna meddle detector?” he repeated, louder. The bed of the pick-up overflowed with Soviet-era industrial equipment. “Ten bucks for an hour, twenny for three. Better than the competition,” he promised.

“No, I’m alright,” Parker replied when she realized the implications of his offer. In the 6 or so hours that the Chesapeake Herald had advertised the loot, there was already a self-regulated economy around the hunt. A man in a Berlin Rotary Club t-shirt gave her a free water bottle and told her to stay hydrated.

The field next to MacArthur pond swarmed with treasure-seekers. They walked in neat lines, staring at the dead grass beneath their feet like it was scripture. They snorkeled in the pond, hoping to find submerged clues. They waited to roast in porta-johns, discussing what they would do with two million dollars. Two lost children wailed for their parents. Later, the Berlin town hall would register two marriages and a divorce on that date, originating at that location.

None of the hoopla compared to Aaron Reed. He was laughing too loudly at a joke, like the whole world should be jealous of his good cheer. When he noticed Parker, he sauntered up with a shovel on one shoulder. “I’ll call you when I’m a millionaire, babe,” he said and left.

“If air-brained Aaron can do it, I guess we weren’t as clever as we thought,” Danny said. He’d recognized the Panthers from his dad’s high school yearbook and it had only taken five minutes conjecture for them to end up on their way to the old football field.

“Cock-balls, not just him. There are thousands of people here!” The angrier she got, the more varied her swear vocabulary. She once called Danny a fuck-bucket following a failed home ear-piercing.

“What else is there do?” Danny said. The way he spoke, in a monotone while squinting at nothing in particular, he came across as very sage or very stupid. Parker hadn’t decided yet.

“We misread the clue, it couldn’t be this obvious.” Parker yanked her bike from the weeds. “We’re not done yet.”

Otto

Billy deposited another hooligan arrested at the old Panther field in the tiny holding cell. That made Otto, a previous hooligan, and 447 white-washed cinderblocks all together.

“It’s a mad house out there. The fire marshal really ought to shut it down,” Billy insisted.

“Out where?” Otto wondered. Billy was already marching down the hall. No one ever answered Otto.

The first hooligan was curled on the floor napping his inebriation away. The new addition, a record store employee judging by his goatee and Smashing Pumpkins t-shirt, plopped down on the bench beside Otto. He clutched a blood-drenched, Berlin Rotary Club towel to his head. Despite his best efforts, syrupy blood dripped on the tiles.

The man started to speak. “I found a big rock, man. This guy thought it was a briefcase and started whalin’ on me with a shovel. It was just a rock. What’s up with that?”

Otto realized he was talking about the money. “Where were you looking?”

“The field by the pond. Where the Panther’s used to play.”

“The Panthers used to play? That’s silly. It says ‘the Panther.’ It says ‘he.’” Otto wagged his grubby forefinger.

He shook his head. “WXMS told me.”

Otto sighed. “Everyone is so silly. I might be a crazy homeless guy, but I can read.”

Principal Montgomery

He almost killed the blue-haired girl and her mopey boyfriend. They came around the corner on their bikes and cut him off as he made the turn down to the old field. After he calmed the bucking Taurus, he reversed to them, window down, to lecture on the benefits of wearing reflective clothing while cycling.

“You don’t wanna go down there, Mr. M,” advised the girl before he could begin.

The boy yawned. “It’s oversaturated.” Second yawn. “Sir.”

“What?” Montgomery said.

“There’s like a lot of people there,” she explained. “We think we did the clue wrong.”

“I don’t care. You kids should wear – how many people are there?” he asked.

“Thousands.” Principal Montgomery finally remembered their names. Parker, a sophomore but already an editor on the literary magazine and Danny, who was taking college level math and Latin. Good kids. Smart kids. Good, smart partners to have in this endeavor.

“You need a ride back into town?” he offered.

Parker

Principal Montgomery and Danny Sweets were in her kitchen eating her mother’s sugar cookies. The newspaper was on the table. Outside, the pale sky was sullied by steel wool clouds, like a handful of dust in a fishbowl. The clouds emerged from the east as if the sun was pulling them up as it slipped away west. At 4pm on the dot, there would be a bitchin’ storm and there were concerned that if they didn’t end their hunt soon, they have to take a rain delay.

“It calls the Panther ‘he.’ Nobody owns a panther do they?” Danny suggested.

Principal Montgomery snorted. Danny blinked solemnly and Montgomery’s smile died like a punctured balloon. “Well, I guess there could be…”

“It’s a person,” interrupted Parker. “Where we hear the Panther’s roar and who the person is, are separate things.” She’d looked at the clue from the outside, like it wasn’t a riddle, but just a sentence.

Principal Montgomery wiped a crumb from his mustache. “Maybe not.”

“What do you mean?”

“Now that I think about it, there was a person who was also a panther,” Montgomery explained. “There was our mascot, Jim Caldwell. He led the Panther roar. You know Jim?”

Danny shrugged and ate a sugar cookie. “I guess the town barber is also a millionaire.”

Otto

The storm erupted like a firecracker. Teasing rumbles lit the fuse and quickly gave way to sky-splitting explosions. White-loud bolts lanced the earth. “Lightning! Thunder! Bears! Oh my!” thought Otto. He gravitated to the window to hear the curtain of water sweep over the police station parking lot. He closed his eyes and sonically located individual droplets of water by their pitch – a fat drop splattered on a car roof. A trio of small ones pinged on a telephone wire. It reminded him there was a place he liked to sleep by the quarry where the rain echoed like the world’s biggest shower the every time it stormed.

The power in the station cut out. With his eyes closed, he only knew because the air conditioning stopped its laborious pant. When he opened them, it was still very dark except the intermittent blue glow through the window. Otto made his way to the door and gave it a tug. Still locked. As he tried it again, the lights flashed back on and the door buzzed open. System reset. Despite the drastic change in their conditions, the drunk was still asleep and the injured man sleeping too or unconscious from his blood loss.

“Hello?” No one responded. Did they ever respond to Otto? He couldn’t remember. He had trouble remembering things he didn’t care about, like cops who didn’t listen. He wandered out of the jail cell and out of the of the station, into the town, into the fray, and towards two million dollars.

Principal Montgomery

As they ran to his car under fire from aqueous ordnance, Montgomery couldn’t help but think of Furnace Quarry. On summer days as a boy, he’d swim in the quarry but only on days without rain. When it rained, the quarry would overflow and clog the roads until they diverted it to the quarry. Nonetheless, there was always danger. Herb Tucker, a boy two years older, drowned and they didn’t let kids go there anymore.

“You sure we shouldn’t wait until tomorrow?” he yelled. Thirty years of school assemblies had conditioned his vocal chords to out scream 900 hundred kids. The gale winds massacred his speech. Nonetheless, he saw Parker shake her head.

Inside the car, the lash of rain on the windows and roof filled the air with a hum. His pitiful wipers smeared the lights and colors of the outside world into a Van Gogh.

“Jesus, Carl there is stupid and then there is this,” Montgomery thought as he crawled down the road. When he came to Main Street he thought something else: “I’ll be damned.”

The road – if he could call it that – was flooded. A more appropriate term was river. Water gushed out of the woods where a creek ran parallel to the road, using the roadway as an aqueduct. The muddy water was at least four feet deep and frothing like chocolate milk when it encountered parked cars, signs, and parking meters. The floating debris was comprised of sticks and leaves, but people’s things too: a tricycle, a plastic playpen, and an origami boat that reminded Montgomery of a papier-mâché Noah’s Ark he’d made in Sunday school. Of course, the meteorologist that morning had called the approaching storm ‘biblical.’

“The church,” Danny said, pointing to the tiny Berlin Baptist Church perched on a hill their side of Main Street. The front gates were open and several people had parked on the grass. The lights were on inside.

“High ground,” Principal Montgomery agreed.

“C’mon Mr. M,” Parker scoffed. The kids were giving him their ‘duh’ face, the one they practiced for whenever and elder made the slightest gaffe. He followed their gaze.

The church announcement board read: August 12, Funeral of James Caldwell.

Parker

Sooner than Parker could rub her chilled arms, Danny’s flannel was around her shoulders. The church air conditioning was well prepared to fight Jim Caldwell’s decay.

“Thanks,” she said before she thought to give it back. It was a boyfriend move, and flannel was not the dress code for a funeral, especially if you barely knew the deceased. She kept it and they sat down in the back of the worn pews. The pastor gave them an encouraging smile.

There were about twenty people inside the small chapel. Parker recognized a few people, like Nancy the crossing guard, her older sister’s friend Katie and – shockingly – Aaron Reed. He’d lost the shovel but not the smirk. It was obvious that the church was filled with the few people who’d figured out the clue properly. The people who came to a funeral during the biggest storm of the decade hoping to get two million dollars.

The pastor began with a short prayer and then addressed the crowd.

“If Jim could see this display of love, I’m sure he’d be pleased. It’s a shame that God chose to water the plants today. I know Jim had big plans.” Then, he signaled to someone in the front row and exited the pulpit.

He was replaced by a man in a grey double-breasted suit, wearing thick glasses that could rival the Hubble telescope. The man extricated a paper from his breast pocket and read it aloud.

“From the last will and testament of James T. Caldwell: Berlin, you have been my home and I love you. I spent years as a mascot screaming your praise. Before my death, I came into a lot of money. You may ask how – the lottery, a rich uncle, treasure – the answer would bore you. However, without any family save this wonderful town, I have no one to give it to. I know how scary a boring summer can get so I made a riddle. Here is your final clue: I left the case with two million near where my old friend Herb Tucker lives, so that he can watch over it until it is found.”

Next to Parker, Principal Montgomery stiffened like an army private called to attention.

“You know?” she whispered.

“The quarry!” he said, far too loud. His voice echoed in the stone room.

They stampeded for the door as if the storm was within, not raging outside.

Otto

Otto didn’t register the lights on in the church as he cut through the back of the property on his way to the quarry. The rain hurt his eyes when he looked up, but he liked the strength. It washed off the sterile tang of the cell and the stink of living outside for days. He felt new.

He’d always known the answer to the clue because for him it wasn’t much of a riddle. One night in his den next to the quarry, he’d heard a car drive out behind the church. A man came from the car with a big bag in one hand and a battered oxygen tank in the other. He watched as the man dug a shallow hole and marked it with an old panther mascot outfit. When he’d read the news story it was obvious. If only Billy had trusted him.

Principal Montgomery

There was no way that Principal Montgomery would win this race. He was too old, too out of shape, and too unenthusiastic. He didn’t need two mill. But Parker and Danny had a chance. They were first out the door and halfway down the hill by the time that the others caught on. It was only Aaron who worried him. Aaron was a regular figure in his office. He was the school’s premiere delinquent, but also a former track star that’d been kicked off the team when he failed his marijuana test. The tall son of a bitch ran in a way that put gazelles to shame.

Aaron was only twenty feet in front of Montgomery, but he was pulling away fast. His lithe legs propelled him to the forest where the quarry waited. Parker and Danny were at the bottom of the hill, but they couldn’t glide like Aaron. He had to stop Aaron.

Montgomery squished through the mud and remembered every time Aaron had told him, “Whatever” and rolled his eyes. He ran faster. He remembered what it was like to wake up this morning and again tomorrow. He ran faster. He thought of the dark school windows and hit hyper speed. Within five feet of Aaron, he let fly and gave his first tackle since his stint on freshman JV. Aaron crumpled like a tissue.

Parker

It was just her and Danny, side by side, as they barreled through the woods. They could hear the roar of water surging into the quarry. The forest may have been secondary growth but it was as primeval as a jungle. They leapt over rotting logs and ducked heavy branches. Parker should have been heaving in asthmatic pain, but the moist air slipped down her throat. She moved without thinking, without feeling, for once

As they neared the water, they saw it: a panther costume leaning against a tree. Danny yanked the sodden costume away and revealed freshly turned soil. Panther marked the spot. Together, they dug. They flung aside handfuls of dirt until they uncovered an old case.

When they stood up, Parker realized that Danny’s hand was also on the handle. He was several inches taller so the case pulled towards his side. Why should he get to keep it? It was her idea. He wasn’t even her boyfriend. She started to tug the case towards her, but Danny caught on. He yanked it back so hard she nearly lost hold. They grappled for control and Parker found herself swatting at Danny, trying to remove his glasses. Anything to give her the upper hand. Suddenly, she hated everything about Danny from his breath to his nerdy apathy to his David Bowie poster. When he squinted, he did look stupid.

She was finally going to grab his glasses when she slipped. The water at their feet had loosened the soil. Her stomach lurched when her footing melted away. Her momentum was all backwards; leading her to the edge...Danny dropped the case and grabbed her with both arms to support her. To save her. The case was swept up in the flow, and fell into the quarry.

“Shit,” Danny said. The case disappeared in the foaming water.

“Who fucking cares,” Parker said and kissed Danny on his cold, wet, stinky mouth.

Otto

Otto saw the children drop the case in the water from his den. He laughed and climbed into his den to sleep away the night. Tomorrow, he’d try to get a job cleaning people’s lawns after the storm. He’d have to pay for all his stuff that washed away in the storm unless he could find it when the water calmed. He slept and dreamed of two panthers, one of which had blue hair and the other had glasses.

Principal Montgomery

Principal Montgomery knees felt like twigs at afternoon reveille. 3:47pm. Much later than normal. He sat by the window in boxers drinking coffee, wondering if he’d lose his job for assaulting a student. And no one even had two million, not even Parker and Danny, but he supposed it was ok. Who needed it? August was back to its normal, boring self.

In the street, a homeless man walked by pushing one shopping cart and pulling another. Rather than food or a tarp, his cart was filled with books. For no particular reason, Montgomery raised his cup. The man waved eagerly. Five minutes later the same homeless man reappeared, pushing two more carts with books. Montgomery opened the window, peered down the street, and saw many more shopping carts filled with thousands of books. Today wasn’t boring after all.