Bess rubbed her head. A bump was beginning to appear where she had hit her head against the car window. “I think so,” she said in a dazed voice. “Good thing we were wearing seat belts.”

“But why isn’t there a barricade across the road?” George asked, jumping out of the car and stepping cautiously to the edge of the drop-off.

“Maybe the slide just happened,” Ned suggested.

Nancy got out and looked around. “I don’t think so,” she said. “There are signs of erosion down there, and even a few weeds in the rubble. I’d say this road has been out of commission for weeks, at least.”

Bess came to stand beside Nancy. “What’s that?” she asked, pointing to something orange half-hidden behind a pile of brush a dozen yards below. “Isn’t that a barricade?”

George scrambled partway down the slope. “It is a barricade,” she called. “It looks as if somebody tried to hide it!”

“You mean somebody tried to kill us?” Bess asked.

Nancy frowned. “I don’t think we can draw that conclusion from the evidence,” she said slowly. “All we know is that the road is out and the barricade is missing.”

“That barricade was deliberately hidden,” George corrected her breathlessly, climbing back up to the road. “There’s no way it could have accidentally gotten covered up under all that brush.” She shivered. “You know, Nancy, as Ned was saving a few minutes ago, if we’d driven up here last night after dark-the way we were supposed to-we wouldn’t have stood a chance.”

“That’s true,” Nancy said. “But we don’t know that the barricade was removed just for our benefit. A road crew might have come to inspect the slide and forgotten to put it back up.”

“Well, maybe you’re right,” Bess said, looking pale and shaken. “But I don’t know. Between this and your phone call, Nancy, the whole thing looks really suspicious.”

“You’re right,” Nancy agreed. “I’d say that we have to be on our guard.”