The Gold Bug
Saturday Morning Car Tune In
“Look what I found on the sidewalk,” Snappy waved a funny looking piece of paper in his beak.
“Did you find a gold bug with it,” yawned Rattail.
“A bug?” Snippy got excited. Something fun to eat.
“You mean this?” Snappy held up a toy gold bug.
“That’s the one.”
“You mean it’s not a real bug?” Snippy lost interest.
“Maybe there’s more,” Rattail swatted at her tail.
“Like what?”
“Have you never read The Gold Bug by Edgar Allen Poe?”
“I have. I have!” Snappy was excited. “Or rather my teacher read it to our class when I was in grade school. When she got to the invisible ink note part... oh, you made US a treasure hunt just like in the book.” Snappy looked at Rattail admiring his ingenuity.
“Could be.” Rattail grinned.
“We have to figure out the puzzle to get our treasure?” Snippy was aghast. That meant work.
“I love puzzles,” Snappy got pencil and paper.
“This is hard,” Snippy tried to help. Maybe the treasure was food.
“Well I’ve got something, Snappy pushed back his chair, “but it makes no sense.”
“Let me see,” Snippy took the deciphered note. “Oh easy,” she ran for the binoculars.
“Look through these in that direction, I mean the note says spy glass but close enough.”
Snappy snapped his mouth shut and took the binoculars. “What am I looking for?”
“A tree branch.”
“Just any?”
“No seventh one up on the east side.”
“Sheez, this is hard. Oh I see something. A skull hanging from a branch?”
“It’s not real,” Rattail was enjoying himself immensely.
“Now what?”
“We take the gold bug and drop it through the eye of the skull.”
“This treasure better be worth it.”
Snippy and Snappy rush to the tree. Snippy climbs up and drops the gold bug through the eye socket of the toy skull. “Start at the trunk and mark off fifty paces through the spot where the gold bug landed.”
“Now what?”
“We dig.”
“Did you bring a shovel?”
“No did you?”
“No need,” says Rattail walking up with a picnic basket. “You solved the riddle and here is your treat.” He spread out a checkered cloth and they dined until they could not eat another bite.
just the word for word solution
Saturday Morning Car Tune In is a play on words for those in another lifetime Saturday Morning Cartoons. And a nod to stories told in the car in response to a spur of the moment request.