Tom stood in line for the Devil’s Corkscrew at Slidewaters. He heard a rustle in the bushes. People shouted. Tom looked to see why, and he saw everyone pointing at the green light over the slide. It was his turn to go. He lay at the top of the slide and zipped down the first drop. He turned the first corner.
  
Smash! He flew up as the slide vibrated like an earthquake. Still sliding, Tom looked back and saw a big hairy monster zooming toward him. Tom shrieked like a siren. The monster jumped off and into the bushes.
  
Then Tom was underwater at the bottom.  He swam to the surface, and breathing heavily, looked around. He couldn’t see the creature. Before long though there were more shouts as the beast stomped through the park, chasing people away.
 
Tom knew who to call for help … Sam Stealth.

***

Sam Stealth was a fourth grade detective with blond spiked hair. He was Tom’s best friend and had solved many mysteries.

Sam rode the trolley to the almost empty waterslide park. Tom took Sam to where he heard the bushes rustle. They searched for something suspicious. Then Sam saw a black hairball. He kept searching and found a big footprint. He looked through a hole in the bushes and saw a trail. He followed and gasped. Bones! Human bones!

“Tom, come here,” Sam yelled.

Tom ran to Sam and whispered, “Uh oh.”

***

Sam brought the clues to his lab. He took out his microscope and turned on his laptop. He investigated the bones first. After studying them he realized real bones were
different than the ones he found.

“Bones fake,” he wrote in his notebook.

Then he looked at the hairball under the microscope. It was obvious.

“Hair artificial.”

***

The boys went back to Slidewaters. They ran to the owner’s office and knocked on his door.

“Come in,” said the owner.

“Oh, it’s not him,” he said when they walked in.

“It’s not who?” asked Sam.

“A man who wanted me to sell Slidewaters to him. I thought he’d come back. Why are you here?” he asked.

Sam explained they’d discovered the monster was a fake.

“GRRRRRRR!”

“What was that?” Sam shouted.

“The monster, it’s here,” said Tom.

“Let’s chase it,” Sam whispered.

They chased it to the top of Downhill Racer. The beast had only one way to go, down the slide. He jumped on and zipped toward the bottom as Tom, Sam and the owner raced down the stairs. Then the monster ran up to TubeBlaster. He slid down, but this time, so did the boys. At the bottom the beast was gone. The boys looked around. Then suddenly a huge pile of sliding tubes toppled over and the beast ran from behind them.

They ran after the monster and saw him jump into the swimming pool. When the monster came up for air, Tom dumped tubes on it. Then Tom jumped in and held tubes around him, but the monster swung his arms wildly and escaped. Tom yelled at Sam to run to the kiddie area to stop the monster.

It worked. The monster was trapped. The boys chased him around while the owner made sure the monster didn’t escape. Finally, the monster stepped on the springy pelican toy and sprung into the water. They boys ran to the monster and pulled off his mask.

“It’s the man who wanted to buy the park,” exclaimed the owner. “You should be thrown in jail.”

“As for you boys, you’ll both get a free season pass to Slidewaters.”