Chapters 7 - 9 Summary

Dylan and Casey go swimming at the beach below the crack. The water is cool and clear, and brackish, half seawater and half spring water. The two discuss Louie's past, how he comes from a broken home and lived for a time in a warehouse, and how Mr. Bellows hopes the Scouts will rehabilitate him.

Tad gets lost. No one can find him. Casey and Dylan go in search of him, ranging over the lava beds. At last they find him, wedged into a crack in the lava. How did he get there? He was hiding from wasps, he explains. They were after a can of peaches he was eating. He finished the can of peaches, but then couldn't get out of the crack because the fit was so tight he couldn't move his arms or legs. The boys manage to...