Warm Weather clue #1:  Jackets have come off and shirt sleeves are rolled up past the Trail- elbow…  Warm weather clue #2:  don’t see one, but one is enough along with what the whiny old man is saying: “The fish have quit biting… whaaa!”  In panel 3 Doc looks genuinely afraid of the black fly invasion being predicted by Mark.  Pupils dilate, brow furrows, he looks nervously to one side, then I suppose to the other in anticipation of the buzzing swarm about to descend upon them…

But what’s with all the “stuff” in the canoes?  If they have made camp, then why are they schlepping all their gear out in the middle of the lake with them?  Or maybe they are forever on the move, leaving no trace, making it ever more difficult for Rusty to ever catch up with them…  That’s right, old man. Better douse yourself with deet and wrap up in your netting, not that it will do you any good when Rusty DOES find you… Hell hath no fury like an orphan scorned…

Although someone ought to tell him that his hat and shirt don’t match… so close but no cigar! But there he is, one arm akimbo, one placing the hat on his pony-tailed noggin… Jeff is resplendent in his black raw wool turtleneck sweater.  Note the woven fisherman’s creel in the foreground of panel three… those don’t come cheap, along with the rod case he holds in his left hand… no wonder they only have enough money left to afford a bare lightbulb for ambiance…

And as we get a lesson in how to fool fish into thinking that there is something edible hiding the hook and line, Cherry has pulled out a Camelot-era pillbox hat, pink to match her sweater, and looks on with… I don’t know… Admiration? Disgust? Ennui?  I think she continues to up her medication as she evaluates the dumpster fire that has become her life.  She has managed to ditch Rusty, but now she is stuck with her old man and this asexual, unfeeling, meat sack called Mark Trail…

And the fact that he is using a “Grey Ghost Streamer” would suggest that he is reaching into the afterlife to spirit some fish onto his line…  But seriously, ever since he put that Ranger Rick hat on, his countenance has grown positively cadaverous…  And I give him credit, though.  The fact that he can tie a fly onto his line without the aid of cheaters… must be that he has had the cataract surgery- one eye to see close, the other to see far!

Meanwhile, back at the Bar, Jeff ‘n’ Jared are making fools of me.  Of course they will sell their stolen Indian “stuff” to a museum… No questions asked!  And such respect and formality regarding their intended victim:  MR. Dunlap, if you please…

Andy looking stoic and brave in the face of the missing member of his pack…  Where IS Rusty??

C’mon Jeff, get it right.  It’s not just STUFF we are talking about here, it’s RELICS.  RELICS is worth money… a lot more than STUFF!!

Can’t be TRACED?  Huh?  Like Money?  Maybe I need to go to bad guy school, but eventually you will need to turn all this STUFF into money, and the market for Indian relics is probably thin at best.  How on earth do you propose to do THAT??  And we will pull this off how?  I can’t wrap my head around this one…  I guess bad guys in the Trail-verse all have a common thread connecting them- that of not being very clever.  So they canoe in, tie up the old man, carefully wrap all the relics, put them in the canoe hanging from the ceiling and quietly float away?  This I have to see.

Now, we all know that real bad guys don’t repeatedly say each other’s names in conversation:  “What do you think, JEFF?”  I don’t know, JARED.” Especially in PUBLIC.  But then these are two new characters, unshaven, one with a PONY TAIL, for crying out loud!! Large Schooners of Beer, overflowing with suds, scheming of the first order… Do we need any more visual clues that these guys are BAD??

Sorry, but Jared’s hand is all catawampus in the middle frame.  It’s like it’s just floating out there in space, emerging from the talk-balloon…  And in Panel three, we see that his right hand is all mangled, like he got it caught in the license plate stamping machine or something…

No doubt Bad-Guy Jeff has the story that was written about the Indian artifact collection going up for sale…  And apparently it’s front page news in whatever backwater we find ourselves trolling for opportunity…

Doc, you just don’t look like yourself at all in the wilderness… you really don’t…  And Cherry is happy that she “decided” to join Mark and drag her Father along while Mark gets to carry not one canoe but two up the rocky trail…  Hey, isn’t that Mark’s Long-lost brother- Rocky Trail- which is who we are probably being introduced to in panel 3…

At this point Mark is no-doubt wondering how his “time off” became burdened by his wife and Father in Law…  At least Andy pulls his weight.

MEANWHILE… Let’s cut to the State Penitentiary where Jared is being sprung and picked up by Rocky… (total guess there…)   And where is he going?  Disneyland? Nope, to the local Watering Hole for a beer.  Seems harmless enough, until we learn about his plans to further his criminal career, since he remains unemployable and just left what amounts “bad-guy finishing school…”

Wow.  We must really be in the boonies…  If the only way to the Island of Indian Artifacts is by canoe, and our intrepid columnist has to “see that <he gets> a copy of the paper when the article runs…”  With all the late breaking world changing news in the pipeline, though, it could be weeks (?) before that Story makes its way to page 5…

But back to the Trail clan…  Let’s review the visual clues in Panel 2.  They have “made portage,” yet water is to their backs.  Did they walk on this water while carrying their canoes?  I thought canoes were made for water, floated nicely and do a splendid job of carrying passenger and gear.  Big Pine Lake is 1 mile that-a-way, which is where I guess they need to haul the canoes next?  Doc is bent over in a heap declaring how “heavy canoes can be,” yet it looks like he “portaged” it 20 feet from the shore??

Meanwhile, Cherry is copping total attitude, looking almost disdainful of her aging father’s attempt to do what probably came easier to him in his thirties…

Anyone seen Rusty??

What exactly is Mr Dunlap doing in the first panel?  It’s either that or he’s on some early rustic, prototype version of the Chuck Norris “Total Gym…”  Besides, what does an old man really need after all?  Some seed for the bird feeder, a pair of Jeans, a nice blue, civil war era shirt, a pair of suspenders and a ready supply of adult diapers…  Going to retire?  It looks like you have already crossed that Bridge, my friend… And what was his business anyway?

Note the Strong, White-guy handshake being exhibited in panel three.  “Mr Logan…  Mr. Dunlap…”  Why, Minneapolis’s own recently former Mayor Turned Activist contributed to an op-ed piece yesterday suggesting that the achievement gap could be solved if this maneuver was more prevalent among at-risk youth.  That, and pulling their pants up…

But seriously, folks…  Where’s Rusty?  A brief mention of his “being with a friend,” and not only is that preposterous notion not challenged, but the whole clan takes a powder on him!

Ah, Dr. Wilheit, I presume… I hear you know more about Native Americans than ANYBODY ELSE…  That’s a tall claim, Slim, and one that he no doubt has to defend every time he gathers with the other anthropologists that might know a thing or two about arrowheads and birch canoes…  Speaking of which, since when are birch canoes GREEN?

Well, let’s apply the age-old maxim to value:  It’s only worth what someone else is willing to pay for it…  Is it possible that there is someone out there crazy enough about arrowheads to write you a big fat check?  Or more likely will you have to set up shop on e-Bay and sell things piecemeal?  A dealer perhaps?  But I get ahead of myself.  Where’s the taught possibility of evil in this build up?  I am not feeling it right now…  Old man with collection looking to do good, local journalist looking fill column inches with something other than the usual pap, Mark, Andy, Cherry and Doc lazing down the river in canoes… I am not feeling it.  Not yet.

Is it me, or does this guy look like SOS John Kerry (or maybe his father…)?

They left Rusty behind!  Probably didn’t even leave a note!  It’s a bright, crisp day when Mark, Cherry and Doc finally make good on their pact of ditching the lad that has brought them nothing but head-splitting, cringe-worthy dialogue and narrowness of interest… “Want to go fishing?  Can I take some pictures?  Want to go fishing? Can I take some pictures?”  Seriously, who can blame them?

Ah, the subtleness with which new stories are introduced…  No call from Editor Bill Ellis this time, just a quick cut to two strangers- one apparently a reporter (gee, that’s different…) the other a member of the The First Nation of Human Beings, resplendent in his Cornflower Blue Tunic and suspenders.   What exactly is that style, anyway?  Looks like a pain in the ass to me…  Or is he actually a Native American? Or just a poser?  An enthusiast? Someone with a collection disorder (bordering on OCD, so I am told) that needs to make his affliction public…

Prove helpful to whom?  Oh, the tension mounts…