Four boys lounge around a campfire beside the lapping edge of Lake Inclement. They each are a perfect 12 years of age, at the stepping off point of their teenaged years, when diving in the lake with friends and gobbling hotdogs around the fireside is just about more important than anything else. The star-studded sky stretches out above them, and they talk about nothing much when suddenly a glow appears in the woods to the south. All of them-- Walt, Paxton, Carpenter, Zack, and his faithful beagle, Flash, wonder at the sight, but it is Grampa Clondyke, Carp's beloved grandfather that is there...