Free The 39 Clues: Cahills vs. Vespers Book 5: Trust No One by Linda Sue Park Page B

said.
    “Pardon?” Amy asked.
    The capoeirista looked at her coldly.
“Um, dois, três,”
she repeated. Then she muttered something that sounded like “more” and “a little less” and “a bell,” and pushed past Amy to rejoin her companions.
    What was that all about?
“Um, dois, três” —
that must be “one, two, three” in Portuguese. And the rest didn’t make any sense, so it was probably Portuguese, too. But why did she give me that nasty look?
    As they got into a taxi, Amy decided she was imagining things. If it had been a deliberate attack — a far-fetched idea to begin with — it wasn’t a very good one: Atticus was nearly unscathed.
    Just now he was asking Dan a typical Atticus question: “Do you think they say ‘ouch’ here in Brazil? Or do they have a whole different word for it?”

    Dan had never seen anything like it.
    It wasn’t just one waterfall, or a central waterfall with a sideshow or two. Iguazu Falls was
hundreds
of waterfalls, spilling over the rim of a huge horseshoe-shaped plateau.
    Magical,
Dan thought.
That might be the only word for it.
    “Two hundred seventy-four waterfalls,” Amy said, reading from the brochure she had picked up at the ticket counter. Among the tourists, camera shutters were clicking so furiously that they sounded like a horde of strange mechanical insects.
    Dan put his backpack down on the ground and took out his cell phone so he could take some photos, too.
    “Dan!” Atticus tugged on Dan’s arm. “Quick, get a photo of THEM!”
    Turning away from the rail, Dan saw half a dozen animals approaching. They looked like big raccoons. Except they were mostly tan, instead of gray. And had long snouts instead of bandit masks. Their tails were striped like a raccoon’s, but were much longer and thinner. And they weren’t the least bit afraid of humans, coming within an arm’s length of the group.
    Dan began snapping photos from every angle.
    “What are they?” Jake asked.
    “Coatis,” Amy said, reading from the brochure again.
    “Co-whattees?” Dan said.
    “Coatimundis,” Amy said. “It says, ‘Please do not feed or touch them.’ It also says they’re very curious —”
    Atticus laughed. “Look at that one!”
    A coati was investigating Dan’s backpack. It had managed to undo a couple of the Velcro flaps and was busy emptying a compartment. It pulled out a few small plastic vials, then a ziplock bag, and began pawing at them.
    The serum ingredients!
    “HEY!” Dan shouted and rushed toward the coati.
    He grabbed the pack and tried to shoo the coati away. Hastily he picked up the items and put them back into the compartment. Then he searched the ground to make sure nothing else had been pulled out.
    “Get out of here, you stupid co-whatever-you-are,” he said angrily.
    The coati stood up on its hind legs in front of Dan, as if it were begging.
    Atticus giggled. “I don’t think it understood you. Maybe if you spoke to it in Portuguese —”
    “Very funny,” Dan said, hoisting the pack a little higher. “I just don’t want it messing with my stuff.”
    “It’s only looking for food,” Amy said.
    “Yeah, Dan, it’s not interested in your dirty underwear,” Jake said with a snicker.
    Dan didn’t dare make eye contact with Amy.
Did she see . . . ?
He aimed an air-kick at the offending coati. “Leave my stuff alone,” he muttered.
    “Hey, chill,” Atticus said. “It’s no big deal, right?”
    Dan gritted his teeth. “Right,” he said. “No big deal.”

    The path to the river level of the park descended in a series of switchbacks supplemented by an occasional set of stairs, all under the canopy of the Brazilian rain forest. At the bottom of the last set of stairs, they saw a broad walkway flanked by metal railings. It extended several hundred yards out over the Iguazu River and ended in a viewing platform.
    They walked toward the platform, Dan and Atticus leading the way. Jake could feel a cool dampness in the air; a few