Bo Duke shifted uncomfortably in the back seat of the car he'd been shoved into. He'd been alone at the Duke spread, out in the barn doing the morning chores when two guys in a big car pulled up, found him in the barn and marched him out to the car at gunpoint. Now here he was, still with no idea why.

"You fellas mind tellin' me where we're going?"

"Shutup, kid," said the one with the gun, who was sharing the back seat with Bo.

"Okay, how 'bout lettin' me know why you're so interested in me?"

"I said keep quiet!", Bo's seat-partner yelled, clubbing him in the back of the head with the gun. Bo fell unconscious.

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About that time Luke and Jesse got home, back from running a few errands in town. They were flustered when they saw no sign of Bo.
"Uncle Jesse, I can't find Bo anywhere," Luke said.

"Maybe he just went into town."

"I don't think so - the General's still here. It's not like him to run off."

Jesse tried to keep Luke from getting too worried, but Luke still started looking through the woods and calling for Bo.

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When Bo came to, he looked out the car window and saw that they had pulled up near Hazzard Lake. The two gunmen were a few yards away, fiddling with something on the ground - was it a rowboat? He went to reach for the door handle and realized his hands had been tied behind his back with something that felt like a zip-tie. He began to think this really wasn't looking good.
One of the men returned to the car and opened the door on Bo's side.

"C'mon, pretty boy, you're going for a boat ride."

"Nah, I don't really care for one right now."

He dragged Bo from the back seat and steered him toward the boat, Bo trying to break the man's grip the whole time. It was no use - this guy must work out, he thought. They cut Bo's shirt off of him, pushed him into the boat, and forced him to lie on his back.
"Please tell me what this is about", said Bo as they tied his upper arms to o-rings in the sides of the boat.

"Okay, kid, it's like this. You remember those guys you saw getting away after that bank robbery, when you were in Atlanta a couple months ago? Well, one of 'em wants to make sure you ain't available to testify at his trial tomorrow."

"A lawyer came to talk to me about that a couple weeks ago - he said they wouldn't need me to testify. I ain't got any plans to do that!"

"It don't matter, kid. You're goin' out on the lake. We'll be back the day after tomorrow to pick up what's left of you."

As they finished tying his feet to the bow, Bo said, "You won't get away with this; my cousins and uncle won't stop lookin' till they find me."

"No one comes out to this lake in winter," the man replied. "There'll be no one around for a mile. And if someone does see the boat, they won't be able to tell anyone's in it. But, just in case --"

With that, the man tore off a strip from Bo's shirt and stuffed it in his mouth, then picked up Bo's yellow bandanna from where it had been thrown on the ground and tied it tightly around his head to hold the rag in place.

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Luke was at his wits' end. He'd spent most of the day asking everyone in town if they'd seen Bo and gotten nowhere. He decided to head back to Cooter's. Maybe together, they could think of something.

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Bo looked up at the sky, since he could hardly look anywhere else. They'd tied him so tight it was nearly impossible to move. He'd spent the first hour or two in the boat trying to work his wrists loose. They were pretty raw now, and they were just as securely tied as when he started. He was also getting a pretty bad sunburn on his upper body. Bo figured his captors were just sadistic bastards. On top of that, he was pretty thirsty. Ironic, huh, that it was possible to die of thirst while floating on a lake. Bo had considered trying to wriggle around enough to capsize the boat, but that seemed like an idea best left for when he became completely desperate... or suicidal.

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It was after sundown when Luke made it to Cooter's garage. Cooter asked if he'd had any luck.

"No. No one's seen him, and I really don't think Bo ran off on his own. His chores were half done. It's like he was just swept off the face of the earth."

"Well, maybe he went with that lawyer fella."

"Cooter, the lawyer was here a couple weeks ago. He told us that Bo wouldn't need to testify about the bank robbery."

"No, I mean the one that was here yesterday."

Luke looked up. "What do you mean?"

"Well, like I said, this lawyer was in town yesterday asking where he could find your place. I remember noticing he weren't too well dressed for a lawyer, but I didn't think nothin' of it then."

"This has gotta be it, Cooter. What kind of car was he driving?"

Cooter described the car, and Luke headed to the Sheriff's office.

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At least night had fallen, thought Bo. The cooler air was starting to relieve the sunburn as he continued to try working his wrists free, soreness be damned. These goons that had captured him had to be the only smart ones he had run across. The other crooks he and Luke had run afoul of had always left them with their pocketknives. Not these two, though. They had taken his knife, and he couldn't see how he was going to get free without it. It was a clear night, and Bo mused that under other circumstances he might think it was pleasant to be out here. After a while, though, the cold air started getting to him and he worked all the harder to free himself.

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After much pleading and cajoling, Luke had gotten Rosco to ask Enos if he'd seen a car matching the description of the "lawyer's" car in the last day or two. Enos said that yes, he'd seen a car like that this morning on the Old County Road. Rosco refused to investigate, eventually threatening to arrest Luke for abusing police resources. Luke headed back to Cooter's, where he called Jesse and brought him up to date.

"Uncle Jesse, can you and Daisy take some battery-powered lamps and start looking for Bo near the Old County Road? It's the only thing we have to go on. Y'all start at the north end and Cooter and I'll start at the south end."

He and Cooter grabbed some portable lamps and took off in Cooter's truck.

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It must be nearly morning, Bo thought. It certainly seemed like he'd been laying in the boat forever. He was really cold now, but he'd managed to get some slack in one of the ropes tying his left arm to the side of the boat. Bo didn't quite know how this would help him in the long run, but he had to try anyway. He looked at the sky and saw that it was definitely getting light again. He wasn't sure if he could take another day of sunburn.

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Jesse and Daisy met up with Luke and Cooter halfway up Old County Road. Now that it was getting light out, it was decided that Luke and Cooter would continue searching along the road; maybe they could find a clue in the daylight. Jesse and Daisy would go back to the farm in case Bo somehow showed up there.
An hour or two later, Cooter noticed some tire tracks heading off the road into the woods. They followed them hoping this was the clue they'd been looking for. As the two men walked through the woods, Luke spotted something bright in the distance. At first he thought it was just the sunlight glinting off the lake, but then he saw that it was a piece of cloth. He called Cooter over and ran toward it. It was Bo's shirt, or the remains of it, anyway. Just then, Cooter yelled, "What's that?"

There was a boat out in the middle of the lake. It seemed to be abandoned, but they had to find out. Luke didn't want to think about what he might find, and started taking off his boots to swim out to the boat before Cooter stopped him.

"It's too far out, you'll never make it."

"Cooter, I've got to know."

"Look, I'll go back to the truck and radio Jesse to bring your boat down here. You can't risk trying to swim out there."

Luke reluctantly agreed and an hour later, Jesse and Daisy were there with the boat. It was the longest hour of Luke's life.

Luke and Cooter made it to the center of the lake in record time. As they got closer, Luke could see there was someone in the boat - someone not moving. He nearly lost control of himself, but as they got even closer, he could see that it was Bo and he was just tied down.
Cooter maneuvered next to the boat Bo was in, and Luke leapt out to free Bo, who was clearly trying to move and couldn't. He took his knife and released Bo's arms and legs, then helped Bo untie the gag.

"Water... I need water," Bo managed to croak.

Luke scooped up a bit of the clear lake water and offered it to his cousin, who drank it eagerly. "There's more water in the truck, Cuz."

A few minutes later they were all standing at Jesse's truck, although Bo's legs were still a bit unsteady. After quenching his thirst, Bo told Luke what had happened and Luke told Bo what he'd found out.

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Everything turned out okay in the end. The bank robber was not only convicted of that crime, but also of kidnapping and attempted murder. Luke got Bo to promise that if he ever did take off on a whim, he'd make sure to leave a note. Bo decided he wasn't going back out to Hazzard Lake for a while.

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