The summer of 1991 arrives early in the small town of Donaldsonville, Louisiana. Allison Smith, a twelve-year-old circus aerialist in her father's Smith Family Circus, discovers that her prize elephant, Chang Phoouk, has disappeared. She asks her ten-year-old brother Steve to help her find him to solve the mystery on his capture. Did someone kidnap him so that he would earn lots of money for his ransom? Is Allison's aerial partner, jack Everly, really to be trusted? What is the reason for Chang's irrational behavior whenever Jack comes around him? She has to follow the glare of Jack's white shirt into the night to see where he takes him. Does she run into many obstacles? With bold courage and witty detective work, she finds Chang imprisoned in a sawmill along the levee in Donaldsonville.