Death and Love at the Old Summer Camp Read online

  “From Frosted Flakes?” he joked back. “Would you prefer a Wheaties pony or a Grape Nutty one? How about for now I take us to the lily pond bog?”

  I knew he was on a roll.

  “Are you going to start in telling me about the Lilliputians, again?”

  “You got me. Besides, you always like the part where Swift has Gulliver ‘make water in the castle!’”

  “Yeah. You know, I got in trouble in school for talking about that part. According to the good Sisters, it wasn’t proper for Catholic young ladies to laugh about ‘bodily functions.’”

  “Their loss, Toots. How about we be quiet for the fish? I’ll bait up two lines, and we’ll troll slowly.”

  I helped hook the worm as my father managed the motor with his right hand and held the pole with his feet. I watched the bait, hook, and bobbing thing gently go plop in the water. We drifted on at a snail’s pace. A slight tug, and then I reeled in an eight-inch sunfish.

  “Is he legal?”

  “Sure, put him in the tin.”

  By now, we were in Paradise. We floated, swished our way through the lily bog, surrounded on all sides by yellow and white flowers. The long leaves separated before our prow.

  I leaned over and just stared. My father gathered a bouquet for my mom. My eyes looked into the water, murky, but still clear enough that I could see my reflection. I looked tired, messy, and scared. It all came back to me…the dream, the hurt. As the pain of my nightmare came rushing back, reality slipped around me. What was real? I couldn’t be sure. I let my hand stroke the water. Cold. A slimy lily pad tendril wrapped itself around my wrist. I started at the sensation.

  “What?” My father’s voice brought me back.

  “Nothing, just a lily pad.”

  I looked at the beautiful bouquet we’d gathered. “Think that’s enough?”

  The flowers wouldn’t last long. My mother would see the wilted, puffy, round heads and put them in water just to please my dad. Their anniversary was August fifteenth. Tomorrow.

  As we started to oar our way out of the bog, my line caught on something. A huge fish judging from the weight, and it wouldn’t budge. This was unheard of, something this big in this little lake. My father took over to help me pull in my fabulous find. It wouldn’t budge; we wound up drawing the boat closer to my catch.

  “Hey, hey, you did it!” He laughed. “Come over here.”

  “What is it?” I looked into the water and saw that I had hooked an old tire.

  “Here, honey, let me cut the line.”

  As he bent over the water, my father asked me to get his glasses. “Something shiny, here. Get me the small net too.”

  He was tugging and pulling, but nothing worked.

  “I think we hit pay dirt, really,” he grunted as he lost his footing and gracelessly flopped into the water, rubber-soled canvas shoes and all.

  When he turned back to me, he was clutching something, but his demeanor had changed. He was white. Dad held his hand away from me as he heaved himself up and into the rowboat.

  “Start the engine,” he yelled.

  “But Dad.”

  “Just do it!”

  “What about the pay dirt?”

  He slowly opened his hand. I saw the shimmer of something. A ring. A big signet ring, but something else. I couldn’t see well, and my father was turning to vomit off the side of the boat.

  He said quietly, “Someone has been badly hurt.”

  “I don’t understand.”

  “It’s not just a ring, Pina. Someone lost his finger.”

  “Daddy, you’re scaring me.”

  “I’m sorry, honey. Don’t be scared; it happened a while ago.” He put his other arm around me.

  My father still clutched our macabre sunken treasure in his hand: the unmistakable bones of a finger still wearing a heavy man’s ring. I began to sway, and a cold sweat broke out on my forehead. He held me up as we motored back very quickly.

  “Don’t tell your mother.”

  “But what are you going to do? You can’t keep it.”

  “I’ll worry about that.”

  “How could someone lose a finger?”

  “Must have been a fishing accident,” he said as he took a long, pained drag on his wet, filterless Raleigh.

  Dad seemed someplace else, and his color was only slowly coming back into his normally tanned cheeks. When we got back to the dock, I saw him wrap up the bones and the ring and put it all the way down in his wet, baggy pants. He would have to tell my mom some big story to explain his sodden clothes, the kind he could usually weave so well when pulling someone’s leg.

  But this time was different. I held the lilies, which now felt more like funeral flowers. Maybe it was a burial at sea, although this was not like any Robinson Crusoe story I had read.

  I wished Katie were here so badly, or that I had gone to Star Island with her. I tried to make my thoughts go there: helping Katie celebrate, unwrap presents, and blow out her sixteen candles. I could do that so well, just go away, make my thoughts take me elsewhere.

  I felt better now. The bog was behind us, and I was laughing, showing off my sunfish.

  My mother was busy “tut-tutting” at my father’s wetness. “Oh, your father has done it again. At least you’re dry. Surprised you didn’t both drown.”

  “Look at the wonderful flowers Daddy got you. For your anniversary tomorrow.”

  “Yes, that’s likely all I’ll get,” she groused.

  “No, Mom, Dad has a real surprise for you,” I said.

  I knew my father planned to take us to the local lobster pound. Normally, I’d be delighted, but I just wanted to be with Katie. I had to talk to my father about the bones, and I really wanted to see the ring. Signet rings always have initials.

  I suddenly felt tired. I just wanted to sleep now. Maybe if I went to bed early, Katie would be back before I knew it.

  Chapter Ten

  BREAKFAST REUNION

  Katie was back. I could see her through the thick morning fog still shrouding the pines in front of the dining hall. I had dreamt about her during the night, visions of her taking the small ferry to Star Island with her mom and dad. I even imagined Katie on the rocking chair she’d told me about, rocking and rocking as if she could just take flight into the ocean from the wrap-around porch of the old hotel. Now that she was here, I felt a bit shy.

  After breakfast in the overheated dining hall, we stood around out front of the dining room, kicking at pine needles.

  “I don’t want to ruin your birthday, but I’m scared,” I said finally.

  “How’d you know?” said Katie.

  “Know what? I can’t keep it all to myself.”

  “So you didn’t find out about my father?”

  “Your father?”

  “My father has the scar, or square. Jeez, you think he’s really bad? I saw it on his arm, the square, the scar. You know, the sign of the secret group.”

  She described her father carrying the birthday packages, shirtsleeves all pushed up, almost like a hood’s, she said, but without the Luckies rolled up in his undershirt. Then she saw it. She saw the shirt ripple up, his somewhat flabby muscle wiggle and distort the mark on his arm. It was a square, all uneven and faint, kind of like an old tattoo. The edges were ragged, as if it was made with a knife and blue-black pen ink.

  Katie said she tried to act nonchalant, questioning him about hurting himself, but he made up some story. Then, as Katie’s dad pulled away from her to bring more presents, he tugged his shirtsleeve all the way down and put on a cardigan as if he was trying to cover up.

  “Holy crap!” I said.

  “Exactly what was the square about?” asked Katie, scrunching up her face.

  “First, I’ve gotta tell you about…so much that happened while you were away. I dreamt I was attacked.”

  “You mean, for real?”

  “It was in my dream, but I woke up with welts on me.”

  “Slow down. You’re really scarin
g me.”

  I started from the beginning. “In the dream, it was like I was at the camp, back in the ‘30s. Like, maybe this stuff really happened.”

  “Attacked? Oh my God…what can I…my father…oh my God!”

  I felt myself being folded into Katie’s soft arms.

  “I’m hurt and achy,” I said. “You feel so good.” For the first time since the dream, I just let myself go. All the feelings I’d tried to get under control finally released. I felt every part of me overflow like a dam, up and over the barrier of my body.

  After a long, quiet time, Katie whispered, “I don’t understand how…I don’t know what to say. Did you tell your folks?”

  “What’s to tell? That a twenty-year old story is happening to me? Mom will die.”

  “Damn! Pina, we really have to tell someone. Really.”

  “First time I’ve heard you curse,” I couldn’t help but giggle. But then I sighed. “There’s more. My father and I went fishing, and we pulled up another bone…a finger in a signet ring.”

  “Gross. What’s he going to do?” said Katie.

  “He hasn’t decided.”

  “Do you think it’s connected to our bone?” Katie asked.

  “Well, there’s a way to find out: signet rings have initials. My folks are going out for their anniversary this afternoon. We’ll take a look when they’re gone?”

  “Creepy, but yeah.”

  “My father tried to say it was a fishing accident. That doesn’t make any sense. See, some real heavy rocks were holding it down in an old tire. Katie I don’t know what to believe. I’m even afraid to go to sleep tonight.”

  “Can we cool this till after lunch? When your folks leave, we can find the ring, the initials, and the bones—all of the bones.” Katie stopped short. She put her hands on my shoulders and just looked at me. Her face softened. “What about your dream?”

  “I don’t know, I don’t know. I can’t go on crying like this. Distract me…just tell me about your birthday presents.” I sniffled and dried my eyes.

  “That seems so…I don’t know…babyish now. But I did get this one thing—”

  “You didn’t?”

  “Yup. The biggest chem set ever and the microscope.”

  Katie and I managed to hang out without talking about dreams or scars for the whole, chilly morning. We strolled over to her cabin, where we could be alone because her parents had gone to the main house to play Bridge. The embers were still alive in the fireplace.

  We built up the fire with some sappy kindling and dried pine. We mimicked the firedogs in the hearth, curling up on the floor to watch the blaze together. Katie leaned back on her elbows, knees bent. She pulled me back against her, her arms around my shoulders. She seemed to help contain the craziness and confusion burning inside of me. All of the things I’d been feeling, our fears, our warmth, this inexplicable thing catching fire between us felt easier, somehow, when we were alone like this.

  I tried to say more about the dream, but Katie just shushed me. We were quiet, listening to the pop and sizzle of the blaze. It seemed like her birthday added more than just a year to her. I felt the wisdom and warmth of age radiating from her.

  Her cabin, with its new woven rag rugs and folk art pictures on the wall, felt safe. I was in the most comfortable place I had ever been, seated on the hard pine floor propped like that against Katie’s knees.

  My cabin was just across from Katie’s, even if it sometimes felt like a world away, so we listened for the sound of my parents’ car. Once they drove off to celebrate their anniversary, we crept over to my place. I saw Katie take in the whole place: the ramshackle bridge table set up with a small, plug-in radio and papers, bills my father had been working on. The rag rugs on the floor in our sitting room, which doubled as my bedroom, were tattered but homey to me.

  Katie must have seen my stuffed Siamese cat on the bed. In an instant, her face softened, her dimples made a rare appearance, and she threw herself with abandon across my bed.

  I loved this side of Katie, this flitty, childlike behavior, but I couldn’t help but worry. Maybe she chose not to ask more about the attack in my dream. Maybe her father came first in her book—

  “I’m scared about my father. What if he was part of…of the attack in some way?” Katie looked devastated at the thought.

  “No way, not your father.” I tried to act confident, for her sake.

  “But if he’s got that mark, he met with those other kids,” Katie said.

  “Katie, we don’t really know anything yet. We don’t know what happened.” I couldn’t let myself wonder about her father now. There were too many other questions.

  I jumped off the bed and crossed the splintering floor to my parents’ bedroom. I dropped to my knees and opened my father’s lower dresser drawer. Katie was at my side in an instant.

  “Is this your father’s underwear drawer? I’ve never seen ugly boxer shorts like that.” She giggled.

  “I suppose your father’s are silk?” I said, throwing a pair of his shorts at her.

  “Stop it, you goof. They just have snaps.” She actually put the shorts over her head.

  “Shine the flashlight here,” I said. We couldn’t take all day even though it would have been unreal to play with my parents’ dowdy clothes. My parents were a good ten years older than Katie’s and many years less comfortable.

  “Eek!” Katie jumped back at the sight of something in the drawer. Once she got over her shock, she reached her hand in to grab the object I had just revealed.

  “Don’t poke.” I tiptoed my fingers to the ring to avoid touching the bone. I managed to shift it a bit so we could read the initials.

  “There they are…B.L.” Katie lowered her head almost into the drawer.

  “Careful, I don’t want to touch the bones,” I said, pulling away.

  “Any chance B.C. on the knife is really missing a letter?” Katie was up and zoomed way ahead of me.

  We closed the drawer and sat in silence for a moment. Katie jumped back on my bed. She threw the stuffed cat for me to catch.

  “I really don’t want things to change. Gimme my kitty.”

  I threw it back at her. “You scared about your father?”

  “For lots of reasons,” Katie said as she snuggled the cat a minute and then sat up and stared at me very seriously.

  “I’m so lucky you’re my friend.” Her voice trailed off as her eyes seemed to focus on something far away.

  “Me too.” Why did I get so tongue-tied when it came to letting Katie know just how much I liked her? I broke the heavy moment by pushing her back on the bed with a playful shove.

  “Let’s have a slumber party tonight for my birthday!” Katie laughed breathlessly.

  The thought of sleeping next to Katie was overwhelming.

  “Okay,” I agreed, feeling kind of nervous. “But only if you come with us to the lobster pound tonight.”

  ****

  Later that night after the lobster pound, Katie’s cabin again felt safe with its thick, knotty pine walls (not just panels like mine), and wide, braided rugs. Katie had her own bedroom, separate from her parents, and the separate sitting room had over-stuffed wingback chairs and three Hudson Bay throws in front of the second fireplace – a real one, not just a stove.

  Katie and I scrambled into bed; we both gave off the lingering, sweet smell of buttered lobster. The fragrance of lavender wafted in, fused with the aroma of pine, which permeated the whole cabin.

  “Brr! Stay under the covers, I’ll get your pajamas.” Katie offered as she got out of bed to get undressed.

  I snuck peeks at Katie’s ivory creaminess as she changed, at her smooth freckled skin.

  I heard myself say, “What kind of bra is that?”

  I almost dove under the coverlet in embarrassment. I didn’t know where to hide myself! I couldn’t take back the question or pretend I hadn’t been staring at the rainbow satin bra, both before and after she removed it.

  “Oh, this?�
�� Katie seemed unfazed. “My crazy aunt shops all the time and finds these far out things. You were peeking, you rat!” She threw my pajamas, worn flannels with a cat and dog design, but she was smiling coyly.

  “I couldn’t see a thing. But…” I smirked. “It almost glowed in the dark.”

  I was glad to have the excuse of dressing under the covers. I could hide the blush I felt spreading up my cheeks. It wasn’t that dark in the room.

  “It’s a kick, isn’t it?” She giggled as she slid under the blanket with me.

  Cuddling, we both fell asleep quickly. It was more than just the cabin making me feel safe. I felt so at home in Katie’s arms. Tomorrow, we would get to use the chem set to find out more about the bones. Answers would come. Maybe answers to dreams, too.

  In the morning, Katie and I woke up still glued to each other’s side. We lay in bed for a while, reading bits and pieces of the manual that came with the chem set. There were tests for blood and ways to differentiate bone from antler or petrified wood. It was distracting to see Katie’s pale, soft skin close up, and all the more distracting for a strand of her thick, dark hair to tickle me. She didn’t have any idea, did she?

  I wanted to stay in bed with Katie forever, but hunger for pancakes and blueberry syrup won out. Still, as soon as we had put in the right amount of time with our families at breakfast, a different kind of hunger came over us: hunger for answers.

  We crossed the road opposite the dining hall, sliding on pine needles and snapped branches and twigs. We carried the chem set between us, and its bulkiness made it hard to scoot under and between overgrown shrubs and thick, bushy pines.

  All of our finds awaited us: the knife, the shirt, the bone from the crafts cabin. The only thing missing was the finger, still in my father’s dresser. Equipped with chemicals, slides, and the microscope, we tested and waited. A drop of solution here, a shake there, and wait, wait, wait. It seemed like we would be standing there forever, and then the results came in.

  Just as we thought: blood, human.

  Silence bounced back from the walls of the science cabin as the two of us let this new information sink in. This definitely wasn’t a plaything anymore. If these objects had been used in a crime, what about the tools we found near the cabin? Shoot! Was there more evidence just lying around?