The Complete Screech Owls, Volume 1

by Roy MacGregor

  “What on earth is that for?” Data wanted to know.

  “That’s how we’re going to turn on your tape recorder, pal,” Andy said.

  “I can do it myself, thanks.”

  “Not in Buddy O’Reilly’s cabin you can’t.”

  How did I get myself into this? Travis wondered.

  Because he was the smallest, he’d been elected to place the tape recorder in Buddy’s cabin, which was just behind the main hall. Nish and Andy had tracked Buddy down–he was drinking beer in the kitchen with the cook while the Blue Jays game played on a little TV in the corner–and they kept up a watch, signalling to Data by the shed, who signalled to Lars at the corner of Buddy’s cabin, who kept Travis up to date.

  “Still clear,” Lars would hiss. “Still clear.”

  Travis thought his heart was going to rip right through his chest. He couldn’t swallow. He couldn’t talk. But he was doing it, not because he wanted to do mischief or because he felt any pressure to do it–but because he wanted to. He couldn’t stand Buddy O’Reilly, and if Nish was going to get his revenge, then Travis Lindsay wanted a part of it for himself. He was actually enjoying this, even if he was scared half out of his wits.

  He found the perfect place for Data’s tape recorder: tucked out of sight under the steel frame of Buddy’s bed, but close enough for the hockey stick to reach to turn it on. Andy had earlier cut a small flap in the screen with his jackknife, so they wouldn’t have to risk opening and closing the screen door once Buddy was inside and asleep.

  Travis checked the tape to make sure it had been rewound, then checked the buttons to make sure the pause wasn’t on. He had scooted out and away with Lars long before the signal came from Nish and Andy that Buddy and the cook had turned off the game. Buddy had drained his last beer and was headed for bed.

  By the time Buddy shut the door to his cabin, the boys were completely hidden in the dark cedars that grew between Buddy’s cabin and the shed. They had only to wait. The stars were not as bright now as they had been earlier, but they were still out in the eastern half of the sky. To the west, the sky was darkening. Cloud cover was moving in. In the distance, Travis could make out the odd low rumble: the sound of an advancing storm. Perhaps it would pass them by, but even if it didn’t, it was still a long way off. They’d have time.

  “I wish I had a smoke,” said Nish.

  “Somebody’d see the light,” countered Travis. He hated it when Nish talked this way, trying to be something he wasn’t.

  “Then a chew,” said Nish.

  “You’d chew tobacco?” said Data, disgusted.

  “Yuk!” said Lars.

  “Shhhhhh…,” said Andy.

  Buddy’s light had been out for some time. When Andy had got them quiet, they all listened as hard as they could. They could hear an owl in the distance. And every once in a while a distant rumble from the far-away storm.

  “He’s snoring,” said Andy. “Let’s go!”

  They all waited a moment longer, just to be sure. It was snoring all right. And it was coming from Buddy’s cabin. Andy scrambled out of the cedars, followed by Nish. Travis could hear Nish’s breathing: excited, a bit frightened.

  With the other boys trailing, Andy and Nish made their way to the cabin door. Buddy had shut only the screen door so as to let in the cool air, and they could make out his bed in the moonlight.

  Buddy’s mouth was open. He was dead to the world. His left hand was over the side of the bed, the palm wide open. Andy gave a hand signal for Nish to bring the stick-and-hanger combination. He was already pulling back the flap of screen that he’d cut earlier.

  Nish attached a big soup spoon to the stick and piled it high with shaving cream. The can made a low, quiet hisssss. Very slowly, they worked the stick in through the flap. Expertly, Nish dumped the light-as-air cream into Buddy’s hand. Buddy didn’t even flinch. Working together, silently, Nish and Andy pulled the stick back out and removed the spoon. Leaning low, they could make out the shadow of Data’s boom box, so they knew where to aim. With Andy steadying the stick, Nish lined it up and very gently, very carefully, pushed the button.

  Quickly, they removed the stick once more. Andy fumbled for the feather to tickle Buddy’s nose. He dropped it, and picked it up again. They would have to move fast. He began wrapping the tape around the feather’s stem.

  RRRRRIIIIINNNGGGGG!

  It was Buddy’s cellphone. Travis’s heart almost flew through the top of his head.

  The phone. The phone! The cellphone was ruining everything.

  Andy and Nish scrambled away from the door and leapt back into the cedars after the others.

  They could hear Buddy swearing through the screen.

  “What the–?”

  A light went on.

  “Who the hell–?”

  They could see him shaking his hand. He had grabbed the phone with the hand full of shaving cream, and now it was all over everything. The precious phone slipped and fell, crashing to the floor. Buddy cursed and grabbed it with his other hand.

  “Hang on! Hang on!” Buddy shouted. “Just a damned minute, okay? Some kid snuck in here and…”

  The Screech Owls didn’t have to hear any more. They were already hightailing it back to “Osprey,” laughing so hard they could hardly catch their breath.

  Maybe it hadn’t worked out according to plan. But this way–with shaving cream all over the phone, all over Buddy’s ear, all over his hand, all over his room–the result was better than anything they could have imagined.

  Whoever had made that telephone call to Buddy at that particular moment, Thank you, thank you, thank you…

  “KKKKKK-RRRRRAAAAACKKKKKKKKK!!”

  Travis sat straight up in his bunk, his eyes wide open. The last time he had been in this cabin and heard a crack like that it had been instantly followed by a rush of air and the crash of the falling hemlock. This time, however, there was only the burst of thunder, followed by nothing. He could hear rumbling in the distance; the storm was closer, but still not raining on the camp. The crack that had woken him must have been moving ahead of the pack. Travis lay back down in his bed and was soon fast asleep once again.

  The Owls and Aeros practised in the morning. It was, by far, the finest practice so far that week. It was almost exactly as Travis had envisioned hockey camp would be. Muck set up the drills, and Jason and Simon ran them. Morley Clifford was there, and came out during the break with Gatorade and sliced oranges for the players.

  The difference, everyone knew, was that Buddy O’Reilly wasn’t around. No fancy tracksuit with his name all over it. No shrieking whistle. No chewing out anybody who failed to do exactly as he said. No picking on Nish.

  They played a few games–even British Bulldog, which they hadn’t played since novice–and then had a wild and crazy scrimmage, defencemen and goaltenders against forwards. The goalies and defence won by about a zillion-to-ten, because Travis’s side had no one with the slightest notion of how to make a save.

  Nish was the hero of the scrimmage. His puck-carrying abilities were the best of all the defence. He once even set up Jennie Staples, a goaltender, for a goal when he went in on the last forward back–poor Dmitri–faked him to the ice, and then sent a perfect Sarah-like pass back between his skates to Jennie, who was driving to the net as fast as her big goalie pads would let her.

  After the goal, Nish skated over to Sarah Cuthbertson and went down on both knees, his head bowed. It was Nish’s way of finally apologizing for what he’d done to her after she had made the same play the day before. Sarah knew Nish well enough to know how hard this was for him. She wasn’t interested in any revenge that might involve hammering Nish head-first into the boards. She laughed, turned her stick around, and tapped him on both shoulders: Sir Nish, Knight of the Between-Your-Skates Pass.

  Practice over, the happy Screech Owls and Aeros were on the buses to go back to camp, when Simon and Jason came down the aisle and leaned over the seat Travis was sharing with Nish.
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  “Good on you, Nishikawa,” Simon said.

  “Classy act, Nish–proud of you,” Jason added.

  Nish nodded and looked down. Travis could see that his friend was battling to contain a smile; he was looking straight down into his lap, trying with all his might to remain serious.

  Sarah came along, the last player to board the bus. She, too, stopped as she passed.

  “You guys ready for adventure?” she asked.

  Nish looked up. “Whatdya mean?”

  “Muck’s given me permission to take you two out in a canoe to the little island this afternoon. We can swim and jump from the rocks.”

  Travis looked up, unsure. “It’s okay?”

  “Of course it’s okay. I’m a fully qualified Red Cross lifeguard, you know. Nish goes down, I can go get him.”

  Travis smiled. “Would you have to?”

  “Are you up for it?” Sarah asked.

  “Sure,” said Travis.

  “Nish?”

  Nish just nodded. He wasn’t even trying to fight the grin any more.

  Before they took out the canoe, Travis and Nish had to take care of their wet hockey equipment. They spread it on the ground in front of the cabin so it would dry in the sun. Travis noticed there wasn’t even a light dew on the grass, and he remembered the storm during the night. It must have passed right over the camp without raining. He wondered if the lightning with the single clap of thunder had struck anything.

  “Let’s go!” Nish shouted.

  Nish was excited. Before he’d come to camp, he’d never even been in a canoe. Now he thought that, next to Sea-doos–and anything else that had an outboard engine, for that matter–canoes were a terrific way to move about the water. Like the others, he thought the silence was incredible, the way they could sneak up on almost anything: the loons, the ducks, maybe even old Snappy sitting out sunning on a log.

  The two boys ran across the main camp grounds and down along the beach to the boathouse. Sarah was already there, waiting for them.

  “I thought maybe you’d chickened out,” she said.

  “You seem to forget you knighted me,” said Nish. “I’m ready for anything–even hand-to-hand combat with that stupid turtle.”

  “Right,” Sarah laughed.

  Nish was anxious to get going. He opened the door to the boathouse and the three friends entered. Inside, the air was musty from woodrot and years of wet life-preservers. But it also smelled neat. The walls had never been painted, and there was the faint odour of cedar, and of oil and gas and outboards–the smells of summer at the lake. They could hear the waves lapping lightly under the boat slip. A swallow left its nest high in the beams and swooped out under the main door.

  There were two canoes in the boathouse. One was missing a stern seat, so they moved out the good one and began loading up. Sarah had even brought a small picnic for them.

  “I’ll get the paddles,” offered Travis.

  He looked around: old fishing rods, sails, rudders, oars, a fibreglass canoe with a great gaping hole in its side, an auger for drilling holes in the ice on the lake in winter, several old propane lamps that needed cleaning, water-skis, the tube, a new wakeboard.

  “Over there!” Sarah called to him.

  She was pointing to a jumble of ropes and stacked-up gas tanks on the far side of the slip.

  Travis jumped across the slip, took one step, and crashed down onto the rough boards.

  “Walk much?” Nish shouted. He was laughing.

  “You okay, Trav?” Sarah called.

  “I slipped on something,” Travis answered. He felt okay. He wasn’t hurt. He had put his arm down to break his fall, and something had jabbed him near the wrist. “There was something here on the boards,” he said, struggling up.

  “Yeah,” laughed Nish. “Your own shadow!”

  Travis bent down to look. It was difficult to see. He rubbed his arm. Whatever it was he’d landed on was hard. A short distance away, something was shining in the dim light of the boathouse. He crept over and picked it up. Without a word he held it out in the palm of his hand for the others to see.

  Sarah caught her breath. “A bullet?”

  It wasn’t a live bullet, it was an empty shell. It had been fired. Travis sniffed it: he could smell gunpowder.

  Could this have been the crack of thunder that woke him up last night?

  “What’s that on your arm?” said Nish. He was pointing at Travis’s other arm, not the one that had landed on the shell. Travis felt it.

  Goo!

  “What is it?” Sarah asked. She seemed concerned.

  “I don’t know,” Travis said.

  “Maybe that bird we scared out left you a present.” Nish giggled. He didn’t seem in the least concerned.

  “It’s pitch,” said Sarah. “Pitch from the boards.”

  “I guess,” said Travis.

  There was a rag near the gas cans. He picked it up and wiped his arm. Whatever the goo was, it was sticky. Probably pitch. He rubbed hard and got most of it off.

  “Let’s get going!” Nish called. “Day’s a-wasting!”

  Travis carried the paddles over to the canoe. Nish was already in, and Sarah handed him the waterproof bag with the sandwiches and drinks.

  “We’re short two life-preservers,” Sarah noted.

  “We don’t need them,” Nish said. He already had one on and was keen to get going.

  “We’re not going anywhere if we don’t all have one,” said Sarah.

  “Okay, okay–but let’s get a move on!” Nish said. “There’s probably a couple over there where you found the paddles, Trav.”

  Travis went around the slip this time, not wanting to jump across and risk another fall. His arm was throbbing a bit. He’d have a bruise.

  Everything was piled up in this corner as if it had just been thrown there–and yet everything else in the boathouse had been very neatly stored. It made no sense. He pulled away a couple of the gas cans, some rope, and a pair of old oars. He yanked at a plastic tarp that had been thrown into the mess. It was stuck, but he was sure he could see the faded red of a life-preserver underneath. He yanked again and the tarpaulin gave a little.

  There was something sticky on it. It felt the same as what had been on his arm. It couldn’t be pitch. What was it?

  Blood?

  He pulled again, and the tarp came free.

  When Travis saw what had been hidden underneath, he gasped. He must be mistaken! The shadows…the bad light…

  He moved so more light could get in. It was an arm, the fingers tightened as if trying to hold something. The arm went in under an overturned canoe. And beneath the canoe, presumably, was the rest of the body.

  “Hurry up!” Nish called.

  Travis tried to speak, but he couldn’t.

  “Travis!” Sarah called sharply. “What’s wrong with you?”

  Travis stammered, then spit it out: “Th-th-there’s a b-b-body under here!”

  “A what!” Nish laughed.

  “What?” said Sarah. She wasn’t laughing.

  Travis felt frozen, unable to move. He could see Sarah coming toward him uneasily. And he could see Nish scrambling to get out of the canoe.

  “What do you mean a ‘body’?” Sarah asked.

  Travis moved aside slightly so she could see. He heard her breath catch.

  “Lemme see!” Nish shouted. He was scrambling across the planking.

  “Wh-wh-who is it?” Sarah stammered.

  “I don’t know,” Travis answered. He thought he did, though. He knew the jacket.

  “Move the canoe!” Nish shouted. He was already pulling at the bow. “Help me!”

  Travis moved without thinking. It was as if he was watching a movie of himself, stepping over and reaching down and taking the other side of the bow, and lifting…

  Most of the body was in dark shadow, but as they raised the canoe higher, some dim light from the side door crept over its chest, and towards the face.

  “Budd
y!” Sarah hissed.

  “Is he dead?” Nish shouted. He couldn’t see as well as the others. The bow of the canoe was in his way, and he wanted to be closer to the action.

  “I think so,” said Sarah. But there could be no doubt. Buddy was white as a ghost. His face looked as if it had been carved out of candle wax. His eyes were staring past Travis, seeing nothing.

  “Let’s get out of here,” said Travis.

  “We better find Muck,” said Sarah.

  They set the canoe back down, carefully covering the hideous dead face of Buddy O’Reilly.

  And then they ran, Nish well out in front of the others.

  This was no way to picture a summer hockey camp. There were police cars everywhere. There was police crime-site ribbon around the boathouse, Buddy’s 4x4, even his sleeping cabin.

  “Am I going to get my tape recorder back?” Data wanted to know.

  Just like Data, Travis thought–from another planet. Who cared about his stupid tape recorder? He, Travis, had seen a dead body and he couldn’t get Buddy O’Reilly’s dead, empty stare out of his mind. He and Nish and Sarah were prime witnesses. They had found the body, and the bullet, and the blood. And Data wanted to talk about his tape recorder? Give me a break, Travis thought.

  Muck and Morley Clifford had taken charge. They had called the police, and the police had brought along an ambulance. Men in white coats removed Buddy’s body on a stretcher. It had been covered with a blanket when they carried it from the boathouse to the ambulance, but it was still a body. And everyone watching felt ill thinking that Buddy O’Reilly was dead, no matter what they may have thought of him alive.

  “I saw him close up,” Nish told the boys in “Osprey.” Travis didn’t bother disputing Nish’s tale. He knew Nish hadn’t seen much. Travis and Sarah had seen everything. But he wasn’t about to start bragging about it.

  Muck had phoned the parents in the morning. Some were already staying at campgrounds and lodges in the area, and they arrived immediately. Others were coming from down south.

  Several of the parents had wanted to take their children away immediately, but the police said everyone was to stay where they were for the time being. They wanted to interview everyone who had been in either camp, just in case they knew something or had seen something, perhaps without even realizing it might be important. Some of the parents got angry about this, saying there was still a murderer about. But Sarah’s father and Travis’s father held a parents’ meeting in the main lodge, and at the end of it everyone was agreed, if a bit uneasy, to let the kids stay on. The only condition they asked for was that police be stationed at the camp, and the police were only too happy to comply.