Strawberry Summer

by Cynthia Blair

  “Oh.”

  “My twin sister.”

  “Oh! You mean there are two of you?” Richard chuckled.

  “In appearance only. We’re really quite different. But you’ll find that out for yourself!”

  As she and Richard started up the path leading

  from the arts and crafts building to the dining hall,

  Susan felt more optimistic about the summer ahead

  than she ever had before. The beautiful lake and

  woods, a bus filled with enthusiastic campers, a

  whole wealth of art supplies to work with ...

  and a charming boy named Richard with whom to

  share the next six weeks. It was all turning out

  perfectly after all.

  For now, the “ghosts” that haunted Camp Pine-wood seemed very far away indeed.

  Chapter Four

  The twins’ first full day at Camp Pinewood went well. The children all seemed so gleeful about being back at camp. Even the few who were already homesick allowed themselves to be cajoled out of their tearfulness with offers of a swim or the chance to ride in a canoe. Linda and Sam were eager to show their new cabinmates around. And, as Susan had predicted, Richard and Chris liked each other right off.

  It was a long day, and by evening, Chris and Susan were both tired. But not too tired to go to the “Welcome” party that the Reeds always held for counselors on the first night of camp. Linda was also going, while Sam, tired out from a full day of nature walks, volunteered to be one of the counselors who stayed behind to keep an eye on the campers. Putting on sundresses and sandals for the occasion energized the twins, and by the time they walked over to the Reeds’ house, they were already in a festive mood.

  “Come on in, girls!” Mr. Reed, posted at the front door, greeted them heartily. “Help yourself to a glass of lemonade and some of those homemade cookies over there. Make yourselves at home!”

  Surveying the twins carefully, he added, “I know you said that it was easy to tell you two apart ... but for the life of me, I don’t know which one’s Chris and which one’s Susan!”

  The party was already well under way. Rock music played softly in the background, and some of the counselors were dancing in one corner of the living room. Laid out on the dining room table was a generous display of cold drinks, pretzels, and cookies. Somebody, probably Mrs. Reed, had obviously put in long hours of baking in order to make things special for the party.

  Following Mr. Reed’s advice, Susan went directly over to the refreshment table and helped herself to a glass of lemonade.

  “Pretty thirsty, huh?”

  She whirled around and found herself face to face with Richard.

  “I guess this afternoon’s session of making papier-mâché puppets with twenty-five eight-year-olds really took a lot out of you!”

  “It was a long day,” Susan admitted with a chuckle. “But I think it’s turning out to be even more fun than I expected. For one thing, I’m finding out that teaching art is a lot different from doing art!”

  “That’s for sure. One major difference, I’ve found, is that doing it yourself is a lot less noisy!”

  Armed with glasses of lemonade and some of Mrs. Reed’s homemade cookies, Susan and Richard ambled out to the porch that ran along the back of the house. It offered an unparalleled view of Lake Majestic. It was a clear night, and the moonlight reflecting off the waves was magnificent. Susan felt as if she had stepped into a picture postcard.

  Chris, meanwhile, had been taken under Linda’s wings. As a much more seasoned counselor, she already knew a lot of the other Camp Pinewood regulars. She introduced her around, and while Chris found it difficult to remember everyone’s name, she could already tell that they were a great bunch. Before long, they were all talking and laughing together as a group, each one trying to outdo the others with humorous recollections of things that had happened in past years. The time that some of the kids put salt in all the sugar bowls, for example, and the annual water sports competition between the campers and the counselors.

  After a while, Chris began to get the feeling that someone was staring at her. Her eyes automatically traveled to the door that led into the Reeds’ kitchen. Alan Reed was standing there, looking as if he wanted to join the crowd but hesitating, probably out of shyness. But it was Chris he was watching.

  She blushed, wondering why it was that he had singled her out. She had to admit that as uncomfortable as the boy made her feel, with his cold green staring eyes and stony silences, there was something intriguing about him. As she sat with the group of counselors, aware of his eyes upon her, she tried to tell herself that she simply felt sorry for him, since he seemed to be kind of a loner. But she couldn’t help wondering if there was more to it.

  Suddenly, she stood up and walked over to the refreshment table, pretending to want another cold drink. But the table also happened to be located right next to the kitchen door. As she casually poured herself a second glass of lemonade, she glanced over at Alan and smiled.

  “Hello again,” she said, trying to sound friendly.

  “Hello.”

  The tall, lean boy looked a lot less forbidding than he had the first time she’d seen him. His straight black hair had been combed, and he was dressed in the same kind of T-shirt and khaki pants that most of the other boys were wearing. Most of all, the look in his eyes was much more open, without the guardedness she had seen in them the day before, when he had picked her up on the driveway.

  He hesitated, then came over and helped himself to some lemonade. “It looks like everybody is having a good time.” He gestured toward the crowd in the living room, still laughing together about the funnier moments in Camp Pinewood’s history. Chris noticed that Richard and Susan had just come in from outside to join them.

  “Yes,” she agreed. “And from what I can tell, it also looks like everybody really enjoys working here at Camp Pinewood. Listening to them makes me glad that I’m here. I feel as if I’m lucky to be part of all this.”

  “That’s a shame.” Alan’s voice had become bitter, and that same icy look she had seen before had come into his eyes again. “I hate to disappoint you and everybody else, but I’m afraid that at the moment the future of Camp Pinewood looks kind of dismal.”

  “So I’ve heard.”

  “I wish I could be as carefree as they all are tonight,” he went on, staring off at the crowd of counselors but seeming not to really see them.

  There was an awkward silence. Chris broke it, her voice strangely high-pitched from its forced cheerfulness. “Well, I guess I’ll go back to the others. I see my sister just reappeared. I thought she’d gotten lost....”

  “I’m sorry,” Alan said suddenly, his voice softer. “I didn’t mean to sound so angry. Or to lay my family’s problems on you. Please don’t just walk away.”

  “O-okay.” Chris was surprised by this sudden change. She was also surprised to see this other side of Alan Reed that was suddenly emerging. And curious to know more about it.

  “Why don’t we go outside on the porch?” he suggested. “It’ll be much quieter there. Besides, there’s a full moon out tonight. You should see how beautiful Lake Majestic looks.

  “So, you live in Whittington,” Alan said as they leaned against the porch railing, taking in the view and sipping their lemonade. “That’s about a hundred fifty miles from here, isn’t it?”

  “Why, yes, it is.” Chris was surprised. “How did you know where I’m from?”

  “Oh, I just happened to check out your application. I figure it can’t hurt to know something about the people who work for my folks.” He tried to keep his voice light, but it was obvious to Chris that Alan didn’t bother to “research” all of the counselors.

  “What else do you know about me?”

  “Not too much. But I hope to find out more.”

  His last remark really startled her. And here she’d thought he was staring at her from across the room because he didn’t like her!
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  “Well, of the two of us, I’d say that you’re the mysterious one, Alan Reed! You seem so distant ... as if you’re a thousand miles away.”

  “Yeah, I know. The truth is, I have been pretty preoccupied lately. Worried about the camp, and my parents, too.

  “But tonight is supposed to be a night for celebrating, not worrying! We’ve got the whole summer ahead of us. Besides, I shouldn’t be burdening you with my family’s problems, anyway. Hey—I have an idea. Are you in a daring mood tonight?”

  “Pretty daring ... Why?”

  “How about a moonlight swim?”

  “Well ...”

  “Come on. We’ll just slip away, and no one will ever even notice that we’re gone. I know I’m in good hands, since you are the swimming instructor and all. Having you there is even safer than inviting along a lifeguard! Besides, you’ve got to admit that Lake Majestic looks pretty inviting!”

  Chris laughed. “You certainly can be convincing! All right, it sounds like fun. Let me go change into a suit, and I’ll meet you at the boathouse as soon as I can.”

  “You’re on!”

  Fifteen minutes later, the two of them were splashing around in the lake, laughing like children who were doing something they weren’t really supposed to be doing. Unwinding in the cool, refreshing water was the perfect ending to the first day of camp.

  “Maybe we’d better get back to the party, before anyone misses us,” Chris said after a while. “I wouldn’t want to hurt your parents’ feelings.”

  “Don’t you think they’ll notice that their son and their swimming instructor both have unusually wet hair?” Alan grinned.

  “Oh, you’re right! I guess that’s the end of that party.” Chris sat cross-legged on the dock, wrapped in the towel she’d brought along. She did feel bad about deserting the party ... but at the same time, she was having a wonderful time. Her swim had revitalized her, it was lovely sitting out by the moonlit lake ... and Alan Reed, much to her continued surprise, was turning out to be excellent company.

  “Since you’re the one who dragged me away from all those homemade cookies, I’d say the very least you can do is tell me all about yourself.”

  “There’s not much to tell.” Alan shrugged. “During the summers, I work here. During the year, I go to high school. I’ll be a senior next year. I’m on the basketball team and the school newspaper, my best subject is science, and I enjoy learning about nature. In fact, I’m really looking forward to Camp Pinewood’s first annual outing next Tuesday.”

  Chris was puzzled. “I don’t remember hearing about any outing.”

  “It’s always one of the hits of the summer. We’re taking the ten-year-olds to a local wildlife preserve. We pack them up with box lunches, load them onto the big blue bus, and lead them on a full day of exploring the nature preserve. It’s always one of the highlights of my vacation.”

  “It sounds like fun. I don’t suppose you can find a place for a swimming instructor....”

  Alan laughed. “I’m afraid you’ll have to stay here and entertain all the other kids, those who aren’t lucky enough to come along.

  “Now, if I don’t get into some warm, dry clothes soon, I think I may turn into a snowman! Unfortunately, I didn’t have the foresight to bring along a towel!”

  “I guess these moonlight swims are not part of your normal schedule,” Chris teased. “But it is getting chilly, now that you mention it. Even with this towel that I had the ‘foresight’ to bring along, I’m getting cold. I’d better go back to my cabin and change, too.”

  “Okay. I’ll walk you back.”

  “Afraid I’ll get lost in the dark?”

  “I could certainly use that as an excuse,” said Alan. “After all, I know these rocky paths a lot better than you do. Or I could just be honest and say that I’m having such a good time that I don’t want the evening to end yet.”

  “Well, that’s hard to argue with. Especially since I feel exactly the same way!”

  Arm in arm, Chris and Alan began the uphill climb from the lake to the cabins. They were laughing loudly, wrapped up in their joy over having found someone they could have so much fun with.

  They never even suspected that they were being watched.

  Chapter Five

  The morning of the ten-year-olds’ outing to the Lake Majestic Wildlife Preserve, a sprawling national park over on the other side of the lake, Jake Reed awoke with the feeling that it was going to turn out to be a perfect day. The sun was shining brightly, its heat tempered by the cool breeze that wafted off the lake. The bus was all checked out and ready to go; the afternoon before, he and Alan had spent several hours working on the motor, anxious to make sure that the first outing of the camp season proceeded smoothly. And probably most important, the campers themselves were excited. Although camp had only been in session for a little more than a week, Samantha and the other nature counselors had already given them a good background in birds, trees, and flowers—exactly the kind of thing they would be seeing at the wildlife preserve.

  Jake was whistling as he strode out of the house, waving to Alan, who was up ahead, near the bus. But as soon as he saw the expression on his son’s face, his whistling stopped.

  “Oh, no!” he cried. “What is it this time, Alan?”

  “Somebody decided we could make the trip without air in our tires,” Alan said grimly, gesturing toward the bus.

  Sure enough, the air had been let out of all four of the tires. Not just a little, either; every one of them was completely flat. The sight of the tremendous blue bus standing by the side of the road on four flabby black tires might have been comical if it hadn’t been for the fact that the mere sight of it made Jake Reed’s stomach tighten.

  “Well, we’ll just have to get the hand pump and start pumping.”

  “That’ll take at least an hour. It’s almost eight, and we told the kids we’d be leaving at eight-thirty on the dot.”

  “We’ll just have to explain that we need to make a few repairs on the bus before we can get going.” Jake tried to sound matter-of-fact, but he knew as well as Alan that such a delay—especially where something as exciting as an outing to a wildlife preserve was concerned—was exactly the kind of thing that would be reported to parents immediately, in letters and telephone calls home.

  “I’ll get the pump,” Alan offered. “But first I’ll tell Mom to alert the counselors. Maybe they can come up with some way to distract a few dozen disappointed ten-year-olds.”

  At nine o’clock, Alan and his father were still pumping up the last tire. The campers started arriving, led by their counselors, chattering away excitedly as they anticipated the journey ahead. They’d already been looking forward to it for days. They were armed with binoculars, box lunches, and sweaters.

  “Just in time,” muttered Jake. “I’d hate to have to tell this crowd that we still weren’t ready for ‘em.”

  Alan shared his father’s relief. As he watched the campers pile onto the bus, he told himself that a half-hour delay was really nothing to get upset about. He watched from the side of the road, expecting to see his father drive away with a busload of cheering kids.

  But as his father went to start the engine, it resisted, offering little besides a pessimistic whirring sound.

  Something else was wrong.

  Immediately Alan sprang into action. Within seconds he was poking around the motor, trying to find out what was going on.

  “Just another minute or so, kids,” he heard his father call to the campers with false heartiness, “We’ll have this big blue machine moving in no time!”

  It took Alan a few minutes to figure out what had happened. At first, it looked as if everything was in order. He was puzzled. But then he checked under the distributor cap—not a place it would ordinarily occur to him to look—and discovered that the rotor was missing. Someone had taken it.

  “Dad, could I talk to you a minute?” He tried to keep the fury out of his voice.

  “Just a second,
kids. I think Alan’s found out what the problem is.”

  “I found the problem, all right,” he said angrily, once his father had come closer, out of earshot of the children. “Someone stole the rotor.”

  Jake sighed heavily. “They probably didn’t steal it—just hid it someplace cute, like in the refrigerator or underneath the front porch. Well, kids or no kids, I guess the only thing for us to do is drive the pickup into town and get a new rotor. Rudy’s opens at nine, doesn’t it?”

  “I’ll go,” Alan volunteered.

  But as soon as he got near the pickup, parked on the other side of the house, he stopped dead in his tracks.

  The air had been let out of all four of the truck’s tires, as well.

  He felt like stomping around and yelling and then going out to find the person who was responsible for all this. But he couldn’t. So instead, he went back to his father, who was explaining to the busload of wailing ten-year-olds that their departure would have to be postponed once again—for at least another hour.

  “Better make that two hours, Dad,” Alan muttered. “It looks like the pickup isn’t going anywhere, either. At least until we take the time to pump up its tires, too.”

  Jake Reed shook his head slowly. “We’d better cancel the trip altogether. For today, anyway. Do you want to be the one to break the news to sixty eager kids who are already jumping out of their skins, or should I?”

  By lunchtime, the entire camp was buzzing about the morning’s canceled trip to the Lake Majestic Wildlife Preserve. True, it had been rescheduled for the following week. But to the ten-year-olds who had been all ready to go, the following week seemed very far away indeed. And all the other campers were sympathetic. They knew how disappointed they would have been if it had been they who were counting on a trip. And even though they understood all about the broken bus and pickup truck, they couldn’t help blaming it all on the staff of Camp Pinewood.

  “I’m going to tell my mother and father about this,” said Lucy Kramer, one of the camp’s more outspoken ten-year-olds. She had just sat down at one of the long dining room tables. To help reverse the somber mood that had fallen over the camp, the Reeds had ordered the kitchen staff to prepare a special lunch. And Lucy had certainly taken advantage of it. Her tray was piled high with french fries and chocolate cake-—and little else besides.