Kyle's Island (5 page)

“Can I go too?”

“I guess. If Mom'll let you stay up that late.”

“Whoopee!” Josh was off and running up the steps, searching for Mom.

Before I followed him, I turned and looked back at the island. We'd been here three days, and I hadn't been on the island yet. I'd rowed around it every morning, my eyes searching for the most likely place to push through the barrier of trees hiding the interior. It didn't look very hospitable. But that wasn't going to stop me. As soon as I had a whole day to myself, I'd be there.

IT WAS AFTER TEN THAT NIGHT
before I figured it was dark enough to go out. I closed my book and shook Josh's shoulder. He'd fallen asleep right after supper. If he didn't wake easily, I was going to let him sleep. But he was awake in an instant. He wanted to go right out, and I had a tough time convincing him that he had to bundle up and put mosquito repellent on first. “Why do I have to wear a jacket?” he complained. “It's summer.”

“Go out on the porch for a minute and you'll see. It gets chilly here when the sun goes down. Besides, a jacket will help against the mosquitoes. They're fierce down by the water.”

I guess my tone convinced him, because he didn't do any more grumbling. We went out the kitchen door, past Mom and Andrea and Vicki, who were playing five hundred rummy at the kitchen table. “Not too long, now,” Mom said.

“We won't be.”

We didn't turn on the spotlight at the bottom of the hill, just used the flashlight to guide our footsteps. There was another toad right next to the steps—at least I thought it was another toad. Josh was sure it was “his,” the one he'd turned loose right before supper. “I know it's Freddy. I can tell by his eyes,” he said. “See how big they are?”

“All toads have big eyes,” I said. For a minute after I said that, I was afraid he was going to cry. I felt bad, but I have to help him grow up—since Dad's not here to do it.

When we stepped onto the grass at the bottom of the hill, I told Josh, “Walk gently. They can feel the vibrations if you step down heavy.” I directed the flashlight beam into the grass. “Don't look right at the center of the beam. They hide from the light, and you won't find any there. Look at the shadows around the edge of the circle.”

It was only a minute or two before I saw one, and I held the flashlight steady while I knelt down and reached out to grab the worm. “You can't pull too hard or you'll tear it in half,” I explained. “But you have to pull some, because they'll try to slide back down into their holes.” I pulled gently. “Got him!” I said. “You can get the next one.”

Josh turned out to be good at it. Maybe because he's closer to the ground, he seemed to spot them before I did.
We got about twenty, and then I thought we should go back inside. But he wanted to keep hunting, so I let him hold the flashlight and keep on while I walked down to the shore.

I love the lake at night. The water is black and mysterious-looking. It seems almost solid in the dark, like you could walk on it. The waves are quieter than in the daytime. They brush against the rocks along the shore with little kissing sounds. I just stood there a while, wondering what it would be like to be on the island at night. Kind of scary maybe. Did it have any animals? I knew there was an owl. I could hear him sometimes. I could hardly wait to get out there. Josh was too little to go along—he should wait until he's my age—but I could bring something back for him. Maybe one of the turtles that sunned on the fallen tree along the south shore.

A mosquito hummed around my face, and I slapped at it. I remembered I'd promised Mom I wouldn't keep Josh out too late. “C'mon, Josh. That's all for tonight!”

I expected an argument, because he can be kind of bratty sometimes, but he came running over with the coffee can. “I caught seven by myself, Kyle. Big ones! Wait till I tell Vicki! I'll bet she wouldn't even touch one, would she?”

“You won't believe this, but Vicki's an old hand with worms,” I answered. “Dad taught her to bait her own hook
a long time ago. He told her no self-respecting fisherman would make someone else do that for them.”

“I wish Dad were here, don't you?”

“No,” I said shortly. “If he doesn't want to be here, I don't want him here. I've quit missing him, anyway.” That wasn't quite true, but I thought I'd better say it, so Josh wouldn't keep expecting Dad to show up. A couple of times he'd said that he knew Dad wouldn't miss the whole vacation, that he would be here sometime. I knew better.

We covered the worm can, put it on the old table where we clean fish, and started back up the hill. Josh slipped his warm hand into mine. He's kind of a baby sometimes. But it was nice, in a way.

When we got back into the cottage, Mom sent Josh to bed right away. “Last hand, girls,” she said. “I'm going to win, anyway.”

“Want to play when Mom's done, Kyle?” Vicki asked.

“Sure,” I said.

I picked up the score pad. “Jeez, Vicki,” I complained. “Sure you can't write any smaller? I can hardly read these numbers.”

“At least I don't waste paper that way,” she said as she dealt. She had a point. We could probably save a forest a year if everyone wrote as small as she does.

Mom was right—she won on the next hand. She pushed back her chair, kissed us good night, and went into the main room. “Don't stay up too late,” she warned as she closed the door behind her.

“I'm tired of five hundred,” Andrea said. “How about Yahtzee instead?”

Vicki stopped shuffling. “Okay with me,” she said. “Kyle?”

“Yahtzee's good.”

So we put away the cards and got out the dice. Yahtzee's a good game for three. You can play and talk at the same time, so you don't get bored when it's not your turn.

“So what really happened with Mrs. Thompson and the toad, Kyle?” Andrea asked as Vicki was rolling.

So I told them, and when I got to the point where Mrs. Thompson was up on the chair, screaming, “Get him! Get him!” I climbed up on my chair to imitate her and we all laughed so loud that Mom called, “Quiet in there!”

We settled down and played a couple of games, but I got sleepy pretty quick. When you're getting up to fish around five every morning, you don't feel like staying up late. At the end of the third game, which I won, I shoved the dice over to Vicki and said, “Enough for me. I'm going to bed.”

Vicki and Andrea exchanged a glance. It almost felt like
they were relieved I was leaving. It made me feel a little peculiar. Andrea was my twin, not Vicki's. “You two going to stay up?” I asked in what I hoped was a casual tone.

“For a while,” Vicki said.

“Are you going out fishing early, Kyle?” Andrea asked.

“You want to go along?”

“No, but wake me up when you leave, will you?”

“Wake you? Why?”

“Ask me no questions; I'll tell you no lies,” she said in a teasing voice. As soon as she said it, I realized. My birthday was less than a month away. She was planning something. Of course, if it were my real birthday, it would be Andrea's, too, but when we were just little, Mom had suggested we pick separate birthdays, anytime in the year, so that we would each have a day that was ours alone. I was glad she'd done it, because our real birthday was the day after Christmas, and who wants a birthday then? I'd picked July 19, because nineteen is my lucky number, and that way we could celebrate at the lake. Andrea'd picked September 19, so she could be like me but have a school birthday. That's important when you're little.

What could she be planning? It's not like we had lots of places to shop around here. Oh, well, knowing Andrea, it would be something I'd like. She always knew. Too bad
she didn't have the money to pay the taxes on the cottage. That's what I really wanted.

I guess not every family makes a big deal out of birthdays, but ours does. Last January we'd had a really big celebration for Dad's fortieth birthday. It was a surprise party, and all the neighbors came and brought silly getting-old gifts like a magnifying glass, in case his sight got bad, and a box of prunes, in case he began to have trouble that way. (I'm not sure Dad thought that one was funny, but everyone else did.)

I started thinking. January 10. Thirty-five days later he left. That night, when he was blowing out candles and laughing and joking, was he already planning to leave us? I thought back. Vicki and Andrea and I had helped pour sodas and pass around snacks. I thought Dad was having a good time—he actually ate a piece of the cake Mom made for him, although he hardly ever eats sweets. He doesn't even put sugar on his cereal. Anyway, that night he did have a piece of the cake, and he told jokes and laughed and thanked everyone for coming. After the party we helped Mom clean up. When the kitchen was finished, we said good night, and Mom said she was tired, too. “I'm going on to bed now,” she called into the living room. “Coming, hon'?”

“In a while,” he said. He was sitting in the big red chair,
and he'd taken off his shoes and picked up the evening paper.

But it was later than “a while,” I guess, because around two, when I got up to go to the bathroom (I'd had three Cokes), the living room light was still on, and I could hear Mom and Dad talking.

Mom was saying, “I worry when you're like this. Remember what they say: Life begins at forty.”

And Dad said, “So does middle age.”

She took a long time to answer, but then she asked quietly, “Is that so bad?”

Just then I realized I was sort of eavesdropping, and besides, my feet were getting cold, so I went on into the bathroom and shut the door. I wish now I'd listened longer.

I was remembering all this when I heard giggling in the kitchen. Whatever Vicki and Andrea were planning for my birthday (if that's what they were doing), it must be something funny.

I yawned. It had been a long day. The kitchen light shone through the window above me, so I turned my head away and pulled the covers up. The light stayed on for a long time, and I fell asleep to the sound of whispering.

The next morning I headed to Clyde's with my night crawlers in one can and a mess of red worms in another. I'd dug the worms up between fishing and breakfast. Mom hadn't been too happy about having her mixing bowl filled with ground coffee. She'd opened one of the doors in the lower section of the cabinet and pointed to five or six empty cans stored there. Well, how was I supposed to know?

How much money would I get for the worms? I wondered now. It wouldn't be much, but it would be something. In the back of my mind a bright red dollar sign with
400
after it flashed like a neon sign. That was a lot of night crawlers.

I was so busy thinking, I was at Clyde's before I knew it. And I was hot and thirsty. Still, I wouldn't waste money on a Coke. I'd sell my bait and get out of there. Clyde was sitting on a stool behind the counter, the newspaper spread out in front of him. “Damn politicians,” he said by way of
greeting. “They're ruining the country. What can I do for you today, Kyle?”

“I brought some worms,” I said. “Thirty night crawlers and fifty red worms.” I put my cans on the counter. “Do you want to count them?”

Clyde laughed. “I wouldn't insult Hazel Cook's grandson by counting. Your word is good enough for me.” He opened up the cash register and took out some bills and change. “Here you go,” he said. “A dollar fifty a dozen for night crawlers makes three seventy-five, and fifty red worms at four cents apiece comes to two dollars.” He put the money in my outstretched hand, then pivoted around on the stool so he could reach the refrigerator. He pulled out a root beer and handed it to me. “And a bonus for promptness,” he said, chuckling.

“Thanks, Mr. Stemm, thanks a lot,” I said. “I'll bring you some more tomorrow.”

“When you can,” he said with a sideways wave of his brown-freckled hand. “I'll be here.”

I turned to leave. “Oh, by the way,” he said. “Tom Butler said if you came in, he wanted you to stop by his cottage on the way home. Said he had a proposition that might interest you.”

“Okay,” I said doubtfully, wondering what kind of
proposition he could have in mind. We'd never had much to do with Mr. Butler. Not that he wasn't all right—he just kept to himself, that's all. And, speaking frankly, I'd always thought he was kind of gross, since he was so fat. Still, I'd see what he wanted.

* * *

Tom Butler's cottage was one of those that had been converted into a year-round home. He'd done that after his wife died—said he'd only kept the house in Elkhart to please her. For himself, the lake was enough. I remembered Mrs. Butler pretty well. She'd been a little woman, with black hair drawn back into a bun. She always wore red, and she had a way of laughing that made you want to laugh along with her. She made good chocolate-chip cookies, too. She'd only been dead a couple of years. Walking up the gravel driveway to the cottage, I admired how neat and trim it was. Mrs. Butler had always grown flowers next to the cottage, and Tom Butler kept up her flower garden real pretty. I knocked at the screen door to the kitchen. I could smell bacon, and my mouth watered.

“C'mon in. It's open,” Mr. Butler called.

I stepped into a kitchen so big it was a wonder the cottage had space for any other rooms. There was a fancy stove over in the corner and a mammoth refrigerator and
lots and lots of cupboards. Mr. Butler was sitting at the table. He had on a sleeveless undershirt, and springy gray chest hairs curled up around the top. His arms were as big around as loaves of bread. He hadn't shaved that day, and a dribble of egg yolk stained the whiskers on his chin. He gestured at a pile of toast sitting on a plate in the center of the table. “Morning, Kyle. Sit down and have a piece of toast. That honey's special from Missouri. Try it.”