Skating with the Statue of Liberty (21 page)

28

“
W
hat?
Ne raconte pas de bêtise
!”
Nonsense!
“Of course it's there!” Rabbi Blum shouldered his way ahead through the tree branches. The boys crowded behind him. A hillside, bare except for a bit of strewn rubble, looked out over an icy lake. Pale pinks and blues streaked the sky and the surface of the ice.

Father René had been retying his hiking boot. He crunched up behind the scouts, and they all stood there gazing at the empty expanse, their breath making clouds of steam in the frosty air. “It appears it isn't,” he said. “It must have been torn down.”

“What are we going to do?”

“We don't have tents!”

“It's freezing!”

“I know how to build a lean-to, Rabbi!”

Everyone was talking at once.

The two men looked at each other. “It's awfully late
to go back,” Rabbi Blum said. “Maybe looking for wood to build a shelter
is
our best bet. It's going to be a chilly night, though.”

Father René nodded. “Let's go have a look around before we decide what to do.”

The scouts ran down the hill, dropping their packs at the bottom and scattering, looking for large, fallen branches. Gustave found one caught in the crook of a standing tree and tugged at it, knocking a shower of powdery snow down onto his head. Jean-Paul ran over to help him, but the branch was thoroughly stuck. They were working at it, struggling sweatily, when they heard Xavier shriek from across the field. “Come see what I found!”

The boys ran toward him, the snow spraying out around their feet, and the men came trudging behind more slowly and heavily. “What's that?” Xavier called, pointing at a small roof just visible over the trees. “I think it's a shed or something.”

The boys raced across the snowy field, then pushed through trees and underbrush. In another clearing stood a stone silo with a partially collapsed roof. Maurice was trying the door when the adults came panting through the trees, swatting at low-hanging branches.

They all crowded round, peering through the doorway. Inside was an empty, dusty room with some disintegrating hay in a corner and a few broken boards leaning against a wall.

“This is perfect!” said Maurice. “Can't we camp here?”

“Well, it isn't the Ritz! But I think this is our best bet,” said Father René briskly. “Maurice, can you get the boys organized?”

The sky was dusky, and wind rattled the branches of the trees. Under Maurice's direction, Gustave and Jean-Paul and the others gathered firewood, Maurice cleared a fire circle, and he and André started a campfire, while the two men unpacked the food and then began to cook. Xavier, Bernard, and Guy spread out the hay so that it covered part of the floor of the silo and laid out the old blankets on top of it to make a warm surface for the sleeping bags.

“Is that nearly ready, Father?” Jean-Paul asked, dumping a load of wood next to the campfire. “I'm starving.”

“Me too!” Xavier said, sticking his head out of the silo.

“Soon!” said Father René cheerfully. He was frying potatoes and onions in a skillet over the fire. “Time to toast the frankfurters.”

“Finally!” Maurice grabbed a stick and shoved a frankfurter on it, holding it out over the fire. Gustave took one and put it on a stick too, and so did the others. The frying onions smelled delicious. The stars were coming out now, over the lake, and sparks from the campfire swirled upward into the freezing air.

“This is so much better than camping in the mansion!” Maurice exulted as he took a plate of fried potatoes from Rabbi Blum. “A lot more exciting!”

“Exciting—yes, that's one word for it,” Rabbi Blum said wryly. “I think we're in for an awfully cold night.”

It
was
very cold. Even though they wore their jackets and their hats inside their sleeping bags, even though they had extra blankets, and even though they all huddled close together in the corner of the silo on top of the hay, it was almost too cold to sleep. Gustave's icy feet woke him up several times in the night, no matter how tightly he curled into a ball. Then, as soon as the sky got light, he woke up for good. The others were still sleeping. Gustave's breath made clouds of steam in front of his face. It smelled like pine in the silo, and the air was sharply cold in his nose, almost cold enough to freeze. He pulled his scarf up, and after a few breaths he was warmer and the scarf was slightly damp. He was too cold to get out of his sleeping bag, so he lay there, looking at the pale blue glimmer of the lake through the broken part of the silo door.

“Rise and shine! Rise and shine!” bellowed Maurice suddenly, and the morning stillness was over as they all started getting up, groaning and stretching.

Xavier got out of his sleeping bag, ran off to the woods to relieve himself, and then came racing back again immediately. “It's too cold!” he called out, his teeth chattering, getting back into his sleeping bag.

“None of that, none of that! You're right, it
is
too cold to sit around,” ordered Father René. “François, I'm not going to bother starting a fire,” he said to Rabbi Blum, who was adjusting his yarmulke on his head with fumbling fingers. “Let's all just get packed up on the double, march back to the cars, and drive into the village
for a hot breakfast somewhere. I saw an inn when we drove through yesterday. We need to get these boys warmed up.”

“Good idea. Let's go.”

The thought of eating inside a heated building got them all moving quickly, and soon, with everything stuffed back into their packs, they were heading to the trail. It was too cold to sing or even talk, so they hiked silently and speedily through the woods. Gustave's nose and fingers were very cold, and he could hardly feel his toes, even though he had on wool socks. The path felt a lot longer hiking in this direction. But finally they were at the clearing, and then in the cars, and then starting off, and gradually the car warmed from the heat of their bodies.

“Ah! The snowy countryside is so lovely, don't you think?” Guy warbled in a falsetto, and everyone laughed.

“Right now I'd just like to look at its beauty from inside a nice warm inn,” said Father René. “Preferably next to a fire. While drinking hot coffee!”

“Or hot chocolate!” said Xavier. “Do you think they'll have it?”

“I'm sure! And…there it is!” announced Father René, turning in at the inn's driveway. The car crunched over snowy gravel and came to a stop. Behind them Rabbi Blum turned in too. The boys piled out of the cars and hurried into the warmth.

The lobby of the inn was huge, with heavy beams overhead and the antlered head of a deer hanging on the wall over a roaring fire in a stone fireplace. Xavier laughed
when he saw the deer. “When I was little, back in France,” he said, “the first time I saw one of those, in a castle, I ran around to the other side of the wall to see where the rest of the deer was!”

Rabbi Blum took charge. “First, everyone into the restroom to tidy up a little. I'll supervise and make sure you all come out looking respectable. René, do you want to go talk to the people at the restaurant?”

“Sure. I'll take these two with me.” He and Xavier and Gustave washed and slicked their hair quickly in the restroom first and then went down the corridor that led to the inn's restaurant. The corridor was wood paneled, with a plush, crimson carpet. The restaurant smelled deliciously of coffee and pancakes and sweet syrup. Gustave's stomach growled. A friendly-looking man about the age of Gustave's father, impeccably dressed and wearing horn-rimmed eyeglasses, came forward to greet them. “May I help you?” he asked Father René.

Father René spoke effortlessly in English. “We haven't been staying at the inn, but I wonder if you could serve us breakfast anyway,” he said to the host, smiling his usual, charming smile. “My Boy Scouts are very cold and hungry. They camped out last night in an old silo. We were supposed to spend the night in the old Woodress place out on Osprey Lake, but last night we were shocked to find that it wasn't there!”

“Oh, yes.” The host looked intrigued. “It was finally torn down last summer. I'd heard that Boy Scouts used to camp there. Well, you must certainly need a hot breakfast!” he said sympathetically. “I'll even give you all
hot chocolate on the house! How's that, boys?” He peered at Xavier and Gustave through his glasses, smiling.

“Swell!” Xavier grinned.

“I have a big table over there.” The host pointed at a long wooden table by the window. Sunlight streamed in over the dark wood, and near one end a fire burned in another large stone fireplace. “Let me just have a waiter set it up for you. How many?”

Rabbi Blum, followed by the rest of the boys, came into the restaurant at that moment. A tall, supercilious-looking man who had joined the host glanced at Rabbi Blum's yarmulke with a peculiar expression and then tapped the host on the shoulder. The two of them walked a few feet off and spoke briefly.

“I'm going to have waffles
and
pancakes,” Xavier said excitedly. “You said we could have whatever we wanted, right, Father René?”

“Excuse me.” The host was back. His face had lost its earlier friendliness, and his eyes too slid to Rabbi Blum's yarmulke and then to Father René's face. “I apologize. Mr. Blanchard, our manager, tells me that table has been reserved. I'm afraid I can't seat you.”

“Another table would be just fine. Or two tables, close to one another,” Father René said. “We're not fussy.”

“I'm sorry. All of our tables are full for breakfast this morning.”

Rabbi Blum came forward. “What do you mean?” he asked, sounding angry. “I see quite a few empty tables. There. And there and there.” He gestured at the nearly empty room.

“I'm sorry, sir,” the host said coolly. “These tables are reserved.”