Summer at Forsaken Lake (21 page)

Her eyes squeezed shut, Hetty counted, “One, two,
three
!” and jumped. When she surfaced, she was beaming. “Blimey! It’s bloody warm! Uncle Nick! You absolutely
must
come in the water. It’s simply divine.”

“Oh brother. Here we go again,” said Nicholas.

Nick stuck his head through the main hatch. “I’ll go later. Breakfast is ready. You kids come and get something to eat while I row Pistol over to shore so he can do his business. As soon as I get back, we’ll head for the bay on the far side of Onion Island. I know the perfect spot to anchor for lunch, and you kids can work on your movie there. The island itself is a little swampy, but along the edge there’s some pretty scenery.”

The swimmers climbed the rope ladder and then stood shivering in the cockpit while they toweled off.

“I say,” Hetty continued, in her way-over-the-top accent. “I do believe I was warmer when I was in the water.”

“No doubt about it,” Nick said. “Lake’s a good ten degrees warmer than the air temperature this morning. But it’s that red sky that has me a little worried.”

“Red sky at night, sailor’s delight; red sky in morning, sailor’s warning,” chanted Hayley and Hetty.

“What do you think it means?” Nicholas asked.

“Hard to say, exactly,” said Nick. “Sometimes nothing. Other times …”

“A storm?”

“It’s possible. We’ll keep an eye on things. Barometer’s steady so far. Something you always have to remember about the lake: storms seem to come out of nowhere. Seen it a million times. Clear sky, beautiful day one second, and next thing you know, it looks like somebody turned off the lights and it’s blowing fifty. There’s a reason folks call it
God
forsaken Lake. When one of those storms hits, you’re on your own.”

“What do you do if you’re out in the middle of the lake and something like that happens?” Charlie asked.

“Best thing is probably to
stay
out in the middle—away from shore. I usually just tack back and forth until it blows over.” Nick saw the concerned looks on the faces of the twins. “Don’t you worry. If you have to be in a squall out on the lake,
Goblin
is the place to be. She’s built to take it—and then some.”

* * *

* * *

The sun burned off the mist, and they had a slow, uneventful trip to Onion Island, where they dropped anchor shortly after noon. Nicholas took Charlie to shore in the inflatable dinghy, and then returned to
Goblin
for the twins. While Nick and Pistol stretched out on the cockpit benches, Nick with a paperback and an iced tea, and Pistol with a rawhide bone, the kids spent the afternoon on the island filming new scenes for their production of
The Seaweed Strangler
.

In the day’s first scene, the two young archaeologists row ashore with Charlie’s character, in search of their friend, the missing professor. Following the clues they
found on the film, they discover a beat-up canvas backpack that they immediately recognize as the professor’s. Inside is his camera and another leather-bound journal (exactly like the one hidden in his house) filled with barely legible notes and sketches of the creature.

Hetty turns and speaks to the camera. “We have just found the professor’s journal. Here is a random entry:
Saw the creature again this morning. I watched with amazement as he caught a two-pound fish with his bare hands and ate it raw. I fear that he knows he’s being followed. Every few seconds, he lifts his nose high in the air and sniffs, as if he has caught a whiff of something strange to him. I know it is dangerous, but I must follow him, even if it takes me to places no human has ever set foot. Something tells me that he is not alone back here in these woods; I feel certain that there are others like him. If I am correct, it will rank as one of the greatest discoveries of all time. He is heading southwest. More later
.”

“Cut! That was
awesome
, you two,” said Nicholas, high-fiving his sisters. “Even with that stupid accent, Hetty.”

“Oh, you noticed,” Hetty said. “I didn’t mean to—it just kind of came out.”

“It’s all right,” he said. “Now it’s my turn.” He changed into the Seaweed Strangler costume—no shirt, an old pair of jeans cut off raggedly just below the knee and held up with a piece of rope, and his plastic fangs. Except for his face, he looked exactly like Charlie’s dad in the original version.

“Isn’t it going to be weird having two different
Seaweed Stranglers in the same movie?” Hayley asked. “People are going to notice that you don’t look just like Charlie’s dad.”

“Ah, but that’s just it. Maybe there
are
two Seaweed Stranglers. In fact, there might be a whole bunch of them living back there in the swamp. Okay, follow me, everybody.”

They trudged into the interior of Onion Island and spent the next two hours on the movie’s crucial, and tricky, final scenes—for some of which the twins were
behind
the camera, much to their delight. By the time they wandered back to the shore and the waiting dinghy, they were wet, tired, mosquito-bitten, and very hungry.

“There you are,” said Nick from
Goblin
’s bow. “Thought I was going to have to send Pistol in after you. It’s time we got moving if we’re going to make it down to Heller’s Cove by dark. Still not much wind out there.”

When the dinghy bumped the hull, he reached down to help the twins up the ladder. “Jolly good timing, you two. Just in time for ahhhhfternoon tea.” He pretended to drink from an imaginary teacup, his pinkie properly extended.

“Oh no!” cried Nicholas, rowing back to the island to pick up Charlie. “Not you, too, Uncle Nick.”

G
hosting along in a dying late-afternoon breeze,
Goblin
hugged the western shore of the lake as her crew, worn out from the day’s activities, took turns napping on deck. When dinnertime came, they were still several miles from their destination, so Nick went into the tiny galley and heated up some canned chicken noodle soup, which he served in plastic mugs, while Hetty made ham and cheese sandwiches for everyone.

“There’s nothing like hot soup when you’re sailing,” Nick said, tilting his mug up to get every last drop. “Especially when you’ve got weather on the way.”

Nicholas twisted his head around to look over the trees behind him. “D’you still think we’re going to get a storm today?”

Nick nodded. “Weather reports are all talking about scattered storms around the county tonight. We might get lucky. Either way, we’ll be safe and sound in the cove. If the storm comes from the north or west, there’s no better place to be—it’s very protected.”

As they edged around a point of land littered with driftwood, a serene farmhouse, surrounded by pastures filled with grazing Holsteins, came into view.

“It’s like a
picture
of a farm,” Hayley noted.

“Moooo,”
said Hetty. Her voice carried over the calm water to the shore, where several cows looked up at her. “Hey! They heard me!
Mooooooo
!”

“That’s the Kuerners’ place,” Nick said. “Just the two of them now, both in their sixties, running the farm. Had a whole passel of kids, but none of them wanted to farm—they all moved away. Sad to think what’ll happen—” He stopped, noticing that a woman was running toward the shore and waving her arms about wildly.

“Who’s that?” asked Hayley.

“Sue Kuerner. Something’s wrong. Take us in a little closer, Charlie. Nicholas, can you take the mainsheet? Good, good.”

“Nick!” shouted the panicked woman. “Come quick! It’s Ethan—he collapsed in the barn.”

“Did you call 911?”

“They sent an ambulance—it’s on the way. But … please, can you come up to the barn with me? I’m afraid he’s … and they take so long to get here.”

“You go back to Ethan. I’ll be there in a second.”

Luckily, the dinghy was still inflated, resting upside down on the foredeck. Nick took a quick look at
Goblin
’s young crew. “Charlie, you come with me. We may need an extra set of hands. Sue must have left a gate open, because she’s got cows running loose; we’ll need to get them back in the pasture. Nicholas, here’s what I want you to do. There’s a place where you can anchor, a couple of hundred yards south of here. As soon as you get around that bend, you’ll see a bright yellow house. It’s not perfect, but you’ll be safe there until Charlie and I get back. Just wait there for us.”

“Got it,” said Nicholas, taking the tiller from Charlie’s hands as the first rumble of thunder sounded its warning in the distance.

“Better get moving,” said Nick. “Make sure you really get that anchor set. Hayley, Hetty—you girls listen to Nicholas. He’s the captain until I get back.”

Pistol barked as Nick climbed down the rope ladder to the waiting dinghy.

Nick pointed a finger at him. “No—you stay right there, boy. Keep an eye on him. He may try to come after me.”

“I can’t believe he’s leaving,” said Hetty, watching Nick rowing away.

“He’ll be right back,” said Nicholas. “Don’t worry about it.”

Hayley sighed. “That’s just what the kids in
We Didn’t Mean to Go to Sea
said.”

As he nosed
Goblin
around the bend, Nicholas was astonished by the sight that greeted him. Ominous clouds barely skimmed over the treetops, dabbing dark brushstrokes of gray onto a world that, moments before, had glowed with the bright greens and blues of summer. With the second drumroll of thunder came a gust of wind, filling the sails and heeling the boat over rather suddenly.

He barked orders at the twins. “Hayley, come here—now! Take the tiller for a minute while I get the sails down. Head right for that house. Hetty, go below and get those red sail ties. Now!”

Whether it was his no-nonsense tone or the frightening sky above them, they both sprang into action. In a matter of seconds, Nicholas had wrestled the jib to the deck and secured it with the sail ties that Hetty handed him. He opened the anchor locker and lifted out the Danforth anchor and chain.

“Okay, Hayley, when I say
‘Go!’
I want you to turn the boat directly into the wind. Then just keep the bow pointed in that direction, okay?”

Hayley nodded, her eyes wide with excitement—and maybe just a pinch of terror.

“Hetty, you take the mainsheet. The second Hayley starts turning, you uncleat that thing and let it out two or
three feet. Then cleat it again, and keep your head down, because the boom’s going to swing around like crazy. All right?”

Looking as if she might bite through her bottom lip, Hetty gave him a thumbs-up. “I’m ready.”

Nicholas stood at the forestay, watching the fast-approaching shoreline, where the overturned maple leaves seemed to be waving him off. When they reached the spot he had chosen, he gave Hayley the signal. The twins did their jobs perfectly, and he tossed the anchor in front of the boat as far as he could and waited to see if it would “catch” in the mud while
Goblin
began to drift slowly backward.

“Come on, come on,” he said, tugging on the anchor line. He was about to give up on it when he felt a jerk as the anchor snagged on some submerged object. “Yes! It’s holding. Let’s get that mainsail down.”

* * *

While Nicholas and the twins prepared themselves and
Goblin
for the approaching storm, Charlie and Nick had their hands full. Ethan Kuerner, conscious but still doubled over in pain, sat on a hay bale inside the barn.

“Kinda like somebody’s … driving a railroad spike into … my chest,” he said when Nick asked him how he was feeling. Like most farmers, however, he was more
concerned about the livestock than his own well-being. He looked up at Charlie. “You’ve got … to get the cows … in the barn. Bad … storm coming. Can you do that for me?”