Thomas Tryon - The Night of the Moonbow

“Leo’s spider, let’s remember,” said Rolfe.

Fritz shot him a look. “That has nothing to do with it, since the spider was not venomous.”

“Then why did the boy get sick?”

Wanda spoke up. “Because the bite became infected. Reece used a soiled needle to open up his wound.”

“I don’t believe it,” Rolfe protested. “Reece would never do such a thing. He’d sterilize it. A good camper knows that.”

Fritz shrugged. “He did sterilize it-”

“There!” Joy cried. “Didn’t we say so?”

“But then he dropped it on the floor and forgot – he just-”

“Hey, where’d you get a story like that?”

Again Wanda spoke. “From Leo. He was there.”

Rolfe snorted with contempt. “Who do you think is going to believe anything he says? You’re all in cahoots.” “Is that what you think, sir?” Fritz said.

“No!” Joy’s chin quivered and tears came to her eyes as she spoke. “Reece had nothing to do with Tiger Abernathy’s dy- Oh, I can’t say the terrible word! It was an accident, that’s all! Just an accident!”

Fritz spoke quietly but firmly. “Yes, Mrs Hartsig, that is so. But now Leo is being blamed. And he is innocent. Do you think that is fair?”

Joy’s eyes snapped with hostility. “What does that matter? What my husband says is true, you and this -this-!” Without warning she whirled like a demon and rushed at Leo. “Oh, you naughty, vindictive boy! This is all your doing! To tell a story like that! Reece is right, you never should have been brought here. They had no business sending you. You’ve caused nothing but trouble from the day you arrived in camp. You’re the one who’s responsible! You killed Tiger with your nasty spider! You’re the killer if anybody is!”

She rushed out of the cabin onto the line-path, taking pittering little steps up and down, moaning and clawing at the air. Appalled, Rolfe went lumbering after her, making helpless, chastening gestures around her pathetic, bird-like, fluttering form. As the others watched in embarrassed silence, he managed to get her into the car and drove quickly away.

When the field had once more fallen quiet, Leo left the cabin and walked across the line-path into the pine grove, where the tall, silent trees rose beside the lake, and the light filtering down through the boughs was made visible in the dust stirred among the fallen needles by many pairs of feet. In his mind the place seemed just the same as it had been on the evening of his arrival: at a glance nothing had changed, yet now all was changed. He felt intensely the presence of his lost friend, as if Tiger Abernathy stood here beside him as he had on that first evening.

Mr Ives's jitney leaves a lot to be desired. I suggested he call it Bellerophon.

What a show-off Leo had been, a real spud. It was a wonder Tiger had put up with him for a minute, let alone taken him in hand and been his friend. He leaned back on his palms and sighted up to the top of the Methuselah Tree, where the owl still kept its eyrie among the topmost branches. Icarus the flyer.

Icarus.

Icarus?

That might be a good name for the owl. What do you think?

Fingering the hilt of the Bowie knife, Leo thought of the promise Tiger had made him give, to never say die. No matter what, he must, would, stay at camp to the end. As he watched, the owl spread its wings and sailed from its perch. From somewhere over in Indian Woods the dog began to howl again.

That evening a memorial torchlight parade was held, vividly recalling to Leo his first evening in camp. Again the lines of boys bearing their flickering brands wound through the pine grove and along the tiers of the council fire, but tonight the trembling flames were in token of a fallen comrade, prayers for a lost friend. And as, holding their torches, the campers joined voices in the old songs, each was suffused with his own personal memories of their dead companion, each in his heart had the hope that somehow at any moment he might come trotting in from a ball game, whistling between his teeth.

The service lasted no more than a half hour, and afterward, Reece in the lead, the boys wended their way silently back to the line-path, to gather in front of Jeremiah for the benediction. A breeze had arisen, making the torches flicker. From the White House came intermittent gusts of music – Leo, unwelcome among the Jeremians, was there with Fritz and Wanda.

Afterward, people blamed what happened next on moon madness compounded by grief. But in truth there was no explanation for the hot dry wind of excitement that rushed lightly but noticeably among the campers, inciting them to movement and agitation, and more.

Through the window, Leo observed them as they held aloft their torches, the flames flickering in the darkness. Among them he was able to make out Reece and the Jeremians; Hap Holliday was there, too, and some of the bullies from High Endeavor. A dance began, an Indian toe-heel step, and they uttered savage Indian war cries behind their palms – ooooh-woo-wooo, ooooh-wooo-woo – bending low, leaping high, wilder and wilder they danced. Then, some six or eight of them broke free and went racing toward the cottage, where silhouetted in the open doorway stood Leo and Fritz, with Wanda at his side. The boys began yawing and japing at them, poking and lunging with their torches; Leo spotted Hap again, standing on the sidelines, entertained by the mischief.

Then, without warning, a torch was seen to pinwheel through the air and land on the roof, whose newly oiled shingles quickly took fire. A second torch flew up, and a third. Tlie three standing in the doorway ran inside to rescue Fritz’s possessions, but the heat quickly drove them out again, and a rushing, cracking, snapping sound was in the air. The enamel on the shutters popped in ugly blisters. The clapboards buckled with the heat, singing out their protests against the flames, while the little grove of white birch trees became so many torches, writhing in their turn, their foliage burning away until only black poles were left, like the bars of a prison.

By the time the firefighting equipment arrived from Woking Corners, nothing remained except a heap of blackened ruins. Everything was lost: the chess set from Hong Kong, the pewter-lidded stein from Neuschwanstein, the precious album of stamps, including the upside-down airmail special, the record collection, its shellac discs melting and flowing together to form a black viscous puddle of classical composers and that singular novelty Fritz had been so proud of, the voice of Johannes Brahms talking on the telephone with Alexander Graham Bell.

In those waning days of summer Ma Starbuck’s Concord grapes had reached perfection, their gleaming purple jackets dusted with white, like frost or sugar-glaze. But this summer Ma hadn’t put up her usual batch of grape jelly, and so the boys had been allowed to pick an occasional bunch, until the arbor had been largely denuded of its fruit. Now, early in the afternoon, on the last full day of camp, Ma sat with Dagmar Kronborg on the slatted bench beneath its dusty, fading leaves, snapping string beans into an enameled colander. The two women had been commiserating over the recent tragic events, Ma tearfully blaming herself for Tiger’s death, as if she had somehow been remiss in not having looked after him more closely, and Dagmar, more pragmatically, saying that such things happened in life, no one could have prevented it. The terrible fire that had consumed the cottage, however, that was something else. What could they have been thinking of, those boys?

Dagmar’s eyes flashed dangerously as she considered the unfortunate incidents that had led up to the disaster, and the fact that thus far Pa Starbuck had not found it necessary to bring any kind of critical pressure to bear as a result of the boys’ wicked behavior. Moreover, while the police and fire officials had been interrogating both campers and staff, nothing had as yet come of their inquiries. Nor, thought Dagmar, did such seem likely. Even Wanda, when questioned, had been unable to identify any of the perpetrators, though Fritz, never one to take things lying down, had sworn that upon his return he would force the issue with both Pa and Dr Dunbar.