As everyone ate vegan cashew nut cheese and sun-dried potato chips, Jonah pulled something out from under the table—his last package of red licorice—and started passing ropes around the table.
“What, he doesn’t get one?” asked Pablo. He pointed to the tater-bot, which was propped up at the table next to him and was now sporting a Mohawk to match Pablo’s.
“He can eat potato chips,” said Jonah.
“He’s made from a potato!” Pablo protested. “You want him to be a cannibal?”
Kwan laughed. “Well, his name’s Caliban, isn’t it?”
“So what’s the deal with The Tempest, anyway?” asked Clay, still thinking about the paperback he discovered in Flint’s trunk.
“You mean, why did I name him Caliban? Because he’s my little cannibal monster,” said Pablo. “Aren’t you, Cali-boy?”
He gave the robot a poke, and it shook its arms in an arguably monstrous fashion.
“No, I get that,” said Clay. “I mean why is everybody all about The Tempest here? I saw Flint reading it and also—” He was about to mention the references to The Tempest in Price’s journal but stopped himself. “And also the plane to get here, Skipper’s plane, it was called The Tempest.”
Pablo shrugged. “Means ‘storm,’ doesn’t it? Seems like a normal name for a seaplane to me. And Flint—the play’s about magic, and Flint’s into magic, right?”
“Clay hates Flint,” Jonah volunteered. “Hates magic, too.”
“We know—magic sucks!” said Kwan, grinning. “So, how much do you really hate magic, Clay? Like, if I did a magic trick, right now, what would you do? ’Cause I’ve got some mad magic skills.”
“Do what you want,” said Clay. “It’s a free country.”
“That’s what you think,” scoffed Pablo.
“Okay, we’ve got licorice rope, right? So I’m going to do a rope trick,” said Kwan.
With a wolfish grin, he grabbed the rope of licorice out of Clay’s hand and shoved it into his mouth.
“Now, that’s real magic, folks,” he said, chewing.
His teeth were so red, he could have been a vampire.
Clay forced a smile. “Nice.”
Kwan stopped. “You can do a real rope trick?”
Clay shrugged. “My brother taught me a few, but I probably forgot.… Rope tricks are pretty cheese-wiz-y, anyway.”
“Prove it,” said Kwan, holding up a rope of licorice for Clay.
Clay shook his head. “No way.”
“C’mon, bro, you know we’re not going to let you out of it now,” said Pablo.
“Yeah, give us magic or we give you the worst, most epic wedgie in summer camp history,” said Kwan.
“Give the guy a break,” said Jonah. “He doesn’t like magic. So what.”
“It’s okay, I’ll do the trick,” said Clay, feeling foolish for giving in so easily. But why not? What was the big deal, really? He couldn’t stay mad at magic forever.
“All right, that’s more like it,” said Kwan, handing Clay the licorice. “Amaze us, Fellow Worm.”
Standing up, Clay dangled the licorice rope in the air, as his brother had taught him years before.
“Okay, let’s see.… Gentlemen, I have in my hand an ordinary rope,” he said haltingly. “Just, uh, forget the fact that it’s red and rubbery and made of sugar.”
As the Worms watched, Clay tied the two ends of the licorice into a square knot.
“I will now cut the rope with my special magic scissors—”
Holding the licorice with two hands, he bit the licorice in half with his teeth. The others laughed.
“As you see, there are now two pieces of rope. But as a master magician, I have the power to heal all,” he said, just the way his brother used to.
“Now, who has a bad word for me? I mean, a magic word!” he corrected himself, blushing.
“Oh, we have lots of bad words,” said Pablo. “What about—”
(Please. Did you really think I was going to repeat Pablo’s word here? You know better than that.)
“I was thinking of abracadabra,” said Clay. “But sure, any word works if you say it right, right?”
Clay panicked, thinking he’d forgotten how to do the trick. But when he pulled on the square knot, it loosened and the licorice rope dropped from his hand—in a single unbroken piece.*
“And there you have it, gentlemen, the licorice is as good as new.”
Clay bowed his head as his dining companions—as well as a few people from neighboring tables—clapped and whistled enthusiastically.
“Very nice!” “Bravo!” “Way to go!”
Even Caliban jumped up and down, clapping.
Clay flushed, remembering the way he’d felt as a child of five when he mastered the trick for the first time. His brother took the rope out of his hand afterward, checking and double-checking to see that Clay had really done it correctly. “How ’bout that?” Max-Ernest had said, the way he did when he was happy. And Clay had grinned, squinting his eyes, the way he did when he was happy.
Seven years later, Clay was grinning and squinting in the same way when he saw Kwan’s face light up with astonishment.
“Where did that guy come from?” asked Kwan, his eyes looking at a spot behind Clay’s back. “Nobody ever comes here.”
“Nobody even lives here,” agreed Jonah. “I mean except us.”
“I dunno,” said Pablo. “There are caves all over this island, right? Who knows who lives in them.”
“Yeah, like, maybe this guy hasn’t spoken to anybody in thirty years,” said Kwan.
“Right, and he’s like a caveman or Tarzan or something,” said Jonah. “Gotta admit, he kinda looks like it.”
Clay didn’t want to turn around. He had a suspicion he knew who it was. “Is he a bald older guy?”
Jonah nodded. “Why, you know him?”
“Sorta bulging eyes? Muscles?” Clay persisted.
“Just tell us who he is,” said Kwan.
“He’s the custodian at the library—you know, Price’s library,” said Clay, figuring it was only a matter of seconds before they heard anyway. There could be only one reason Uncle Ben had shown up at camp.
“How do you know?” asked Pablo.
Clay didn’t say anything. He didn’t have to.
“No way—you got in!?” exclaimed Pablo. “The bees didn’t get you?”
Before Clay could answer, the newcomer thundered at the assembled campers. “Where’s the director? I demand to speak to the director of this camp!”
Clay finally turned and sneaked a peek. It was the custodian, all right. His goggles were off, but he still looked bug-eyed.
Buzz rushed up to him. “Sorry, sir, Eli’s not here. Can I help you with something?”
“One of your campers is a thief!” said the custodian, his voice still booming.
His heart thumping in his chest, Clay considered his options. There were none. It was no use running. Where would he go?
He looked around. Uncle Ben caught his eye.
“Him! There’s that little lying criminal!” He shook his fist at Clay.
Girding himself, Clay walked toward the custodian and Buzz. Though he’d been waiting for this moment for a week, it was no less scary now that it was happening.
“This boy broke into my library and I—I gave him a tour, sucker that I am,” said Uncle Ben to Buzz, still loud enough for the whole camp to hear. “And how does this ungrateful delinquent return the favor? By taking the most irreplaceable book in the library—The Memoirs of Randolph Price!”
He lunged at Clay. Buzz had to hold him back.
“Clay, is this true? Did you take this book?”
“Uh. No. I mean, I don’t have it…” Clay stumbled.
“But you did break into the library? You admit that?”
Clay hesitated, then nodded.
“Yeah, but I don’t know where the journal is,” he said truthfully.
“That’s a bunch of bull!” said the custodian.<
br />
“You crossed the Wall of Trust,” said Buzz to Clay. “Which means you betrayed all of our trust, not just his.”
“Yeah, I guess I did,” said Clay.
“You guess?”
“No, I mean I did that, yes.”
“Well, it’s all over, then,” said Buzz evenly, looking into Clay’s eyes.
Clay swallowed. “What do you mean, it?”
“Camp, what else would I mean?” said Buzz, his face not giving anything away. “You broke the rules. You’re out.”
“Just like that?” Clay couldn’t quite believe it. Even though he had been warned repeatedly.
“Yep. Just like that. You’re going home, Clay.”
It was only the second time Buzz had called him Clay and not Worm since they’d met. The message was clear: He was no longer one of them.
“It’s what you wanted, isn’t it?” said Buzz. “Why else would you cross the Wall of Trust.”
“I don’t know,” said Clay bleakly.
It may have been what he’d wanted once, but now he was only conscious of a crushing sense of loss.
CHAPTER
TWENTY-TWO
THE NEXT MORNING
It only took a few minutes for Clay to throw all of his belongings into his backpack. Soon he would be home and it would be as if Earth Ranch had never happened. He was already worried about the ramifications. He had been kicked out of school, then kicked out of camp. It was almost certain he wouldn’t be allowed to return to his school for seventh grade.
He extracted a last dirty T-shirt from behind his bunk and stuffed it into his backpack.
His cabinmates watched respectfully from their bunks. Now that they had learned about the library break-in, they looked on Clay with newfound esteem. “He crossed the Wall and came back to tell the tale.” Kwan shook his head. “Who knew the dude had it in him?”
“Let’s just hope he doesn’t go insane like those other three guys,” said Jonah, not letting on that he’d already known about Clay’s library visit. “That would suck.”
“What sucks is him getting kicked out,” said Pablo. “Cali and I were just beginning to like him. I mean kinda. Right, little dude?” The tater-bot nodded its potato head.
“Gee thanks,” said Clay. “That’s the sweetest thing I’ve ever heard.” His tone might have been sarcastic, but he meant what he said. Now that he was being sent home, he finally felt like he was making friends.
“Anytime,” said Pablo. “You know, you could always beg Buzz to let you stay. It worked for me.”
“But you didn’t actually cross the Wall,” Kwan pointed out. “You just got a lot of beestings.”
“Buzz said it was over,” said Clay, closing his backpack. “You know, like it’s all over, not just camp, but whatever else is going on here… or was going on.”
“What else is going on?” asked Kwan. “Besides the fact that we all secretly plotted to get you booted from camp, and now we’re feeling guilty about it.”
Clay forced a smile. “Right. That’s pretty much what I meant.”
“He thinks there’s a conspiracy,” volunteered Jonah. “It has to do with the journal that got stolen from the library.”
“Oh yeah? Tell us more,” said Kwan. “Pablo loves conspiracy theories. Have you heard him talk about the stuff they put in school lunches?”
Clay hesitated. “You guys really don’t know anything about the journal?” He still thought it was possible—barely—that one of them might be in on it.
Kwan and Pablo shook their heads. “Why would we?” said Kwan.
Clay stared at them for a second. Either they really didn’t know anything, or they were really good actors.
“Forget it,” he said. “I’m just going crazy.”
What was the point? There were essentially two possibilities: Either he truly was going crazy, or there was some elaborate game that somebody had been playing with him as a pawn. And if there had been a game, it was now over. The book was closed even if the story wasn’t finished.
“Hey, I think your ride is here,” said Jonah, pointing upward.
Cocking his head, Clay could hear the distinctive sound of propellers coming from high above. Skipper’s plane was circling the island.
It was time to go home.
Clay had assumed he would be hiking down to the black lava beach right away to meet the plane. But when Clay stopped by the corral to say good-bye to Como, Buzz spotted him and told him that Skipper would be making some deliveries to camp first. Clay wouldn’t be leaving until the afternoon.
Clay went back to his cabin to wait while the other Worms went to collect eggs in the chicken coop. He almost wanted to join them, even though it most likely meant getting pecked by a hen. Anything was better than sitting around, wondering how he had gone from being expelled from school to being expelled from camp.
After he had been waiting in the cabin for what seemed like hours but was probably more like twenty minutes, Leira entered. “Package for you.”
She handed him a cardboard box, not unlike the one Clay himself had delivered when he first arrived at Earth Ranch. Only this time, his name, not Jonah’s, was on the box.
“Funny timing, huh?” Leira said, seeing his expression. “Right before you leave.”
“It’s not just the timing,” said Clay. “It would be weird even if I was staying. My parents aren’t really the care package types.”
Leira shrugged. “Maybe they missed you. Stranger things have happened.… Well, are you going to open it or what?”
Clay shrugged. Without much enthusiasm, he ripped open the box with a pencil and pulled out a few crumpled pieces of newspaper.
Clay blinked, not believing his eyes. “What the—?”
“Is that what I think it is?” asked Leira.
Inside the box was an envelope—and a familiar red leather journal.
“I don’t think so. I mean, I don’t think it’s the missing journal; I think it’s my journal.”
“Huh? I’m confused.”
“Remember, there were two? This is the one from my school play, the one my teacher gave me. The one that got me into trouble in the first place.…”
Clay cracked open the journal—just to confirm that it was his, and not by some wild chance, Price’s. Sure enough, there they were on the first page, those two fateful words—MAGIC SUCKS!
Clay opened the envelope and pulled out a note.
“It’s not from my parents,” he said, fighting a small feeling of disappointment. “It’s from my teacher.”
He showed it to her.
Dear Clay,
Your friend Gideon has confessed. He says he was the one who wrote on my wall at school. A prank that got out of hand. I’m sorry I doubted you. You are welcome to return for seventh grade.
Please accept the journal back with my apologies.
Warm regards,
E. Bailey
P.S. I hope you stick it out at Earth Ranch anyway. I think the camp may surprise you.
While Leira read the note, Clay looked at it for a second time. Was it possible that there was such a simple explanation for the writing on Mr. Bailey’s wall?
“Nice friends you have,” joked Leira. “If they aren’t stealing your wallet, they’re setting you up.”
“Actually, Gideon’s a pretty decent guy… usually,” said Clay, perplexed. “I don’t get it, him doing something like that.”
“You must have really pissed him off.”
“I can’t think of anything I did. I mean, he’s always pushing me to do a big graffiti piece, but it’s not like he gets all mad when I don’t.” He studied the journal in his hand as if it might hold the answer.
“Maybe he’s just jealous of you.”
Clay laughed. “Yeah, sure.”
“Why’s that so funny?”
“Well, like, why would anybody be jealous of me?”
“I don’t know. Maybe because you’re so cool.”
“I am?” Clay couldn?
??t have been more surprised if she’d told him he was covered with green stripes.
Leira nodded. “Yeah, you have this thing. This, like, toughness or something. It can be a little intimidating, actually.”
“Huh. Really?” said Clay, blushing. “Thanks, I guess?”
“You’re welcome,” said Leira matter-of-factly. “By the way, you’re also cute.”
“Cute?!” Clay sputtered. “Now I know you’re lying.”
He remembered the Worms saying Leira had a crush on him. Could it be true? The thought was alarming.
“No, I’m not. I mean, that’s not my opinion. That’s objective information.”
“I have the most messed-up hair in the universe. I’m short. I have crooked teeth. My clothes are always wrong.…”
“Trust me, you’re cute. Even Adriana thinks so. She said you were like a little wild animal she wanted to tame and make into her pet.”
“Ugh! And, ugh! I don’t want to be anybody’s pet.”
“I know,” agreed Leira. “You’re too cool for that. You see what I mean?”
“Not really,” said Clay. “I think I’m just going to pretend we never had this conversation.”
“Suit yourself. So, you gonna return the journal to the library or what?”
“Well, it came from home, so I wouldn’t really be returning it, strictly speaking.”
“Right. I forgot for a second.”
“But I guess Uncle Ben doesn’t have to know that, does he?” Clay ruminated. “He said he never opened the journal. Maybe he wouldn’t even notice the difference.…”
“See what a criminal you’ve turned into!” Leira laughed, then quickly turned sober. “Anyway, I gotta go. It’s been, uh, nice knowing you and all that stuff. If I don’t see you ever again… well, bye.”
She gave Clay a quick embarrassed hug, and hurried out the door.
“Yeah, bye,” he said to her departing back.
Clay checked for his wallet. It was still there, which made him sad. He probably wouldn’t ever be able to look at his wallet again without thinking about Leira stealing it.
He would miss her.
CHAPTER
TWENTY-THREE
LOCKED OUT