She pursed her lips and sighed. “The plants?” she said finally.
“I thought you had someone remove all the plants,” Sandy said. She was standing on the other side of Deborah with her arms folded.
“She did,” I agreed. “I thought the plants were removed the day the CITs arrived,” I added.
Deborah shrugged. “Maybe there are still more? I don’t know. I don’t know.”
“Nina was quite insistent that she saw a figure,” Sandy said.
Deborah sighed again, then rolled her eyes. “How would that work?” she asked. “Someone is holding their breath under there? Someone has gills?’
“I don’t know. I’m just telling you what she said,” Sandy retorted.
Deborah turned to her, softening her expression. “You’re a lifeguard. If someone wanted to hang out under the water, not being seen by anyone, and pull someone down—is that possible?”
Sandy seemed to think for a moment, then bit her lip. “It is—well—unlikely,” she murmured.
Deborah moaned again, rubbing her hand over her face. “We spent a lot of money on this camp,” she said quietly. “I can’t shut down the lake. I need this summer to be a success.”
“Deborah, if there is a figure in the water pulling people down,” I said, “it’s probably the same person who stole all the sleeping bags and threw them in the lake. What if someone is trying to sabotage Camp Cedarbark? To keep you from being successful, for some reason?”
Deborah frowned at me. She looked honestly confused. “Why would someone do that?” she asked.
“I don’t know,” I said, “but I’m kind of an amateur detective, and I plan to find out.”
CHAPTER EIGHT
The Secret File
THE NEXT MORNING WE WERE woken up to the sound of rain pouring down on the cabin’s roof. Outside, the ground had been soaked to mud, and tiny lakes and rivers had formed all over the clearing in the middle of the cabins.
Cece groaned. “I was looking forward to the soccer game today,” she said as she pulled a pair of jeans and a T-shirt out from her dresser.
“Maybe it will happen anyway, rain or shine,” suggested Winnie.
“I don’t think so,” Maya replied, staring out the window. “I think you’d need a pair of flippers to play in this! And maybe gills.”
Gills made me think of what had happened at the lake yesterday, and a little shiver ran up my spine. As of today, I was officially on the case. And I meant to figure out who—or what—was responsible for first Deborah, then me and two of my campers being pulled underwater.
When we went to the mess hall for breakfast, Miles announced that after we were done eating, the campers would divide into two groups and spend the morning watching a DVD. My group, along with Bella’s eleven-year-olds, would stay in the mess hall. The other kids would run next door to the crafts barn.
“Aw, man,” Cece grumped.
“It’s supposed to clear up this afternoon,” I said, trying to sound cheerful. “Maybe we can fit the soccer game in then.”
Cece looked dubious, but after a second or two she shrugged and finished her eggs.
Meanwhile, I was sensing an opportunity to get some information. If everyone was going to be cooped up in the mess hall, that might give me a chance to talk to Deborah and Miles about everything they knew.
All I needed was a favor from another counselor. Unfortunately for me . . . the only group that was supposed to stay in the mess hall besides mine was Bella’s.
I excused myself and strolled over to her table once I’d gobbled up my eggs and toast. “Hey, Bella,” I said casually as I drew up behind her chair.
She turned, looked at me, and glared. “Oh, it’s you,” she said, clearly unimpressed. “One of the Perfect Triplets. Well, what’s up? Have I violated the spirit of the camp somehow by wearing a not-cheerful-enough shirt?” She gestured down at her T-shirt, which was for some metal band called Eminent Distress.
“Um, no. I actually wanted to ask you a favor. I could pay you back any time.”
Bella narrowed her eyes. “Why would I do you a favor?” she asked.
“Because we’re both counselors?” I asked. “Because if you do, maybe I could watch your bunk sometime to give you a break? I mean, that might be nice.”
Bella looked from me to her campers, who were all crowded around one girl’s chair. The girl was holding up a letter she’d received and giggling. “Okay,” she said. “I’m listening.”
“I’d just need you to keep an eye on my bunk this morning,” I said. “It shouldn’t be hard. Maya will be there, and they’re all just watching a DVD.”
Bella frowned. “And what will you be doing while I watch them?” she asked.
“Research,” I said tersely. When Bella kept staring at me and I didn’t elaborate, she seemed to get the hint that I wasn’t going to say more.
“All right,” she said finally. “But you owe me!”
“Noted,” I said before quickly spinning around and spotting Miles, who was setting up a movie screen in front of the stage. I darted away from Bella’s table and walked briskly over to him.
“Miles,” I said, and when he turned, looking confused, I went on, “I was just wondering whether it’s okay if Bella looks after my campers this morning. She says it’s fine with her.”
Miles raised his eyebrows. “While they watch the movie? Sure. But what will you be doing?”
“Weeeeeeell,” I said, drawing out the word as I tilted my head, “I thought maybe I could talk to you and Deborah about what happened at the lake before Camp Larksong closed. Privately, of course,” I added hastily.
Miles’s expression changed suddenly, from mildly curious to completely closed off. “Oh,” he said, turning back to the movie screen. “Deborah told me you’re some kind of amateur detective. Is that right?”
“Yes,” I said. “But mostly, I just want to help you guys get to the bottom of what’s going on at this camp.”
Miles turned back to me, wearing an expression of surprise. “What is going on at the camp?” he asked. “Besides some silly pranks and an issue with reeds in the lake?”
“I—well—” I stammered, wondering if Miles was serious. “I thought you had the lake trimmed of reeds,” I said. “And the girls who were pulled under—they said they saw a figure.”
Miles snorted. “Including you, isn’t that right?” he asked.
I nodded slowly, feeling like I’d been caught somehow. But I had seen a figure. . . . “Including me.”
Miles turned away, fiddling with the screen again. “It’s fine with me if you want to chat with Deborah,” he said. “She’s in the office. But I don’t think I have any information that can help you. I’m not convinced there’s a mystery to solve, Miss Nancy Drew.”
I wasn’t sure how to react. I’d gotten what I wanted—hadn’t I? But why was Miles being so strange?
“Thanks,” I said simply, and after saying a quick good-bye to Maya and my campers, I ducked out into the rain and ran across the clearing to the camp office.
It occurred to me as I ran how absent Miles had been from many of the camp activities. He always showed up for campfires, and was usually there for meals, but most of the day-to-day running-the-camp responsibilities seemed to be handled by Deborah. She was the one who had gone to Camp Larksong, I remembered. She presumably had wanted to buy the camp and reopen it.
Was it possible that Miles didn’t want me looking into the “mystery” . . . because he had something to hide?
I pushed the thought from my mind as I knocked lightly on the screen door and then pushed it open. The camp office was on the lower floor of the modest two-story house on camp grounds where Deborah and Miles lived. When I walked in, Deborah was sitting at her desk, staring into a computer monitor. She looked a little surprised when she glanced up and saw me, but she soon gave me a little wave of welcome.
“Hi, Nancy,” she said. “Where are your campers?”
“Bella’s watching
them for me,” I replied. “You know, they’re in the mess hall watching a DVD anyway. I thought maybe . . . Maybe this would be a good time for the two of us to talk more?”
Deborah took that in, looking at me with a not-entirely-eager expression. “Okay,” she said.
“I told Miles I could talk to both of you,” I went on, “but he seemed sort of convinced that, um . . .”
“ ‘There’s no mystery to solve,’ ” Deborah filled in, making her voice deep and goofy—clearly her impression of Miles.
“Yeah,” I agreed.
Deborah gave a little rueful smile and pushed her chair back from the desk. “It’s not personal, Nancy,” she said, giving me a kind look. “Miles is a pragmatic guy. He’s not going to believe there’s something going on unless it’s really obvious.”
A question suddenly occurred to me. “Do you think there’s a mystery to solve?” I asked.
Deborah paused, looking thoughtful. “I think a lot of strange things have been happening,” she said quietly. “Unsettling things. In a weird way, it would make me feel better if one person were behind them.”
At least it’s not just me, then. There was a chair on my side of the desk facing Deborah, and I sat down in it. “Can you tell me more about what happened that night in the lake at Camp Larksong?” I asked. “It seems like—for whatever reason—all the strange things that have happened seem to lead back to the lake.”
Deborah nodded slowly, then wheeled her chair back and over to a large pine filing cabinet. She opened the top and began digging around inside. “Let me find the file,” she murmured.
“You have a file?” I asked.
At that moment, Deborah pulled a manila folder from the cabinet and turned around, looking surprised at my question. “Of course I do,” she said. “I wanted to know everything about Camp Larksong before we bought the land. There were all these rumors and . . .” She stopped and sighed. “I just wanted to be prepared.”
She rolled her chair back over to the desk and pushed the file across the surface to me. I reached out and picked it up but didn’t open it yet. “So what happened?” I asked. “What did you learn?”
Deborah cringed like I’d poked a bruise. “I didn’t have to learn,” she said after a few seconds. Then she closed her eyes and began speaking, like she was telling a story she’d already told several times. “It was strange because up till that night, it had been a perfect week at camp. The kids were really easy, and my bunk got along well. I had one girl, Lila, who was homesick and could be a little quiet and intense. But the other girls really liked her, and they all clicked as a group.”
I rested my palm on the top of the folder, trying to follow what Deborah was telling me. My bunk got along well? Wait—she had been there?
“We got to the campsite a little too early to start dinner, so we all hiked down the path to the lake and went for a swim,” she said. “Lila had this ring she’d gotten from her parents for her birthday or something. It was pretty, a little flower with a pearl in the middle of it. She was really proud of it.” Deborah stopped and rubbed her eyes. “While we were swimming, I don’t know what happened exactly, but the ring slipped off her finger.”
“She lost it?” I asked.
Deborah nodded. “We spent at least an hour with everyone trying to find it. But you can imagine—fifty campers in a small space, a lake with reeds and sand on the bottom . . . It could have been anywhere. And with everyone swimming around looking for it, we could have buried it under more sand and reeds as we were trying to find it.”
“Sure,” I agreed.
“Anyway,” Deborah went on, “finally we had to give up and start dinner. After dinner, while it was still light, me and one of the other counselors swam out and tried to find it again. But we didn’t have any luck. We had the campfire, and Lila seemed like she was okay, she was over it. She was singing and telling stories with everyone. So when it was time to go back to our tent and go to sleep, I figured it was over.”
I figured it was over. “Wait—you were her counselor?” I asked suddenly.
Deborah looked at me matter-of-factly. “Yes,” she said. “You didn’t know that?”
Bella’s tale suddenly came back to me. A counselor went crazy and drowned a camper! Did Deborah know that, in the rumors and stories about what had happened, she’d been painted as the culprit? Was that why she felt she had to have a folder full of research on the incident?
“No,” I said, shaking my head. “But I’m sorry to interrupt. Go on.”
Deborah cocked an eyebrow at me, but then went back into her story. She looked uncomfortable now. “The next thing I knew,” she said, her words slowing, “I was woken up by screaming. It was the middle of the night, and one of the other campers had woken up and noticed Lila was gone,” she said. “They were all freaking out. They thought it was a bear! She’d been attacked by something! In all the commotion, it was a few minutes before we got out of the tent and I noticed the footprints leading down the path toward the lake. . . .” She stopped there.
“She’d gone to the lake?” I prodded gently.
Deborah nodded, her face tense. “When I got there, I could hear her struggling in the water.” She paused. “I screamed. It was all I could think of to do. God, I didn’t even jump in after her! It was another counselor I’d woken up with my screams. She jumped in and found Lila under the water. I thought she was dead.” Deborah’s voice broke on the word “dead.” I reached out and put my hand on hers sympathetically. But Deborah pulled her hand away.
“She wasn’t dead, of course,” she went on after a few seconds. “One of the other counselors pumped the water out of her chest and got her breathing again. We called an ambulance, and she was rushed to the closest hospital.” She took in a deep breath through her nose. “She must have gone back into the lake to find her ring,” Deborah said finally. “She was in the hospital for a long time, I know that. She’d been without oxygen for too long. There were rumors of brain damage. But I heard she recovered.”
“You heard?” I asked.
Deborah looked up at me. Something flashed in her eyes—annoyance or defensiveness, I couldn’t tell which. “Her parents were pretty angry with the camp, and me specifically,” she said. “They sued Camp Larksong. That’s what cost the previous owners all their money—they ended up settling with the family. Anyway, I couldn’t exactly go to visit Lila. I’ve lived with the guilt of not waking up earlier every day of my life since it happened. But I couldn’t tell her how sorry I was.”
Silence enveloped the office. I stared down at the folder, taking all of that in. It wasn’t Deborah’s fault—or was it? I tried to imagine one of my campers sneaking out to the lake in the dead of night. Would I hear it? If I heard it, would I be able to jump in after her and save her life?
What would it feel like to see one of my campers dragged out of the lake, barely alive? Hauled off in an ambulance to be in the hospital for weeks?
I shook myself, trying to disperse the terrible feeling that came over me. I glanced at Deborah, who was staring out the window, pain in her eyes.
“It sounds really hard,” I said finally. “I’m sorry.”
Deborah nodded slightly. “Don’t be sorry for me,” she said quietly. “I’m sure it was much harder for Lila and her parents. But maybe you can understand why, the lake . . . the thought of anything else like that happening there . . .” She stopped and shook her head. “I know what people say around this town. I know they say the camp is haunted, that something even worse happened here. But it didn’t.”
She was quiet for just a few seconds. “If there is someone behind the strange things happening around camp,” she said, “they must know about Lila. Or they know some version of the story.”
I let out a breath and pulled the manila folder into my lap. Carefully, I arranged it right side up and opened the cover. Inside were newspaper articles, pieces printed off the Internet, legal documents. I leafed through them all until something stopped me de
ad in my tracks, sending spikes of ice up through my chest.
A photo accompanied one of the articles. I held it up for Deborah to see. “Is this Lila?” I asked.
Deborah looked at the photo and nodded. “That’s her,” she said. “Lila Houston. She was thirteen years old.”
My hand shook as I turned the article back around and placed it back in the folder, faceup.
Lila Houston stared up at me from what must have been a school photo. She had round, dark eyes—and long, silvery-blond hair.
CHAPTER NINE
A New Suspect
“IT’S A COINCIDENCE,” GEORGE WHISPERED that night at the campfire. We’d settled on a log far from the main action, and I’d used the time to update her and Bess on everything Deborah had told me. “It has to be . . . right?”
“It seems like kind of a big coincidence,” Bess said. “A girl with silvery-blond hair nearly drowns in the lake . . . and a few years later, swimmers are attacked by a figure with silvery-blond hair?”
I nodded solemnly. It takes a lot to freak me out, and I’m usually not one to believe in ghost tales. But this was really weird. The only thing was . . .
“Lila isn’t dead,” George pointed out pragmatically, looking from Bess to me. “Is she?”
“No.” I shook my head. “Deborah says she’s alive and ended up without brain damage or anything. Or so she heard, anyway.”
George held out her hands. “Ergo,” she said, “Lila can’t be haunting the camp. Because people who are alive cannot haunt.”
I took in a breath, trying to think. We were all quiet for a minute. The sound of the campers’ current tune—“Kumbaya”—drifted over to us.
Someone’s crying, Kumbaya . . .
“What if she’s not alive?” Bess asked suddenly. “It’s not like Deborah ever saw her after the accident, right?”
“But her parents sued the camp,” George pointed out. “They settled, but for a lot of money. I think they would have mentioned if their daughter died.”