"Basil has big dreams," his brother explained. "One of them is getting rich enough to not care about breaking the terms of our father's will and leaving town for good."
"That would be hard to do on a hairdresser's salary," Kelly said before spotting Lauren walking past the aisle with an armload of matches and Betty behind her with a gallon of lighter fluid. "Excuse me for a moment," she said as she chased after them.
"Well." Hal smiled warmly. "You can't tell either of my brothers anything."
"You three seem to be very different from each other. You must have the business acumen."
Hal thought about that for a moment. "Basil is the creative, social one. Nigel thinks he's the smart one—and maybe he is. He did become a lawyer, and he's been mayor for years."
"Where does that leave you?" I asked.
"I guess I'm the practical one. I don't make a big splash. I picked a business that was useful to people without being overly important. It suits me."
"That's it?" I wondered. "No big plans for the future? No ambition?"
"Oh, I guess as much as anybody." He spotted a car outside at the pumps. The driver was waving his arms around to get Hal's attention. "I'd better take care of this."
As I browsed the toiletries section, it occurred to me that Hal had really summed things up. It must've been unusual growing up sandwiched in between two ambitious brothers. But maybe that's typical for middle children, even if the age difference was measured in minutes instead of years. I was an only child. I had no idea how that would feel.
"No hair stuff?" Kaitlyn asked.
I shook my head. "Nothing here. I guess it will have to wait."
"Good." The girl grinned. "'Cuz we like your hair like that."
We joined the others at the checkout, where Kelly was buying what looked to be a gross of Pixy Stix.
"Are you crazy?" I asked. "That's just pure sugar!"
Kelly sighed. "It was either that or buy out the supply of matches. I decided to compromise." She took one of the Pixy Stix from Ava and studied it. "You don't think these things are overly flammable, do you?"
We got back into the van, and Kelly drove us back toward Camp des Morts. We'd promised the girls we'd do some cooking for dinner, and keeping them away from Aunt June's house, especially since they wanted to cave dive, seemed like a good idea.
"When can we do the ropes course?" Ava asked from the back.
"Like I told you, I don't think we can," I answered. "I'm not certified, and I don't want to press Toad into finding someone to facilitate it for us."
"But we want to do the zip line!" Betty protested.
My troop loved the zip line. They loved it so much that they learned how to use the harnesses, the helmets, and the equipment on their own. We always did zip at camp. But the only way to get to it here was to climb up to the ropes course. And I wasn't certified in that.
Rex was waiting for us when we arrived. His eyebrows went up when he saw each girl sporting a Pixy Stix as tall as they were, but he wisely said nothing.
"You don't happen to be certified in high ropes courses, are you?" I asked.
"Nope. Now if we had a rifle range like they do at Boy Scout camp…" His voice trailed off as five little girls pivoted in place to stare at him.
"Boy Scouts have what?" Betty shrieked.
Rex gave me a look I liked to call the I shouldn't have said that, should I.
"Yes." I turned to my troop. "Boys have a rifle range. And shotgunning. And use hatchets."
"Where are you going with this?" Kelly asked.
I wasn't sure myself.
"But that's because Boy Scouts have no creativity and get bored a lot." Did they? I was just making this up as I went along. "So they have to offer those things to keep them in Scouts."
Betty squinted at me. "Is that true?"
I had no idea. "Absolutely. Seriously, you guys know how to throw knives, build amazing fires, and do all kinds of stuff that would terrify your average Boy Scout."
Kaitlyn nodded. "That's true. My big brother is a Scout, and he's scared of us."
"Exactly," I agreed quickly.
"I'm not sure this is helpful," Kelly said.
"And like I always say"—I took a deep breath—"when we are doing something hard. If it were easy, it would be done by Boy Scouts."
"When did you ever say that?" my co-leader asked.
"Yeah!" Ava punched the air. "We're scary! Right, Mrs. Wrath?"
You have no idea, I thought to myself.
"And we have Betty the Badass," Lauren added thoughtfully.
"And Betty Machete!" Inez added.
Betty said nothing as she cleaned her fingernails with said machete.
"And," Kaitlyn said, "we have scary snake camp names!"
Inez jumped up and down in place. "And we're at a camp that's got ghosts and aliens!"
"We haven't seen any aliens yet." Ava looked disappointed.
I clapped my hands together. "Right! After dinner, let's go on a ghost and alien hunt!"
Five little girls screamed at the top of their lungs as they ran inside to get their bug spray and water bottles.
"I'm not sure this is better," Kelly said then yelled after the girls, "After dinner!"
Rex thought for a moment. "I was talking to Toad. She was here before you arrived. She warned us to be careful not to mess with the Indian burial mounds and to stay away from the edge of the bluff. She said they wanted to put up guardrails but can't because it's a sacred area. Did you know someone fell off the bluff and died five years ago?"
"We missed her," Kelly said. "I wanted to ask her about a trail to the ranger's cabin."
"We haven't met the ranger yet," I explained to my husband. "Unlike every other camp we've been to, the ranger here doesn't live on the road."
"There's no trail?" Rex pulled the map out of his back pocket. "I can
