Vampire Lodge

acorns and nuts for the winter.”

They both glanced upward then, and above them, racing back and forth over the high branches, were dozens of squirrels, mostly brown, but several black ones, and they even saw one rare white squirrel. Starlings and other birds also roosted high in the trees, preparing to fly south for the winter.

“This place sure is a lot different from the city,” Jimmy commented. “The woods and the animals and the birds. It’s incredible.”

“I know,” Kevin agreed. “Why do you think I like coming here? The only thing I’m worried about is what my dad was saying on the way up, about Aunt Carolyn going ‘bust.’“

“That means she might have to close the lodge down, huh?”

“Yeah, I think so.”

“Well, what happens then?”

Kevin thought about this. It only made sense. “I guess if she doesn’t have enough money to run the lodge and the campgrounds, she’ll have to sell the place, something like that.”

“That’d be a bummer.”

“Yeah, but maybe it won’t happen,” Kevin said. Then he wanted to change the subject because he didn’t like to think about the idea that Aunt Carolyn might have to close down the lodge or sell it to someone else. “Just wait till we get out onto the bluffs,” he said. “This is absolutely the best kite-flying weather I’ve ever seen. A whole lot of wind but not too

hard. If it’s too hard, our strings could snap, or we might not be able to control the kites, and we’ll lose them in the trees or crash them.”

Eventually, the trail opened up into a huge, flat grassy field. Suddenly Kevin and Jimmy were standing right out in the open. There was a mild salty smell in the air, from the ocean, and they could hear the waves breaking time and time again just over the cliff.

“Wow!” was all Jimmy could say.

The view over the horizon was spectacular. Clouds, some white, some dark-gray, churned above them. And beyond that, they could see the deep-green ocean rising and falling, every so often topped by swirling squiggles of white foam that grew and then disappeared, only to be replaced by more of the same white, foamy squiggles. The great, churning ocean seemed like it went on forever. And a steady salt-scented wind rushed against their faces.

“And it’s a safe place, too,” Kevin commented, pointing a finger across the bluff.

Along the edge of the cliff, there was a long, high fence which led all the way down the coast for well over a mile, or maybe more. The fence was made of metal wire attached to steel posts.

“So there’s no way we can accidentally fall off the cliff while we’re flying our kites,” Kevin pointed out. “That fence would catch us.”

“Did your aunt put the fence up?” Jimmy asked, dropping his big spool of string and tying one end to the tail end of his shiny-red box kite.

“Yeah, a long time ago when she first bought the lodge,” Kevin told him. “It probably cost a lot of money to put up, but she wants to make sure no one has any accidents while they’re staying here. Take a look.”

Jimmy followed Kevin out to the edge of the bluff. They put their hands on the sturdy metal fence rail, leaned over, and looked down.

“Gosh,” Jimmy said. “That makes me really dizzy just looking down.”

“I know,” Kevin said. “It’s pretty scary. But it’s a good thing my aunt had this fence put up.”

They looked down. The rocky cliff descended over huge, chunky rocks and led straight down to the sea. Waves crashed against the stone cliff, shooting giant puffs of white foamy water.

“You know,” Jimmy said. “If a person fell all the way down there—”

“They’d get killed,” Kevin finished.

“Wow.”

They went back to where they’d left their kites in the clearing. Kevin looked up at the sky, which was growing darker by the second. “Guess what?,” he said. “Maybe this wasn’t such a great idea. Look at the sky. It looks like it’s going to start raining any second.”

“I think you’re right,” Jimmy said, also glancing upward. The wind jerked his box kite in his hand.

And sure enough—

“Run!” Kevin yelled.

The darkening sky opened up, thunder rumbling overhead, and a second later, it started raining harder than either of them had ever seen.

They dashed back toward the woodline with their kites. The rain made the air look like it was full of tiny, moving slits. More thunder rumbled, the sky got even darker, and then several whip-like streaks of lightning cracked overhead. Kevin and Jimmy made it back to the woods just in time, otherwise they would’ve been drenched right through their clothes.

“What a storm!” Jimmy exclaimed.

““Yeah, and look at the lightning!”

More whips of lightning cracked across the sky, and then the rain was falling so hard they could hear it beating against the ground. “We better get back to the lodge,” Kevin suggested, “and fast.”

They both ran back down the trail in the teeming rain. At least the heavily branched trees overhead blocked out a lot of the rainfall. They trotted on for several minutes, over a carpet of wet leaves, without really paying attention to where they were going. Then Kevin stopped.

“What’s wrong?” Jimmy asked.

Kevin looked around, unsure of himself. “This doesn’t look right,” he said.

“What do you mean?”

Kevin looked around some more, rubbed his chin. Then his eyes went wide with apprehension, and he said, “I think we’re on the wrong trail.”

“What!” Jimmy exclaimed.

“Yeah,” Kevin said. “I think we’re lost.”

CHAPTER ELEVEN

Lost, Kevin thought. The word sounded dreadful in his head. And he was sure now: this wasn’t the right trail—it was straighter and wider and took fewer turns, and Kevin could easily tell that it led in a direction that was opposite from the way they’d come. They could hear the rain pelting the trees limbs overhead, and still more thunder and lightning. Even this deep in the woods, they were getting drenched.

“What are we going to do?” Jimmy asked fretfully.

“I don’t know,” Kevin said. “But we’ve definitely got to get back to the lodge. I guess we better just start walking, and hope we get back going the right direction.”

“But what if we can’t?” Now there was a hint of panic in Jimmy’s voice. “What if this path just leads deeper into the woods? We could wind up walking for miles and never find our way back to the lodge.”

“Don’t worry about it,” Kevin tried to assure him, but he wasn’t even certain himself. Sometimes he’d hear stories on the news about kids who’d get lost in the woods, and the police would have to send out search parties, and sometimes it would take days or even weeks before they could find the kids. But Kevin decided not to mention this to Jimmy, who was close to panicking already. Why make things worse? If we got lost, Kevin very grimly realized, and they had to send out search parties, Dad would be so mad I’d get grounded for a month! And that wasn’t even the worst fear.

What if we got lost, he thought next…and never got found?

Now Kevin was beginning to feel a little bit of panic himself. “We’ll just keep walking,” he said. “Don’t worry. We’ll find our way back.”

“I hope so,” Jimmy muttered

They followed the path. Instead of crunching over the leaves, their feet now