by Helen Wells
The man must also have known intimately the layout of the big office, and where the employees would be busy at that hour. For he had boldly walked down a private corridor and into a deserted inside room which held the company’s safe. No one saw him, no one stopped him, since the employees were occupied in the front office with clients. From the safe the man took a large sum of cash. It was only on his way out of the inside room, as he was going down the corridor, that two women employees noticed a man wearing a raincoat and a hat pulled low over his face. But when they tried to stop him—for this area was for employees only—the man pulled a gun.
“Great balls of fire!” he had said, according to the women’s report, “Get in that door and keep still!”
He had pushed them into a washroom, keeping them covered, locked it, and then apparently had made his way through the crowded outer office into the street—just another man in slouch hat and raincoat whom no one had noticed.
The curious thing was that both women had described the man as faceless. They had been able to see a little beneath the pulled-down hatbrim, but the face had been smoothly, horribly featureless. He was slightly below medium height, they reported, but otherwise the bulky, free-swinging raincoat hid his figure completely. The only identifying mark was the man’s use of the phrase, “Great balls of fire!”
What was so provoking about the case, Cherry thought, was that the loan company would release no information about how the man had gotten into the safe, nor would they speculate on the possibility of an inside job. But now, a reporter had extracted from the loan company the fact that one of its cashiers was a man below average height who frequently used the phrase, “Great balls of fire!” The man’s name was Jack Waldron, he was twenty-eight years old, and he had left for his vacation just a few days before the robbery took place.
“It would have been easy enough for him to come back to the office, disguised, like that, and take the money,” Sue said. She had been watching the place where Cherry was reading.
“Easier, I guess, than to attempt the job from the inside. That is,” Cherry said, “if he is the robber.”
“He used the same funny words. Why do you suppose he did such a stupid thing?”
“He may have gotten excited when the women discovered him, and blurted it out. Just a minute more, Sue—”
Cherry continued to read. “This reporter learned today that the cashier, Jack Waldron, has not reported back to work, although his two-week vacation period is now over. Employees of the loan company stated that Mr. Waldron had planned to go on a camping trip during his vacation. A friend who was to have accompanied him was taken sick. Mr. Waldron told his fellow employees that he would go through with his plans, anyway, even though it meant camping alone.”
Sue urged Cherry to read the last paragraph.
“Friends of Jack Waldron expressed concern at his failure to report back to work. He was due back a week ago. Some feel it is possible that Waldron may be lost, or ill and alone in some woods. Others regard this as unlikely, since he is an experienced camper. A few of his friends received picture postcards from him, postmarked June 10 and June 11. (The robbery occurred on June 14, when semimonthly payments were made.) These post cards were mailed from Lanesboro and Pleasant Mountain, small towns in northeastern Pennsylvania. No word has been received from Waldron since June 11.
“Telephone inquiries by this newspaper to these towns elicited the information that a young man who may be Waldron has been seen there. A grocery store owner recalls that the man, carrying a camper’s pack on his back, made a purchase about ten days ago, about June 19 or 20, late in the evening. A hardware merchant made a similar report.
“A description of Waldron has gone out to police in this widespread area. He is about five feet six, weighs approximately 150 pounds, has brown hair, and regular features. No photograph of him is available. Friends at the loan company, where Waldron worked for six months, say that he told them he had been raised in an orphanage, served in the Army, and had been honorably discharged, then worked in various accounting firms and banks. He is unmarried and has no known relatives.”
That was the end of the newspaper article. Sue had been standing on one foot and then the other, until Cherry finished reading.
“Well, what do you think?”
“It certainly sounds as if he had a bleak, lonely life,” Cherry said. “Not that that would excuse an armed robbery—if he really came back to New York from Pennsylvania and did it.”
“Just three hours by train. Everything points to Jack Waldron,” Sue said. “Things couldn’t look much worse for him, could they?”
Cherry pretended to shiver. “I hope we don’t find any armed desperadoes lurking around Camp Blue Water.”
“If we did,” said Aunt Bet, overhearing, “we’d probably put them to work painting the dock. Get your suitcases ready, everybody! We’ll be there in ten minutes!”
CHAPTER II
A Puzzling Request
BY MONDAY, CAMP BLUE WATER WAS IN FULL SWING. Everyone was busy, enjoying a swim in the lake, paying calls from cabin to cabin, and taking their first lessons in horseback riding. The arts and crafts cabin and the woodcraft area were humming with projects, and the nature counselor was in constant demand to answer questions about newly discovered plants, flowers, and animals.
Cherry had a bird’s-eye view of the activity from the infirmary, which was a log cabin perched high up near the top of a slope. Looking down, Cherry could see the campers’ cabins scattered among the grove of sweet-smelling spruce, pine, and hemlock trees; the Midgets’ and Juniors’ cabins at a safe distance from the edge of the beautiful blue lake.
Off to the east, at the camp entrance, stood the directors’ “Main House” and office, and the airy Mess Hall. Then came the barnlike Playhouse where the girls would put on theatrical productions, and invite the boys from Thunder Cliff to square dances. Besides these, workshop cabins, tennis courts, and grassy play areas made up the rest of camp. At the west end of camp was the cabin which Cherry shared with five other staff girls and a mouse.
Cherry and Jean Wheeler did not mind the mouse. Since Jean Wheeler, called Nature Girl, taught nature lore and was hike leader, she had encountered many animals more frightening than a field mouse. Cherry, being a nurse, felt sympathy for all living creatures.
“I admit a mouseless cabin would be cleaner,” Cherry said. “But honestly, Leona, there’s no need to rip open our cots each time before climbing in.”
“I wish I knew a nice, helpful cat around here,” Leona sighed.
Leona Jackson was the dancing teacher, her sister Doris Jackson was camp pianist. They were high-strung, city-bred young women, not used to country living. But they were willing to laugh at their own greenness. The other two occupants of this roomy cabin were Ruth M. who supervised arts and crafts, and Ruth J. who was the head swimming instructor.
Cherry saw less of her cabin mates than of little Sue Howard, whose “Mountaineers” cabin was just across the path. Sue ran over before breakfast to say good morning.
She was prompt to acquaint Cherry with Blue Water ways. “You’d better not spread out any clothes to dry in this field, Miss Cherry,” she said early one morning. “I’ve seen squirrels come out of the woods and scamper all over the things we leave around.”
“Thanks, Sue.” Cherry gazed into the dense woods which rose like a wall behind the field. “How deep is this forest?”
“I don’t know,” Sue answered, “but it’s big. On the other side of it is Thunder Cliff.” Sue pointed out the footpath along the edge of Long Lake which led to the boys’ camp.
“How long is Long Lake?”
“Gosh, at least five miles, maybe farther. They say the far end is wild and deserted. We’re not allowed to row near there, or go exploring or hiking there.”
“Even with counselors?”
“Even with counselors, and Jean Wheeler leading the hike. Especially not to Tall Man’s Island.”
The name arr
ested Cherry’s attention.
But Sue was already telling her about the Eplers’ farm nearby, where the camp purchased its eggs and butter. “The Eplers are an awfully nice young couple,” she said enthusiastically. A little farther away, she added, was another farm, the Model Farm, where the campers had their own vegetable patches and helped take care of the farm animals. Last year Sue’s cabin had been in charge of raising a calf.
“I can hardly wait to see her grown up into a cow,” Sue said. “Will you come with us, Miss Cherry? Please?”
“I’d love to, but it depends on when I’ll have time off from the infirmary.”
Cherry was very busy these first days helping Dr. Lowell and his wife organize the infirmary. The log cabin was divided into a clinic, a small examining room, a supply room, and a large room holding four cots. “A complete little medical unit, although I’d rather not attempt surgery here,” said Robert Lowell. For any serious emergencies, he told Cherry, they would rely on the hospital in Martinsville, the nearest good-sized town. The doctor said it was a first-rate hospital.
“We don’t really expect any serious cases,” Janet Lowell told Cherry. “When Bob and I first came up here, four summers ago, we were all set for appendicitis and a broken arm or leg. But the Blue Water girls fooled us.”
“You don’t sound a bit sorry,” Cherry said, smiling.
She liked the young, brown-haired Lowells—Robert so quiet, and Jan so pleasant, both of them such responsible, warmhearted medical people. It was wonderful to have another nurse here to work with. Cherry and Jan wore crisp white uniforms and caps. Dr. Robert, as the children called him, wore starchy white, too.
“Nursing won’t monopolize all your time,” the Lowells told Cherry. Jan taught the girls fine needlework when she had spare time, and the doctor was always willing to give a first-aid lesson on the infirmary’s porch. “Bob and Bet Wright may ask what you’d like to do, Cherry, so think about it.”
The infirmary’s first patient was the new girl from Sue’s cabin. Katy Osborn came limping in on Tuesday morning, all by herself.
“Why, where’s your counselor?” Cherry asked. “Didn’t she or some of the other girls offer to bring you up here?”
“I didn’t tell them I was coming. They’d have laughed at me,” Katy said. She limped over to a bench and dropped down. A pretty little girl with fine skin and silky hair, Katy wore the simple camp uniform of shirt and shorts with an air. “Besides, I don’t want the other girls to be fussing around me. Oh, my ankle!”
“That’s a shame,” Cherry said. “Let me see it.”
“Can’t the doctor see it?” Katy murmured. “If you don’t mind—”
Cherry looked at her in surprise. “He will, in just a minute.” She explained that Dr. Lowell and his wife were busy setting up health record forms for each girl, and this morning it was Cherry’s job to be the receiving department. She examined Katy’s ankle.
“I don’t see a thing except a scratch,” Cherry said.
“But it hurts! Can’t the doctor—please?—”
Dr. Lowell came in and examined Katy’s ankle. He, too, found nothing wrong with it except a scratch.
“But that’s exactly what hurts,” Katy said pleadingly. “Quite a lot.”
“I’ll paint it with iodine,” Dr. Lowell reassured her. “Then you can run along and enjoy yourself.”
After the doctor had applied iodine and a Bandaid, and had left, Katy continued to sit forlornly on the bench.
“Homesick?” Cherry asked.
“Oh, no,” Katy said. “It’s nice at Blue Water. It’s just that I don’t see any fun in tennis practice. The other girls work so hard to win, it’s so silly.”
Perhaps this girl with her air of being specially privileged did not like to compete with better players. But it was only tennis practice … Cherry wondered.
“Besides, I couldn’t play tennis with this bad ankle.”
“Now, really, Katy, there’s nothing the matter with you. I’m sure you have enough spirit to overlook a scratch.”
Katy looked as if she wanted to cry but was too proud to. “Why can’t anyone around here see how hard it is, especially for a new girl, Miss—Miss—?”
Cherry supplied her name, and said encouragingly, “New ways aren’t easy at first, are they? Do you want to tell me what’s bothering you?”
Katy burst forth into an account of her troubles. She was obliged to make her own bed and help sweep out the cabin—before she’d had breakfast, at that! … Well, yes, so did all the other girls. But she wasn’t used to it, she’d never had to do such things at home. Besides, if she wanted a shower, she had to walk way over to a shower cabin for it. That was how she’d scratched her ankle, on a stone along the way.
“Poor Katy,” said Cherry. She felt amused, but concerned for the youngster, too. “But, you see, part of the fun at camp is living mostly outdoors, living very simply. And doing your share of the chores together with your friends is part of the fun, too.”
“Sue and the rest aren’t my friends,” Katy said very low.
“Do you like them?”
“I’m trying to.”
Katy stood up, excused herself, and limped down the hill. From the way her shoulders drooped, it appeared that she felt infinitely sorry for herself.
Yet Cherry liked this pretty girl. She was anxious to hear more about Katy from the camp director, in his crowded office, when she delivered the day’s medical report to him.
“Just read this letter from Katy’s parents,” Bob Wright said. He was a lean, homely, likable man. “Next they’ll write me they don’t want their treasure to go swimming for fear she’ll get wet. Katy is a nice girl or she could be, if her parents ever let her stand on her own feet.”
From the letter it was clear that Katy, an only child, had had everything done for her. Overprotected, indulged, cradled in luxury from babyhood—no wonder she was frightened, indignant about making her bed, and lost among the other campers.
“Maybe she’ll learn at camp, this summer,” Uncle Bob said. He peered at Cherry through his round glasses like a kindly owl. “We’ll all do everything we can to help her.”
“I’ll try, too,” Cherry promised. Maybe she could drop a hint to the Mountaineers of Katy’s cabin.
Then Uncle Bob surprised her. “You know what I think? And Lil Baker thinks, too? The girls themselves are going to be the ones who help Katy. They’ll either cure or kill her. That cabin is going to have a summer they won’t forget.”
The Lowells were right, Cherry did have a pleasant amount of free time. Of course she remained on camp premises within call of the infirmary, and she was not idle. Whenever she saw a way to make herself useful, she joined in. It was fun to lend a hand with the Midgets, at their cabin called the Beehive, in honor of Bea, their unit counselor. Two afternoons Cherry helped the swimming staff with the kindergartners in the crib. The craft shop attracted Cherry, as the girls collected reeds to weave baskets, and some started leather work. Cherry thought about what sort of contribution she could make.
“You probably know a good deal about biology, since you’re a nurse,” Aunt Bet said that first week. “Perhaps you’d like to help out in the nature department.”
“We might start a Can-You-Name-This Shelf,” Cherry suggested, and Aunt Bet agreed that that would be a good idea.
At first, though, Cherry was content to do the small extra jobs that no one else had time for. That was how she happened to bump into Reed Champion, and to meet the Eplers.
Sophie, the cook, announced one morning that she needed extra cream and eggs at once, for ice cream and cake for Ding’s birthday. (It was a Blue Water custom to hold a birthday party for any girl lucky enough to possess a July or August birth date.) Who would go over to the Eplers’ farm for extra supplies? Cherry volunteered.
“Our station wagon is temperamental,” Uncle Bob told her, giving her the keys. “It’d be surer to walk over to the Eplers’—it’s only fifteen minutes’ wa
lk—except that you’d have to carry the eggs and cream on the way back, and it takes a lot of eggs and cream to make enough dessert for this gang.”
Cherry didn’t expect the motor to stall on so short a drive, but it did. She was considering leaving the car in the road and continuing on foot when a twin station wagon came toward her. It stopped.
“Stuck?” the young driver inquired cheerfully. “Need help? I’m the head counselor at Thunder Cliff, remember?”
“Of course I remember,” Cherry said, “and even though this motor has me confused.”
Reed Champion laughed, and slid out from behind his own wheel. He was tall, athletic, already sunburned, and moved with an easy strength. He lifted the hood and released a part of the mechanism.
“She always catches like that with a new driver,” Reed said. “You’re all right now—ah—I’m awfully sorry but I can’t remember your name except that it’s some kind of a fruit.” He actually blushed.
“It’s Cherry, but sometimes I think Tutti-Frutti would be easier for people to remember.”
“Tutti for short? Anyway, the name Cherry matches your coloring.” Then Reed Champion looked downright embarrassed. He changed the subject. “Is this your first season in camp work?”
They talked camp for a few minutes, in the warm sun, with green trees blowing gently around them. Reed was dedicated to his work with young people, Cherry could see. In the winters he taught physical education and coached basketball and baseball at a Long Island high school. Every summer, except for an enlistment period in the Air Force, he had been first a camper, then a junior counselor, and now head counselor at Thunder Cliff.
“The kids say you can tell an old-timer by how long he’s known old Reed.” The young man smiled, a wide, friendly smile. “A lot of us love this mountaintop. We come up here Thanksgiving and Easter, to hike and sort of keep an eye on the camps. Fred and Vernie Epler invite us to dinner and tell us the local news.”
