He closed his fist around the pebbles and clenched them tightly so his knuckles turned white. Then he spilled them back into their bag, pulled the drawstring, and set the bag back on the night table.
“Thanks for the poem,” he said, leaning back on the pillow. “It’s a good one. ’Specially the ending.”
Through the trees came the light notes of Wiggy Pugh’s cornet as he blew retreat. Leo knew he should be getting back to camp; he’d have a tough enough job explaining to Reece why he’d missed Counselors’ Night; there’d be docked desserts to pay for that crime. And for the hundredth time a vision of Stanley Wagner crept into his mind, that shadow that had a habit of reappearing at the moment Leo least expected it.
Such thoughts failed to force him from the sickroom, however. Tiger had shut his eyes again; there were drops of perspiration on his brow; it felt hot to Leo’s touch. Then he stirred in the bed and spoke a few words, which Leo failed to catch.
“What?” he asked.
Tiger mumbled again, but again the sense was lost.
From across the way at Three Corner Cove came the soft strains of dance music:
You go to my head
With a smile that makes my temp’rature rise,
Like a summer with a thousand Julys,
You intoxicate my soul with your eyes.
There was a curious thing about music heard across water, an indefinable something that altered the tonal qualities of the notes, not subtracting but adding to their sum, rounding and hollowing them, making them both remote and somehow more intimate, like the warming gleam of a familiar but faraway star. And in years to come, whenever he might hear that song, no matter where he was or what he was doing, for Leo Joaquim it would always be the summer of ’38, his Moonbow summer.
Beyond the partition, Wanda lay on the day bed, listening to the soft burr of the boys’ voices. She glanced at her alarm clock. Eleven. It was late. She tried to picture the Abernathys in their car, rushing through the night to their son’s bedside. No need, of course, no real need, she told herself. But as well they were coming, just in case. She must go in and shoo Leo out. Hearing a sound, she sat up: a dark shape slipped through the open doorway. Wanda smiled to herself as she listened to the nails clicking on the floorboards. Well, who cared, really? A dog wasn’t going to hurt anything. She could hear the music from over at the Oliphants’. She lay thinking in the dark, then felt her eyelids drooping…
She hadn’t slept. She was certain of it. Yet, when she looked at the clock again, its phosphorescent hands told her it was ten minutes past midnight. She got up quickly and tiptoed from the room. In the adjoining one Tiger lay on the bed with his eyes shut, his free leg angled and sticking out from beneath the sheet. In the chair Leo slumped, head canted to one side, his mouth partly open, hands loosely folded in his lap. Between the chair and the bed lay Harpo, who raised a sleepy head to regard her with inquisitive eyes, then dropped his muzzle to the floor again.
Wanda felt Tiger’s forehead; it was moist and warm -too warm. Still, if he was resting she didn’t want to disturb him; there was no telling if he’d get back to sleep again. She checked her watch. She estimated the Abernathys would arrive some time after breakfast, certainly not before. A hundred and fifty miles was a good distance to travel.
She went back into the other room, lit a cigarette, and sat smoking as she looked out into the darkness.
Hours later, in the sickroom, Leo came awake in his chair. It was Harpo who’d roused him. The dog was sitting close to the bed, rubbing the crown of his head against the bedrails, whimpering, and Leo got up and went to calm him. Absently he stroked the animal and stared down at Tiger’s head on the pillow. His cheeks had lost their bright color, and when Leo touched his friend’s forehead it felt cool. He got his chair and sat close to the bed, wishing Tiger would open his eyes so they could talk some more. After a while Harpo sat up, then clambered awkwardly into Leo’s lap, where he sat licking his face, looking from him to Tiger in the bed. The animal felt hot and heavy and Leo wanted to put him down, but he didn’t. Under his thick curly coat the dog was trembling. Probably he should be put out; Wanda would be annoyed if she awoke and found she’d been disobeyed.
Through the window he could see familiar shapes as the dawn began to break. The lake surface was already glinting in the early-morning light. A fine mist curled along the edges of the Three Corner Cove. On the washline three sets of female bathing attire hung: Maryann’s, Honey’s, and Sally Berwick’s. Doc’s Chris-Craft rode at easy anchor, calm and motionless.
Leo tensed as from the bed came the sound of Tiger’s voice.
“Ha… al… yee hepp… ridge,” Leo heard. Was it fever talk? Tiger’s eyes were open and he stared up at Leo but didn’t seem to recognize him.
“What? What did you say?” Leo asked.
Tiger turned his head restlessly on the pillow.
“How al – keh… uh… ”
Leo frowned slightly. Then it came to him. “How valiantly he kept the bridge,” he said. Tiger moved his hand on the coverlet, smiled, and shut his eyes again. He looked peaceful. Leo felt exhausted but not sleepy. Harpo had become too heavy. Leo put him down, then got up and stretched a couple of times.
“Come on, Harp,” Leo whispered, but the dog, now lying near the foot of the bed, made no move. Leo paused a moment longer, then backed away and left the room. Through the dispensary doorway he could see Wanda stretched out on the cot. She moved, then sat up, rubbing her eyes.
“Is he going to be okay?” Leo asked.
Swinging her feet to the floor and kneading her back, Wanda drilled him with a look. “Of course he’s going to be okay.” She took her thermometer, shook it down, and went in to look at the patient, while Leo wandered out onto the porch. His backside ached. The camp was already stirring. Over at the Oliphants’, Maryann appeared on the porch. She was wearing an Indian-pattern bathrobe, carrying a coffee mug and a lighted cigarette. Leo returned her wave, wondering why nobody ever saw her in curlers like other women.
Just then Harpo forged his way through the open doorway, bursting from the place like the hound of hell itself, bounding down the porch steps and racing off along the path, past Three Corner Cove to disappear into the woods. A moment later an unearthly howl arose that raised the hair on the nape of Leo’s neck.
“Gosh, what’s wrong with that poor creature?” Maryann called over. No one answered. On the infirmary porch Leo was backed against the railing so hard a spur hurt his leg. Heedless of the discomfort, he was staring at Wanda, who stood motionless in the doorway. Her brimming eyes sparkled in the morning light. But people like Wanda didn’t cry, they helped others dry their tears. In a husky voice she told him she was going over to use the Oliphants’ telephone. Gripping the porch post, Leo followed her with his eyes as she went down the steps and along the path; then he walked back inside.
In the sickroom the shades were pulled down to the sill. The bedsheet was drawn up over the pillow. He could make out the general shape of Tiger’s head underneath. He did not go inside the room. His knees seemed about to fold on him, and he sat down suddenly in Wanda’s chair. He tried to think, but his thoughts floated out of reach like ghostly things, as if what was happening wasn’t really happening, was just part of a dream, another bad dream he’d had. Yes, that was it, he was still asleep, he hadn’t woken at all, and he was still dreaming. In a moment he would wake up and everything would be okay – it would, wouldn’t it? If only He heard the sound of an auto engine. Through the opposite window he saw a car pull into view. It came to a stop on the grassy spot beside the infirmary and the Abernathys got out. They came up the steps and into the room. “Hello, Leo,” they said. “How is our boy?”