Party Summer Page 11

  “Wow,” she mouthed silently.

  “What is itf” Eric asked eagerly. He stepped up beside her and peered in also.

  They stepped into the brightly lit room, nervously checking all around them.

  “It’s some sort of trophy room,” Cari said.

  “Yeah. Look at the hunting trophies,” Eric said, picking up a silver cup. It had a hunter and a hound etched into its side.

  “I don’t see a phone,” Craig said, sounding very disappointed.

  “This is weird,” Eric said. “Way weird.” He stepped up to a glass display case, admiring the brass and silver trophies inside.

  “Let’s go,” Craig said impatiently, starting toward the door. “Who cares about a bunch of hunting trophies? So what if people like to hunt at this hotel?”

  “Yes, let’s get—” Cari started, but abruptly stopped. Her mouth dropped open, and she gasped in horror.

  “Look—” she cried.

  She was staring past the glass display cases to the far wall.

  Mounted high on the wall, much like deer or moose heads, were four heads.

  Four human heads.

  Chapter 20

  BOAT PROBLEMS

  Into the warm night.

  The symphony of crickets. The shock of the darkness.

  The relief of being out of the hotel.

  The fear that she wasn’t far enough away yet.

  Cari ran with the two boys through the tall grass along the back of the hotel. Everything seemed exaggerated. All of her senses were distorted. She could see every blade of grass, every clump of sand before her. She could hear the scratching crickets, the brush of the wind off the ocean, the hard breathing of her companions. She could smell the salt from the water, even smell the grassy dew that clung to her legs as she ran.

  She could feel the fear.

  The fear that had made them run from the hideous trophies, run blindly down the stairs and out the narrow back exit by the storage pantry, and keep on running without looking back.

  Her bag felt heavy, but she didn’t slow.

  None of them did.

  They turned the corner, breathing loudly, running at full speed, and headed past the hotel building, down the steeply sloping hill at its front, and onto the narrow private road that twisted through the woods down to the water.

  “Ow! I’ve got a stone in my shoe!”

  Craig stopped and dropped his bag onto the road and sat on it. Breathing heavily, he pulled off his sneaker and turned it over to empty it.

  Cari, struggling to catch her breath, was grateful for the break. She turned to stare up the hill at the hotel, which was dark except for two lights on the second floor.

  “I think we’re going to make it,” Eric said, wiping his forehead with the back of his hand. “They didn’t see us. They’re not coming after us.”

  Such a hot night, Cari thought. She was dripping wet.

  Craig was gulping air. “We’re not away yet,” he managed to say, still trying to catch his breath. “We’ve got to get off this island. I won’t feel safe till we’re on the boat.”

  “You sure you can drive a boat?” Eric asked.

  “Yeah. I’m sure.”

  “I can just picture you in a yachting cap,” Eric said, grinning. “And the white pants and the admiral’s jacket with those things on the shoulders. It’s perfect.”

  “I can pilot it without a uniform,” Craig said with a grim smile.

  Cari still saw the four mounted heads in her mind. She couldn’t stop thinking about them. They seemed to be following her, watching her as she ran through the night. “Those heads—” she said, to no one in particular.

  “Try not to think about “them,” Eric interrupted, squeezing her shoulder tenderly. “Let’s just go.”

  “But were they—” She couldn’t finish her question.

  Were they four other people who had vanished on Piney Island? she wondered. Four hotel guests who never returned home? Had Edward written a letter to their relatives saying that they had mysteriously disappeared?

  Cari tried to shut the hideous sight from her mind. She tried not to think about Jan. Poor Jan. But the four faces on the wall, their features stretched in horror, in agony, their hideous expressions trapped forever, followed her as she jogged with her friends down the road, through the whispering pines toward the water.

  A few minutes later the tall wrought-iron fence came into view.

  “We’re almost to the dock!” Cari cried happily. Being so close to freedom helped her forget the aching of her arm, the heaviness of the bag, the fearful pounding of her heart.

  Eric reached the gate first. He grabbed the gate latch and pulled.

  He heaved a loud sigh.

  Cari and Craig caught up with him. She could immediately see the despair on his face.

  “The gate’s padlocked,” he said, breathing hard.

  He tugged at the lock. He tried pushing it.

  He slammed his bag against the gate. He put his hands around the bars and shook the gate as hard as he could, more out of frustration than as an attempt to get it open.

  “We’re locked in. We can’t get to the dock.”

  “We can climb the fence,” Cari suggested. But then she looked up at how tall it was and saw the spikes all along the top.

  “No way,” Craig muttered, dropping his bag to the asphalt. “The dock is so close. Just on the other side.”

  “Wait!” Cari interrupted. She had an idea. “We’ll go back to the hotel—”

  “What?” Eric cried. “Have you lost it? Edward and Martin must know we’re gone by now. They’re probably out looking for us.”

  “Wait—just listen to me,” Cari said shrilly, unable to hide her impatience. She knew her idea was good. “I don’t mean go into the hotel. We can run behind it and get down to the hotel beach. There are those canoes at the hotel dock. You know the ones. They’re always tied up there. We can take them to get away.”

  “The canoes are on the bay—not the ocean. We can’t take them around the island,” Eric scoffed.

  “No,” Cari told him. “But we can take them to Willow Island. It’s close, you can see it from the hotel beach. We can paddle to Willow Island and get the police.”

  “Now, that’s a great idea,” Eric said quickly.

  “I guess so,” Craig said. “I just hate the idea of going back up to the hotel.”

  “We’ll keep to the trees,” Cari said, picking up her bag and leading the way, leaning into the hill, forcing her legs to climb. “We’ll stay as far from the hotel as we can. The lights weren’t on in the back. It’s pitch-black back there. They won’t see us.”

  Her enthusiasm was catching. They picked up the pace as they made their way up the hill. The pale moon was just bright enough to light their way. Owls hooted softly from somewhere overhead. Again, Cari had the strange feeling that she could hear every sound, see everything around her with unnatural clarity.

  The two upstairs lights had been turned off. The hotel was now completely dark. It loomed in front of them, a hulking black shape against a blue-black sky.

  Walking through the tall grass that bordered the woods, Cari and the boys slipped past the hotel. The grass felt wet and scratchy against Cari’s legs. She wished she had worn jeans instead of shorts.

  The grass gave way to sand, and the dune that sloped down to the bay. She could hear the soft lapping of waves against the sand. Then she could see the bay, the moon reflected in its gentle waters.

  They stopped just below the top of the dune, safely out of sight of the hotel. Cari turned toward the small dock where the canoes were always kept.

  And gaped in disbelief.

  And disappointment.

  The canoes were gone.

  She stared hard, thinking maybe they were hidden by the darkness.

  But no. The canoes were not there.

  “We’re trapped,” she said softly, reaching for Eric’s hand, surprised to find it ice-cold. “We can’t get off thi
s island.”

  Chapter 21

  EDWARD’S SURPRISE

  The rain came without warning, a sudden burst that caught Cari and the boys by surprise. She looked up at the jet black sky. The moon was gone now, covered by low rain clouds.

  A jagged streak of white lightning crackled out across the bay.

  “I’m totally drenched!” Cari shouted over the rolling thunder that shook the dune beneath them.

  “We’ve got to get out of the rain,” Craig cried. “But where can we go? Do you think if we followed the beach we could walk all the way around the island to the ocean side?”

  Another streak of lightning made the low rolling waves brighter even than in daytime. Cari brushed her soaked hair back with her hand, large raindrops running down her face, making it difficult to see.

  “No, it’s too far and the storm is too dangerous,” Eric said, pulling at his wet T-shirt, his eyes on the sky. “The lightning’s getting closer.”

  Another boom of thunder shook the dune. In the white light of the next bolt of lightning, Cari saw the tall grass sweep and bend eerily from side to side, as if trying to escape the storm.

  “How about the pool house?” Cari suggested the accompanying thunder roared. The lightning was only a mile away now. The long, low pool house behind the swimming pool in back of the hotel housed all of the pool supplies and cleaning equipment. It would be a little cramped, but at least they’d be indoors, out of the downpour.

  “Let’s go,” Eric said.

  They started to run, no longer worried about keeping to the shadows. The ground was wet and soft. Cari slipped, stumbling over her suitcase, which seemed to weigh a thousand pounds now. She pulled herself up quickly and, dragging the bag in both hands, ran as fast as she could, following the boys to the low structure, praying that it wasn’t locked.

  It wasn’t.

  Eric pulled the door open, and they ducked inside. Cari was breathing so hard she thought her lungs might burst. The pool house smelled of chlorine. It was very hot, and the rain pounded deafeningly on the roof.

  Eric clicked on the fluorescent lights and they flickered to life on the long, low ceiling. “No! Turn them off!” Cari cried, alarmed. “Edward—he’ll see the light and—”

  “It’s okay,” Eric said soothingly. “There are no windows in this place, remember?”

  Cari sighed. Her hair was soaked and matted against her forehead. Even Craig, who always managed to look neat, appeared as if he’d been through a clothes washer.

  “Now what?” he said, glancing around miserably. “Where do we go from here?”

  “Is there a phone in here?” Cari asked. It was an outside chance, but worth a look.

  They searched the cluttered building quickly, the three of them looking like strange water creatures, wet and green skinned under the fluorescent lights.

  There was no phone.

  “How do we get off this island?” Craig asked no one in particular, his desperation evident in his voice. “Edward has obviously locked the gate and hidden the canoes.”

  “Now why would I do that?” a gruff voice boomed from behind them.

  Craig cried out in shock. Cari felt herself about to scream, but the sound caught in her throat.

  She turned to see Edward Fear in the pool-house doorway, his hunting rifle in one hand, an umbrella in the other. He wore a long yellow rain slicker that came down to his ankles.

  He tossed the umbrella to the floor and, leaning on the rifle, stepped briskly, purposefully, into the center of the room. His face looked livid under the fluorescent light, his white hair more unruly than usual, standing out about his head. He glared at them with his one good eye, his mouth twisted in a strangely pleased smile.

  “Such a nasty night. What are you doing out here?”

  No one replied.

  How did he find us? Cari wondered. How did he know we were here?

  “Well?” he demanded, the smile fading from his face.

  A flash of lightning and an explosion of thunder made Cari gasp out loud. “We want to leave,” she blurted out.

  “Leave?” Her answer seemed to surprise Edward. Leaning on his rifle, he used his free hand to scratch his stubbly jaw.

  “Yes. We want to leave the island,” Eric said, finding his voice.

  “But you can’t leave,” Edward said. He sounded almost hurt.

  “We have to,” Cari said. Edward had left the pool-house door open. The sky flashed behind him, immediately followed by the sharp crack of thunder. Sheets of rain now pounded the ground.

  Edward was silent for a bit, staring at them, not moving from his spot in the center of the room. “You can’t leave now,” he said finally in a low voice filled with menace. “I’m formally inviting you to the party.”

  “Party?” Cari uttered, feeling the dread grow in the pit of her stomach.

  “The party is about to start,” Edward said, staring at her. He took a few steps closer to her. Cari tried to back up, but she was already against the concrete wall.

  “Martin and I have been waiting for the party to start,” Edward said, his strange smile returning. “Guess what kind of party it is.”

  “Please—we just want to go!” Cari cried, feeling on the verge of tears. “We won’t tell anyone about Simon or anything. We promise. We just want to go home.”

  “Guess what kind of party it is,” Edward repeated, ignoring Cari’s plea. He didn’t wait for any guesses. “Give up? It’s a hunting party!” He laughed, a loud cackle. “And guess who Martin and I are going to be hunting this season!” He laughed again.

  Cari felt chilled through and through. “No!” she cried out, picturing the four heads, the four human heads, mounted on the trophy-room wall.

  She understood what Edward meant. They all did. They all understood what kind of hunting party Edward had in mind. And they all understood immediately that they were the prey.

  “This is crazy!” Cari cried. “You’re crazy!”

  She didn’t even realize she was saying it. The words just exploded out of her.

  Edward raised the hunting rifle in response.

  Cari cried out and tried to edge away. But there was nowhere to hide.

  “You shouldn’t have said that,” Edward said angrily. “I invited you to a party. You shouldn’t insult me.”

  “Let us out of here!” Eric demanded.

  “I’m not crazy,” Edward said, ignoring him. He raised the rifle higher, aimed it at Cari, and took two steps closer to her.

  “No—please—” Cari screamed. Without thinking about it, she plunged forward and batted at the barrel of the rifle.

  The rifle went off, a fiery explosion.

  Edward cried out, staggered, and toppled backward. His head hit the corner of a wooden picnic table as he fell.

  Cari and her two friends didn’t wait for Edward to get up.

  Leaving their bags behind, they scrambled past him to the door and out into the driving rain.

  PART THREE

  THE PARTY

  Chapter 22

  EDWARD TAKES AIM

  “This way!” Eric yelled.

  Her sneakers slipping on the wet sand, Cari followed him into the woods. “Hurry!” she said to Craig and tried to peer through the darkness to the pool house. Edward still hadn’t emerged.

  Into the safety of the woods.

  The three of them, running, slowed their pace only a little to follow the twisted path through the trees. The rain had turned to a drizzle, but a fresh burst of large cold drops fell onto them every time a gust of wind shook the leaves.

  Like rifle fire, Cari thought.

  Rifle fire hailing down.

  The clouds parted just then for the pale moon to show through the treetops, making the woods silvery and ghostlike. The leaves shimmered eerily, wisps of mist rose damp and warm around them.

  “Where are we going?” Craig called.

  “Just keep running,” Cari said, breathing hard. “Ouch!”

  A twig on a
low tree branch snapped hard against her forehead. She stopped, stunned by the sudden stab of pain. Rubbing the spot, she realized she was okay.

  A gust of wind sent down another volley of raindrops from the trees. She ducked away, too late, and was completely drenched.

  They ran a bit farther into the woods. The path ended suddenly, and brambles rose up menacingly, blocking their way.

  “Where are we going?” Craig repeated, sounding a little more frantic. “Stop! Come on—where are we going?”

  They stopped and huddled together under a wide tree. The ground is dry here, Cari realized. The trees were so thick, the rain couldn’t get down to them. She struggled to catch her breath.

  A tremor of wind. The leaves seemed to shiver.

  “Is he coming?” Craig asked, pressing both hands against the rough bark of the tree.

  They all listened.

  The only sounds were the eerie whispers of the wind and their own heavy breathing.

  “He’s going to hunt us down,” Cari blurted out. “Like animals.”

  She pictured again the four heads on the wall of the trophy room. The four human heads, their expressions frozen in horror.

  Were they the victims of Edward’s last hunting party?

  “We can’t just keep running,” she told them, wiping the warm perspiration off her forehead with the sleeve of her T-shirt. “We need a plan.”

  “We’ve got to get off this island,” Craig said, searching behind him, his face reflecting his fear.

  “We’ve already tried that,” Eric said, tugging nervously at his ponytail. He slapped at a mosquito on his arm. “We can’t get off the island without a boat.”

  “We’ll build a canoe out of tree bark,” Cari said. “Isn’t that what the Indians did?”

  “Very helpful,” Eric muttered. Despite his fear, he smiled at her. “You have a weird sense of humor.”

  “Just trying to keep it together,” Cari said, realizing she could lose the struggle at any moment, fall apart, let the fear take over. At least the rain had stopped.