In the Dark of the Night Read Free Page B

ambulance!” Ellen Newell chimed in. “Don’t forget an ambulance.”
    As everyone at the table started laughing, Jeff Newell chimed in from the far end: “And a hearse, too! Might as well prepare for every eventuality.”
    “They’ve got it all,” Ashley said. “It’s not the wilderness, Merrill. Phantom Lake is a whole town, for heaven’s sake.”
    “They’ve got a great health food store,” Ellen offered.
    Jeff Newell’s voice rose above his wife’s. “If Dan weren’t so cheap, the Brewsters would have joined us at the lake years ago. However, better late than never, I say.” He raised his wineglass. “Here’s to watching Merrill learn to water-ski.” Everyone laughed, and Merrill felt her face burn as she realized they all knew there wasn’t a chance in the world that she’d risk breaking her neck behind a speeding boat. Even Marci was grinning at her.
    “Well, maybe I’ll surprise all of you,” she said, deciding it was better to go along with the joke than get upset. “I could water-ski!” As the laughter at the table grew louder, she added four more words: “When hell freezes over!”
    “Well, I think a summer at Phantom Lake will be good for you,” Ashley Sparks said when the laughter finally died away. “Maybe you’ll finally realize that ninety-nine percent of the things you worry about never happen.”
    “But they might,” Ellen declared in a voice that almost perfectly mimicked Merrill’s.
    Merrill waited until the latest wave of laughter started to die, then held up her hand. “It’s not just the waterskiing,” she said. “What about the plumbing? What about the electricity? My God, we could all drown in darkness, without even any water to put out an electrical fire. Don’t you people think about
anything
?” She leaned back in her chair and smiled. “There! Did I leave anything out?”
    “Actually, Pinecrest is probably the solidest house—” Kevin Sparks began, but his wife silenced him.
    “She was joking, Kevin!
Joking!
”
    “But he’s right,” Ellen Newell said. “Rita Henderson isn’t going to rent a house that isn’t in perfect condition.”
    “Any house that’s been empty that long has to have something wrong with it,” Merrill began. “Empty houses—”
    “Aren’t always abandoned houses,” Ellen Newell cut in.
    “It’ll work, hon,” Dan said, seeing the uncertainty in his wife’s eyes. “Jeff and Kevin and I are going to share a float plane and fly up on weekends.”
    “A plane?” Eric said. “Cool! Can I learn to fly it?”
    “Maybe,” his father replied in a tone that said no.
    And Dan will be alone at home in Evanston all week, Merrill thought, and nobody will be there to clean up after him, and—and I’m being an idiot! she silently declared, breaking into her own thoughts. They’re all right. I worry too much about too many things, and it’s going to be a great summer, and that’s that.
    As the waiter came over to take their orders, she raised her glass. “To all of us,” she said. “To all of us, and to Phantom Lake, and to a perfect summer.” As everyone started to put their glasses to their lips, she added, “And one more thing—to all of you telling me when I’m worrying about nothing and making mountains out of molehills and trying to protect everyone from everything. This summer, I intend to stop worrying and have a great time.”
    As everyone clinked their glasses and drank their wine, Merrill decided that maybe the words she’d just uttered in an act of pure bravado weren’t as false as they’d sounded to her. Maybe, after all, everything was going to be okay.
    Except that so far no one had been able to tell her why Pinecrest’s owner had disappeared.
    Disappeared without a trace.
    As she turned her attention to the menu, all the brave words of a moment ago once again rang as hollow as when she’d first uttered them.

D AN BREWSTER CLICKED off the late news, but instead of rising out of his favorite chair