Doom Lake Holiday

Caliban.

1

A Family Vacation

They were lost. Chip Mallory knew it. He’d been sitting in the back of their SUV, watching a movie on his DVD player, wearing his super-noise-cancelling earphones, and not paying much attention. After a while, however, he couldn’t miss his father’s hesitation at the intersections, the stop-and-start motion of their vehicle, and the obvious concern about their route.

Distracted, Chip unhooked from his movie. His sister Lee tossed her copy of Flare across the seat in front of him, and threw up her bare arms in frustration.

That route-finder thing broken, Dad? she asked.

Just acting up a little, John Mallory reassured her. Maybe there are some metal deposits around here, or one of the satellites is on the fritz.

Why don’t we just use a map? Anne Mallory suggested. It’s getting a bit late, and if we’re going to have a swim today…

I definitely want to try out my new bathing suit, Lee informed them. And I don’t want to freeze to death, either.

Don’t worry, Sis, Chip put in. It’s brutal out there. And if we arrive in the chilly night you’ll keep warm running away from the bears — or maybe Dad’s new hydrofoil water scooter will turn out to have headlights and a heated seat.

Now that you mention it, I hope that thing’s secure up there on the roof, Mr. Mallory said. He pulled the SUV slowly onto the margin of the road and stopped the vehicle, but left the engine running. You notice those bumps back at the last detour? Maybe I’d better check the boat, too. That glass-bottomed job cost me a fair bit. I’m afraid the scooter might be whacking against it.

Mr. Mallory sighed, unfastened his seat belt, and swung the door open. He stepped down on the dirt road. He was a middling-tall, trim figure of a man, with a narrow, strong face, dark eyes, and neatly cut dark hair. He was dressed in designer jeans and a light yellow T-shirt, with fancy running shoes and a carved wooden tiki pendant — one he had picked up on a recent business trip to Australia.

Mr. Mallory was president of his own successful computer company, with headquarters in Ottawa’s Silicon Valley North, but in recent years he had been travelling all over the world — so much so, in fact, that he had begun to complain about it. I need more quality time with my children, he had recently told Chip and Lee. I’m always flying off somewhere, and when I get home you’re never in. Why don’t we take a vacation together — the whole family? Let’s just head out to a lake somewhere. I’ve always wanted to take my family to an Ontario lake. When I was a kid, you know, we never went. Dad couldn’t afford a cottage — not even a rental. Heck, if I find one I like, maybe I’ll buy us a nice summer place and we can go there every year. You guys won’t be around home forever — we should spend as much time together as we can!

Chip, seventeen, and Lee, sixteen, had listened politely to their father’s suggestion, but inwardly they were resistant. Their father’s concern sounded a bit artificial: had Mr. Mallory been reading a how to get closer to your teens article in one of his flight magazines? That summer Chip’s friend Peter had invited him to Toronto, where he was sure they would be able to hang out with friends, go to some Blue Jays games, and have a great time. Lee had immediately thought of four or five picnics and parties she was hoping to drop in on with her first serious boyfriend, Dirk, who was eighteen.

In the end, though, she and Chip hadn’t had the heart to turn their father down. After all, he was providing pretty well for them. The family shared a relatively new but pretty hot little mansion in Ottawa’s expensive Rockcliffe Park, and they both had techno-toys beyond most young people’s wildest dreams. So they had grumbled a bit, but when Mr. Mallory looked disappointed — and promised to buy them new cellphones with all the extras so that they could keep in touch with their friends — they caved.

Hey, Chip! Can you give me a hand up here? his father called. Mr. Mallory had opened a side door so as to access the roof rack and the hot August air was pouring in, making all three passengers squirm and groan.

Chip put down his DVD player and started to climb out. The scene was monotonous. Bare fields stretched away, parched and yellowing, randomly dissected by barbed wire and half-fallen snake fences. Beyond them lay clumps of cedars and a few cultivated acres thick with corn. The green, leafy maize plants seemed to dissolve in the steaming air and dazzling sunlight.

Up here, Mr. Mallory explained. Just hold the tarpaulin while I tighten these ropes. You know, son, I’m beginning to wonder about that Jackson woman’s directions.

Chip shrugged his shoulders, then grabbed one of the loose covers. As he did so he leaned against the roof rack, touching the hot metal. He winced and pulled back, then waited patiently while his father struggled with the ropes. Minutes passed; in one of the scrubby fields beyond the road a red farm tractor groaned and shuddered into sight from behind a cedar stand.

Hey, Dad, Lee called out. The locals have arrived. Why don’t you ask them for directions?

Mr. Mallory grunted. Yeah, guess I’ll have to. I can just see their smirks — city folk lost again.

The roof adjustments finished, Chip climbed down and wandered dreamily along the deep ditch that ran along the side of the road. The heat was awful, but he was bored with sitting in the car. His father slammed the car door and started across the road toward the tractor, signalling to the farmer as he walked.

Everything around him looked pretty dishevelled and dried out, Chip thought. He bent over a scrawny willow branch that lay against a nearby jutting rock. An idea occurred to him and he pulled out his Swiss Army knife and held the magnifying glass attached to it over the branch, avoiding the stream of red ants swarming in and out of a crack in the stone. After a while a tiny wisp of smoke rose from the thinnest of the twigs. Chip cast an amused glance back at the car. Watching him, his sister shook her head as if to say, Doing stupid things again — there’s just no help for that boy.

The smoke ceased and Chip stood up and saw his father lope across the field toward the tractor. Seconds later, the engine racket stopped and Mr. Mallory was conferring with a sturdy-looking, straw-hatted man who had climbed down to meet him. Arms waved, and Chip smiled, imagining the conversation. He strolled a little farther along the ditch, then stopped.

In the cleared space at his feet, among the sprouting weeds, lay a small animal. It looked almost as if it had been planted there, squished into the earth, belly up, its bloated stomach like a tiny sick half-moon, two paws raised helplessly against the heat and the sky. Flies swarmed around the thing, buzzing and darting. Chip held his nose, thoroughly disgusted but also fascinated. He bent closer to the carcass and heard something odd: a low, chomping sound, as if a thousand tiny teeth or claws were at work. He shook his head, puzzled, then a picture from some TV nature show, or from a book, shot into his mind of burying beetles, or maggots, doing their grisly removal work.

The dead groundhog — for that was what it was — was being ushered back into the earth, and Chip remembered a little rhyme that Grandfather Wilson had quoted him one day, after he’d had a glass or two:

The worms crawl in, the worms crawl out,

The worms play pinochle in your snout…

He laughed, jumped the ditch, and trotted back through the scruffy field toward the car. Pretty soon he was sweating miserably, but happy, feeling himself alive and in motion — a million miles away from dead groundhogs, flies, and burying beetles.

The tractor was clattering away again, back toward the cultivated land, and his father approached the parked car, stepping across the road with what seemed to be a confident look.

A few minutes later, the SUV, turned around, was heading back the way they had come.

It seems we should look for a sign to Bascombe, Mr. Mallory explained. A little town or hamlet we should find if we turn right two roads back this way.

A hamlet? Mrs. Mallory quipped. To be or not to be.

Most likely not to be, Lee said scornfully. And how come Mrs. Jackson didn’t mention it?

You know how it is, her father said. I rented the cottage from her at short notice and by telephone. She seemed pretty anxious to rent to us and in a hurry to go somewhere herself. And even at the best of times people often give very personal and eccentric directions. That’s why we make computers on an either-or language basis. Makes the routes a little more certain.

Are you sure this cottage is going to be all right, John? Mrs. Mallory said. The countryside around here seems pretty boring.

Yeah, that’s been bothering me a bit, too. But heck, Mrs. J. sent me an email picture and it looked okay. Sometimes you’ve got to take a chance on these things.

Is that what you tell your customers, Dad? Chip teased him.

Mr. Mallory laughed. I guess so. But you know something? That farmer back there had never heard of the Jacksons. He told me to ask in Bascombe. We must have really messed up. I thought everyone around here would know everyone else for miles.

The country’s not what you thought, dear, his wife said. You’re just going to have to spend more time getting to know it.

Mr. Mallory cast a glance at the scrubby fields. I don’t know if I want to. Not exactly beautiful, is it? That farmer was a little odd, too. He had some kind of a scar, or cut, or mark on his cheek. A birthmark, maybe — I don’t know.

"The mark of Cain?" Chip said in a spooky comic voice, and they all laughed.

Well, here’s the second right, his father said. Bascombe is this way, he told me. Doesn’t look too promising, does it?

They bumped along on a rutted road that ran steeply up into a wooded area. Within minutes they were among the trees. Leaves trembled in a haze of heat. The tangled underbrush spilled over into the ditches, taking shape in patches of day lilies, elderberries, and sumac. The car knocked against clumps of stiff brown cattails, and here and there startled blue jays hurtled up, flapping above the broken tree trunks, zooming past creepers and wild vines to scout the nests of tent caterpillars hung high in the leafy canopy.

This feels like a tropical rain forest, Chip observed.

Not exactly, his father said. But, boy, this road is in bad shape. That farmer wasn’t kidding. Now, there should be a fork just up ahead.

Sure enough, the rutted road divided near the crest of the low hill. One branch ran upward and was swallowed by the forest; the other snaked along a low embankment and disappeared in a swamp of dead trees.

We’ll take the low road, Mr. Mallory said, steering that way, while Lee gazed around skeptically and asked quietly, Are you sure, Dad?

In answer, her father stepped on the gas, whizzing around a few sharp curves, running over wet patches where the blackened, flattened road oozed and seethed, as if dark flowers were about to burst through its slimy surface.

What a shortcut! Mrs. Mallory said. Right through the swamp of despond.

Takes us straight to Bascombe, Mr. Mallory affirmed. And the lake isn’t far away from the town — or so the farmer told me.

The car climbed out of the swamp and ran along a narrow ledge so fractured with clefts and studded with potholes that Mr. Mallory had to reduce their speed to a crawl. Up they went now, and the woods grew ever thicker. Big trees rose around them — old maples, birches, and beeches. Here and there, among the underbrush, they could see faint tracks and sun-streaked paths made, perhaps, by animals or hunters.

A silence descended on the car; they peered around anxiously, as if expecting something — though they weren’t sure what.

It’s amazing! No houses, not a farm in sight, Mr. Mallory observed. I wonder if that guy was pulling my leg.

The road had dissolved into a vague and narrow track. The SUV brushed shrubbery on both sides, branches ticked the windows, and Mr. Mallory slowed their pace to a mere crawl. Then, at the first widening of the track, where a space appeared between the trees, he stopped, half-turned the vehicle, and pulled them up into a tiny clearing.

I know we have four-wheel drive, he said, but this doesn’t look promising.

He turned off the engine. On an impulse, Chip sprang up, flipped open the door, and swung himself out of the vehicle. Sultry air breathed into the car.

See up there, Dad? This path leads up to that big boulder on the hilltop. I can climb up and maybe see where the road runs from here. We can get a better idea of where we’re going.

All right. Not a bad move. I don’t want to run us into a swamp or something. Don’t go wandering into the woods, though.

Chip slammed the door and walked quickly up the path. The boulder, a formidable rampart rising above the thick bush, loomed above him. On either side of the rough trail rose yellow and white birches and ranks of evergreens.

By the time he reached the foot of the rock, Chip was breathing hard, and the flies were beginning to attack him. He seemed a million miles from anywhere, and could barely catch sight of the car’s hood down below, silver metal glittering between the pine needles and thick leaves.

Luckily, the big boulder had been cracked open by time and weather. There were footholds and branches close enough to grab hold of. After a few minutes of slipping and scrambling, Chip hauled himself up on top. He lay there panting and sweating, his jeans and shirt smeared with moss, but quite proud of himself. Then he got up and looked around.

He had a spectacular view. From where he stood the hill ran down steeply into a huge marshland. This occupied the near side of a broad valley. To the left, in the direction they had come, the valley closed up in thick woods. Opposite where he stood, it opened into brown, barren fields. He could see a rough road, presumably the one they were following, curving away to the right toward a large plantation of trees. Above the trees he caught sight of a church steeple.

That’s it! he told himself triumphantly. That must be Bascombe.

He had started to climb down, eager to get back to the car with the news, when something far below caught his eye. A dazzling figure, a large animal, flashed between the trees and stormed along the edge of the marshes. It was a horse, a white stallion, and Chip watched, awestruck, as it shot away at full gallop, heading straight for the open fields beyond the swamp.

He was astonished. The creature seemed composed of shining light — natural, yet strange and wonderful, too.

The stallion galloped away and within seconds disappeared. Chip gulped and stood wondering, shaking his head in amazement. Despite the quiet spaces around him, he hadn’t heard any sounds at all from below; in fact, the horse’s hooves had barely seemed to touch the ground.

2

Village Store

That’s good news, his father said when Chip reported on his sighting of the valley, the road, and the steeple. Now maybe we can find that cottage!

But the horse! That sounds really magical, Mrs. Mallory said. I wonder who it belongs to?

Someone interesting, I hope, Lee suggested. A Queen’s boy who looks like Brad Pitt and is going to offer me sunset rides along the lake.

The others laughed, but there were groans all round when Bascombe came into view.

A cluster of shabby houses, several large sheds, a stable, and a boarded-up church beside a