“We’re going to drive back to the lodge and get you guys warmed up,” I said. “There’s a big fire going in the fireplace, and it’s almost suppertime. Oh, and I know a secret about the cook at Leicester Lodge.”
“What?” said Bryce and Ginnie eagerly.
“He makes the best hot chocolate in the world,” I whispered.
“Really?” asked Ginnie, intrigued.
“Really.”
By this time most of the kids had stopped crying, and the teachers had gathered up all the loose things — hats and shoes and gloves and lunch boxes — from the crash site that they could find. Now a police officer had managed to climb inside the crippled bus and was handing suitcases through the windows to the Georges.
Very quickly, the teachers, the children, their gear, and us BSC members were back on the Georges’ bus, the heater going full blast.
Before we left, Mrs. George pulled something out of her pocket. It turned out to be a list of all the children who were supposed to be on the bus. The teacher with the fractured arm had given it to her. Mrs. George took a roll call and two head counts before she’d let her husband start up the bus.
Pretty smart, I thought.
The teachers were sitting in the back of the bus with the kids’ suitcases and armloads of loose things they’d found in the snow. It’s amazing how much stuff sixteen little kids can get on a bus for a simple five-day vacation.
My friends and I and the children were sitting closer to the front. We were crowded three or four across in the seats. We could have spread out more, but the kids were so frightened that they’d become clingy and wouldn’t let us BSC members out of their sight. Some of them wouldn’t even let go of our hands.
As we plowed slowly through the snow back to the lodge, Mary Anne spoke up. “You guys?”
“Yes?” said the rest of us club members.
“Could you do me a favor? You know the book I’m making for Logan?”
“Yes?” we said again.
“Well, considering what’s just happened, I have a feeling this is going to be an … unusual week. I want Logan to know what really goes on. I mean, not just from my point of view. So do you think you could each make a few notes every day? Just jot down things that happen — to you or to anyone else. Whatever you think is important.”
“Sure,” the rest of us replied.
“Oh, great,” said Mary Anne. “Then I’ll collect your notes at the end of each day and try to blend everything together so that Logan has a —” Mary Anne stopped talking. She pointed to me and I looked down at my sides.
Bryce and Ginnie were sound asleep. They were leaning heavily against me. The other children were falling asleep, too. My friends and I stopped talking. We rode to the lodge in silence.
Everything happened awfully quickly after we reached the lodge again (safely, I might add). As we pulled up to the front door, Kristy said softly, “Wake up, you guys. We’re here.”
Well, those kids looked up sleepily — and then they came to life! They tore off the bus and through the front door, which Mrs. George held open for them. Then Pinky, the little girl who was wearing a hat on her foot, came to a screeching halt and began yelling, “Miss Weber! Mr. Dougherty! Where are you?”
Of course, a crowd gathered. Everyone wanted to see “the poor little children who’d been in the horrible bus accident.” (I actually heard one woman say that.) Luckily Mr. George appeared around the same time that my friends and I caught up to the kids.
Mr. George told them straightforwardly that Miss Weber and Mr. Dougherty, the two teachers who had braved the snow, had been taken to the hospital to get patched up, but that they’d only be there overnight.
“What about us?” wailed Joey, one of the kids I was watching.
Good question. I looked at the Georges. They were looking at each other. Finally Mrs. George said, “First the doctor wants to check you over. Then I think we should eat dinner. It was served over an hour ago. I’m hungry. How about you?”
We were starved, which is not good for Stacey. With her diabetes, she shouldn’t skip meals. It messes up her blood sugar or something. The kids were hungry, too, after their adventure. So after the doctor had given them a clean bill of health, everyone from the bus went into the dining hall. We sat at two of the long tables. The BSC members scattered themselves among the children, in order to give them a hand if they needed it. When the food came we gobbled it down. That’s how hungry we were. And since, unlike the cooks at camp, the head cook here is nice and really listens to people, there was no food served (except dessert) that Stacey couldn’t eat. (The Camp Mohawk cook kept serving sugary stuff, like candied yams, that Stacey’s not allowed to eat.)
Anyway, when dinner was over, Mrs. George turned the sixteen kids over to the cook, who took them into the kitchen to show them how he and his helpers prepare food for hundreds of people every day. As soon as they were gone, Mrs. George said to the rest of us, who were still sitting at the dining tables, “I want to thank you so much for your help tonight. You don’t know how my husband and I appreciate it. Lots of groups of students visit the lodge each winter, but nothing like this has ever happened.”
“I hate to bring this up,” said Mr. Cheney, one of the SMS teachers, “but what about the kids? What are they going to do now?”
Mrs. George sat down. “I’m not sure,” she said. “They’ll stay here tonight, of course. We can’t send them back to Maine in this weather, particularly not without their teachers. But I guess they could go back tomorrow. I hate to deprive them of this trip, though. They won it.”
“They won it?” I repeated.
Mrs. George nodded. “Their school sponsored a readathon. These are the winners. They worked hard and they’ve really been looking forward to this. They come from a small town and most of their families don’t have much money. This is the first time some of them have been away from Conway Cove. We’ll have to call their parents tonight to tell them what happened. I’m sure the children will want to talk to them anyway. Maybe after a few phone calls we’ll have a better idea of what to do with the kids. The school might be able to send down some parents to act as chaperones or something. Thank goodness none of the kids is hurt. They could easily stay here if we can just find someone to keep an eye on them.”
“What about the teachers who went to the hospital?” said Mr. Cheney. “Won’t they be back tomorrow?”
Mr. George answered that question. “Yes, but they’ll be out of commission, at least for any activities such as skiing or skating. As you know, Miss Weber broke her arm. And the doctor here at the lodge thought Mr. Dougherty might have cracked several ribs.”
At this point I nudged Kristy.
“Huh?” she said. She’d been deep in thought.
“We could help,” I whispered. “We could watch the kids.”
Kristy smiled. “Exactly what I was thinking. Should I say something?”
“Nothing ever stopped you before.”
Ooh. If looks could kill … But Kristy tried to forget what I’d said. She stood up slowly.
“Excuse me,” she said. “I have an idea.” She glanced from Stacey to Jessi to Mal to Dawn to Mary Anne, silently asking their permission to volunteer our services. My friends nodded. “Well,” Kristy went on, “my friends and I could take care of the kids this week.”
“We could even bunk with them,” I added. “We could just move our stuff into another dorm and bunk with the kids.”
“Well, that would be wonderful,” replied Mrs. George, “but I don’t know. It’s up to your teachers.”
“I don’t know, either,” said Mr. Cheney, and I felt myself deflate like a balloon with a hole in it. “Do you girls really want to give up your vacation?” he asked.
“I don’t think we’d be giving it up,” said Kristy. “If Miss Weber and Mr. Dougherty can help watch the kids while they’re indoors, we can just include the children in our regular activities. We’ll take turns doing special things with them. We won
’t mind. The kids can even come to our talent show.”
“Or be in it!” said Jessi excitedly.
“We’re used to kids, believe me,” added Kristy.
“You’re sure this is something you want to do?” asked Mr. Cheney. “It’s not playtime, you know. It’s a big responsibility — and it’s for five days.”
“We know and we’re sure,” said Kristy firmly.
“Right,” agreed the rest of us club members.
“The lodge would be glad to pay you for your help,” spoke up Mrs. George.
That time, Kristy didn’t even need to look at the rest of us for our opinions. “Thanks,” she replied, “but that’s okay. We don’t need to be paid. We’re still going to have a great time here. Besides, every year, you and Mr. George let our whole school come visit and I know we never pay you enough for it. The least we can do is help out some of the other kids you’re giving a treat to.”
Well, Kristy should know better than to say something like that to an adult. Of course Mrs. George began to cry because she was so touched. Us BSC members decided it was time to hightail it out of there. Besides, the cook was bringing the children back.
When Mrs. George recovered, she showed us to an empty dorm room. While my friends and I gathered our possessions and moved them into the kids’ room, Mrs. George and the children called their parents, and the SMS teachers carried the children’s belongings to the room. As soon as they left, we decided to get the kids ready for bed. First, though, we had to sort out that mountain of loose caps and mittens and things. We spent nearly half an hour holding up one item at a time, saying, “Whose is this?” and waiting for someone to call out, “Mine!”
When everything was finally organized, Kristy said, “Okay, you guys, change into your pajamas.”
I have never heard such screaming in my life. Uh-oh — we were in a coed dorm! The boys wouldn’t change in front of the girls and the girls wouldn’t change in front of the boys. And neither group trusted the other to close their eyes or turn their backs. Finally we worked out an arrangement. Since there were fewer boys, they could change in the bathroom while us girls changed in the dorm. The boys were on their honor not to come out of the bathroom until we said it was okay. Even so, the girls changed clothes as if they were on their way to a fire.
At long last, each of our charges was tucked in bed.
Ahhh, I thought as my friends and I climbed wearily into our beds. No sooner were the covers pulled up and the lights turned off than a little voice said, “Stacey? My foot hurts. It didn’t hurt before, but now it does.”
It was Pinky. Stacey got out of bed and looked at Pinky’s foot. She thought it seemed swollen so she called the lodge doctor, who arrived pronto, examined Pinky’s foot, pronounced her ankle slightly sprained (undoubtedly as a result of the crash), bandaged it, and told her to stay off of it the next day. Then he quickly looked over the other kids again and found them fine but sleepy.
When he left, I turned off the lights for a second time. “Good night, everybody,” I said.
“ ’Night, Claudia,” said a chorus of voices. Then all the children began saying good night to each other, one at a time. That was an awful lot of “good nights,” but my friends and I let them go to it because we knew they were still nervous and frightened.
It was eleven o’clock before the last of us fell asleep.
I awoke very slowly and groggily the next morning. It’s amazing how much a few out-of-the-ordinary events can drain you. I realized I was still tired, even though we’d gotten plenty of sleep the night before.
I peered around our semidark room. Mrs. George had put us in a small, oddly shaped dorm. There were just twelve bunks in it. Dawn and I were bunkies again, so were Jessi and Mal, and so were Stacey and Claud. Kristy had thought she had another chance for a bunk all to herself since there was an uneven number of us, but no such luck. Apparently, none of the kids wanted to bunk with Pinky, so Pinky ended up bunking alone, and Kristy shared with Ginnie, who seemed pretty attached to her.
Around me the kids were still sound asleep. I glanced at Claudia, Kristy, and Stacey. They were dead to the world. I leaned over my bed and peered down at Dawn. She was snoring.
It should have been a happy morning. Outside, the snow was still falling — heavily. I love snow, but for some reason I couldn’t work up any enthusiasm over it. I knew that downstairs the cooks were preparing a big, yummy breakfast, and I was hungry, but I couldn’t work up any enthusiasm over breakfast, either. Furthermore, I was pretty sure the kids would wake up in good spirits, since they’d been fairly perky by bedtime the night before, and very excited about the prospect of skiing and skating that day.
But I just didn’t feel … I don’t know. Something was nagging at me. I couldn’t put my finger on it.
I looked at my watch. It read seven-thirty. Breakfast would be served at eight. I climbed out of bed, wishing that I’d gotten the bottom bunk instead of the top, but Dawn had claimed the bottom right away — in both our old dorm and the one we’d moved into the night before.
I turned on the lights in the room.
All around me I heard moaning and groaning.
“How can it be morning already?” mumbled Claud.
“I could sleep forever,” added Jessi.
“Me, too,” echoed Mal. “Forever and ever.”
“It’s still snowing,” I announced, trying to sound cheerful. “Look outside. It’s a fairyland. All you can see is white.”
Kristy was the only one who looked outside. “Oh,” she said, sounding incredibly depressed. “If this keeps up, we won’t be able to hold practices today. What a drag. The events start tomorrow. We have to practice.”
“Cool your jets,” said Dawn. “People are always skiing when it’s snowing. And I’m sure someone from the lodge will clear off the skating pond.”
“I guess,” Kristy replied distractedly.
“Well, come on, everybody,” I said loudly. “Up and at ’em. Twenty minutes until breakfast.”
Our sleepy charges aroused themselves slowly. The boys looked like zombies as they headed for the bathroom. But the girls came to life quickly and dressed in record time, afraid that the boys would come out of the bathroom before we’d given them the all-clear signal.
The kids were dressed and in the process of making up their beds when a knock sounded at our door.
“Come in!” called Kristy.
And into our room stepped … dum dadum dum … Ms. Halliday — my most feared teacher at SMS. She teaches seventh-grade girls’ gym, and last year she’d been the bane of my existence. I couldn’t stand her and she couldn’t stand me. That’s because Ms. Halliday doesn’t like klutzes. And I am a total klutz. I am absolutely no good at sports, which is why I was not taking part in the Winter War.
As you can probably imagine, though, Kristy and Ms. Halliday get along extremely well. Usually, gym instructors don’t have teachers’ pets, but Ms. Halliday was an exception. Her pet had been Kristy, the great athlete of the world, and they were still friends this year, even though Ms. Halliday was no longer Kristy’s teacher.
Anyway, when she poked her head into our room, I just froze. It was like the beginning of another dreaded volleyball game. I could almost hear her saying, “Okay, Mary Anne, serve…. No, over the net, over the net. Use a little power. Put some muscle into it.”
But of course that was not what Ms. Halliday said. Instead, she said, “In all the confusion last night, I forgot to tell you kids that I’m one of your dorm supervisors. The others will be Miss Weber and Mr. Dougherty, as soon as they return from the hospital. The three of us will help you with the Conway Cove students. That’s what we’re here for, okay? I can give them a hand with outdoor activities and the others can oversee indoor activities. That way, you members of the Baby-sitters Club will be able to have some time to yourselves.”
“Thanks, Ms. Halliday!” exclaimed Kristy.
Ms. Halliday left then and my friends and I helped the littl
e kids with last-minute chores — shoe-tying, hair-braiding, etc. I did everything mechanically, like a robot who has been programmed to perform. When we were ready, we left our dorm and Kristy showed the kids the way downstairs to the dining hall. (Claudia showed them the candy machine.)
The twenty-three of us filed into breakfast and chose a table to ourselves. We ate hungrily — scrambled eggs, toast, and fruit. And after that, we were on our own. The snow was letting up, and Kristy had announced skiing practice for the morning. The Conway Cove kids were eager to try skiing, so Ms. Halliday bundled them up (except for Pinky) and took them off to one of the beginners’ lessons.
By ten o’clock in the morning, I found myself pretty much on my own. Kristy, Claud, Dawn, and Stacey had hit the slopes, Mallory was off doing something with her secret journal project, and Jessi had volunteered to entertain Pinky for the day, since Pinky was under doctor’s orders to stay inside with her foot up. If the pain and swelling in her ankle were gone by the evening, then she would be able to do whatever she wanted the next day.
What should I do with myself? I wondered. Even though I didn’t really feel like working, I decided I might as well get on with my job as historian for the Winter Carnival. There were only four days in which to do my research. Once I returned to Stoneybrook, I had to be ready to write up the project. I certainly wasn’t going to be able to do any research on tiny Hooksett Crossing or on Leicester Lodge anywhere but here.
So I went upstairs to our dorm, found a pad of paper and a pen, and went back downstairs to the room next to the common room. It was the Leicester Lodge library.
The books in the library are just there for the guests to read and enjoy. Most of them are novels, mysteries, and skiing guides, but on a shelf near a ceiling-to-floor window, I found two rows of books on local history. I looked at a few of the titles: A Brief History of Hookset Crossing, Rutledge County: A Retrospective, Ski Resorts in Vermont. There were quite a few more, too. Most of them were written by local authors and published by small Vermont presses. Then one title caught my eye: Leicester Lodge: 1920 to 1980, by Thomas George. Thomas George … could that be Mr. George? I checked the book jacket. It was! His picture was there and everything.