Megan’s initial reaction was disappointment. Someone had invaded her own private territory!
“It’s bigger than mine, but not adult-size,” Sandy said, placing his own foot next to the footprint in the sand. “I thought these islands didn’t belong to anybody. I mean, Grandpa didn’t say we’d be trespassing if we built a clubhouse here.”
Megan looked around. While it was true they didn’t own the island, there had been no sign that anyone else ever visited it. Except for the man who was writing a book—the man who threw sticks for his dog—there weren’t even supposed to be any other people living on the lake right now.
“Here’s another one,” Sandy announced, following the trail across the sand. The footprints vanished when he came to the rock. “I hope he didn’t find our hideout! I hope he didn’t mess up our stuff!”
He was off, first scrambling up the rock, then running toward their cave. Megan hurried after him. It wasn’t fair that someone else should be here, in a place that felt like their own, not after they’d worked so hard to fix it up into a refuge, a place where they could almost forget what was happening in their lives on the mainland.
Every time Sandy came to a spot where sand lay over the rock, he paused to look for more footprints. Before they ever reached the cave, Megan knew they were going to find that it, too, had been discovered. Both of the prints her brother had found since they’d left the beach were headed in that direction.
Had someone watched them fixing it up, from the far shore where she could see only dark evergreens and a few contrasting birch trees? She stood for a moment, shading her eyes, but nothing moved on the opposite side of the lake.
“He’s been here!” Sandy shouted, reaching the cave ahead of her. “He even came inside!”
Megan ducked her head to keep from bashing it on the rocky overhang. “He must have known it was a private place,” she said bitterly. “He could see we have our stuff here.”
“It doesn’t look as if he took anything, though,” Sandy said after a moment. “The food’s all here, and the lantern and the sleeping bags.”
“How did he get here?” Megan wondered aloud. “There was no boat. Our own little beach is the only place you can land with a boat unless you want to climb straight up the way we did the first time.”
They didn’t learn the answer to that until they returned to their own boat. Sandy poked around and discovered that in the sand at the very end of the strip of beach, there was an indentation such as would be made by the bow of a canoe, and part of one footprint that hadn’t been washed away by the waves.
“It’s all spoiled now,” Megan said, staring at the marks. “It was a special place, just for us, and he’s spoiled it.” She needed the island, needed a place of her own.
“He didn’t actually hurt anything,” Sandy pointed out. “Maybe it’s another kid. Maybe it’s someone to do things with.”
“He went into our cave. He snooped,” Megan said. “He could see it belonged to someone else.” It was the only place that did belong to them, she thought. They had no home, they had been taken away from their friends, and even the cottage was a temporary place, one Grandpa had only rented until his foot healed.
“There are other islands,” Sandy said after a moment of silence. “Why don’t we go explore some of the other ones?”
This was the best one, Megan thought. You could tell that without ever stepping onto the others. But at least for now she didn’t want to stay here. “Okay. Let’s go look,” she agreed without enthusiasm. They had to do something to pass the time until their mother came back for them.
After they unloaded the supplies they’d brought, they visited four other islands. By the end of the day, they both had aching muscles and sore hands from using the oars. Though Megan was right about their island being the best, the others were interesting, too. They were all small; one was so tiny that it was all they could do to both fit on it at the same time. It had one scraggly juniper bush growing out of the single rock that formed it, and Sandy laughingly announced that he was going to tie something to the top of the bush, claiming it for himself.
When they finally dragged home for supper, Megan picking a sliver out of her palm from her last stint with the oars, Sandy asked Grandpa about the islands.
“Well, I suppose they belong to somebody,” he conceded, raising his voice to be heard over the sizzle of frying meat. “You kids ever have fresh side pork? Hardly ever see it anymore; they usually make bacon out of that cut these days. It was always one of my favorite meals, with boiled potatoes and cream gravy. And peas. I got some fresh peas to go with it.”
“Somebody was on our island,” Sandy said. “We found his footprints.”
“That so? Wouldn’t have thought Mr. Jamison would go out there; I’ve never even seen him in a boat, though there’s a canoe goes with the cabin he rented. Fellow comes up weekends sometimes has an outboard, but he’s older than I am, and all he ever does is fish. Get me some paper towels to drain this on, will you, Megan?”
She handed him the roll of towels. “Maybe we have another new neighbor.”
“Could be. They’ll start coming in droves, they tell me in town, soon as school is out. All the lakes around here, hundreds of people come up from the cities to vacation. Well, this person didn’t steal your stuff, did he?”
“No. He went into our cave, though, and looked at it. We just wondered if the islands belonged to anybody.”
“My guess is they probably belong to the state. They aren’t big enough to build anything on, so most individuals wouldn’t want them,” Grandpa said.
“We went on one,” Sandy told him, getting the milk out of the refrigerator, “that’s barely big enough for both of us to stand on. You couldn’t put anything bigger than a dollhouse on that.”
Grandpa stirred the peas, chuckling as he began to dish them up. “Funny thing about islands, they fascinate most people. I knew you kids would enjoy these.”
“I’m going to try to find something to make a flag to fly on the smallest one,” Sandy said, “and maybe we’ll have a ceremony and name it. Megan can share the big one with Bigfoot, or whoever left his prints there.”
“There’s a miniature American flag in the closet where you got the sleeping bags. Don’t see any reason why you can’t use that if you want it,” Grandpa said. “I like to see a flag flying. Come on, let’s eat.”
They had the ceremony the following day. The flag was a bright spot of color fluttering in the breeze as they rowed away from it. Although Megan had told him that it was only ships that were christened with champagne, Sandy had insisted on popping open a can of 7-Up and pouring it over the juniper bush as he pronounced, “I now name you Sandy’s Island,” in formal tones. He wore a broad grin, and Megan wished that she felt as upbeat as he did.
His joy faded into alarm as soon as they rounded the end of the big island. “Megan! He’s here again! He’s still here!”
There was a yellow canoe leaning on its side on their small beach, as if it belonged there.
“We don’t own the island, and maybe he’s got as much right to come here as we have,” Megan muttered, “but he’s got no right to touch our stuff!”
“Who wants to touch your old stuff? It’s just junk,” the voice said loudly, over their heads.
Megan stopped in the act of drawing their rowboat up beside the yellow canoe.
The intruder stood on the top of the rocky ridge, a tall, skinny boy of perhaps twelve, with faded jeans that needed mending, and a shock of dark brown hair that fell over his forehead. He had eyes so dark they were nearly black, and a scowl twisted his rather attractive face.
“What’re you doing on our island?” Sandy demanded, though he didn’t sound as hostile as the stranger had.
“It’s not your island,” the boy countered. “My dad says these islands don’t belong to anybody, so I’ve got as much right to be here as you do.”
“But not to bother our stuff.”
“I didn’t take any of it.” The boy swiped the hair back from his face. “None of it’s worth taking, actually.”
Megan tried to keep her voice carefully neutral. “Good. Then you won’t get in our way.” She started up the slope, right toward him. Because of the incline, she had to crawl, and she didn’t know until she reached the top that he hadn’t moved; he stood blocking her way, making her swerve aside.
Sandy, right behind her, stood up and faced the boy. “Stay out of our cave, then.”
The boy was even taller than Megan had thought, a full head taller than she was. He made a snorting sound. “It’s a baby’s place. Little kid stuff. Why don’t you build a real house?”
“Because we haven’t got anything to build with,” Sandy said. “It takes lumber and nails and hammers, and we don’t have any.”
The boy considered that. Some of the hostility went out of his thin face. “There’s stuff at my dad’s cabin,” he said surprisingly. “The landlord tore down an old house and brought a load of lumber for firewood. Some of it’s good enough to build out of, and nobody will care. It’s just for the tenants to put in the fireplace. And Dad has saws and hammers, stuff like that. He’s going to rebuild the porch steps, for part of the rent.”
“I suppose you’re an expert on building,” Megan heard herself saying, and then wondered why she bothered with this boy she was obviously going to dislike.
“I know more than just cutting a few spruce branches and propping them over the opening to a cave. My dad used to have me help him build lots of things, before he moved out.” The boy hesitated, then turned to gesture over his shoulder toward the up-lake end of the island. “There’s a great tree over there—a pair of trees, really—to build a tree house in. I thought about it when I first came, last week, but I couldn’t figure out how to get the materials over here in a canoe.”
Before Megan could stop him, Sandy spoke out. “We’ve got a rowboat. I mean, it’s our grandpa’s, but he lets us use it when he’s not fishing.”
The boy ignored Megan, his gaze fixed on Sandy. “You willing to let me haul stuff in it?” Then, before Sandy could reply or Megan interrupt, he added, “You could help with it if you wanted.”
“Sure,” Sandy agreed. “Why not?”
Why not? Megan wondered angrily. Why should they? Although, if he’d been here since last week, maybe he had discovered the island before they had. Even so, she didn’t want him here, not on an island she had considered her own.
“Where do you live?” Sandy was asking.
“The log cabin, over there.”
“Your dad’s the one who’s writing a book?”
The boy’s lip curled. “Yeah. That’s all he does. He didn’t use to be so grouchy, before he and my mom split up. I can’t even talk around him, for fear he’ll forget what he wants to write. I have to fix my own meals, because he doesn’t remember to stop to eat.”
“We’re going to cook hot dogs today,” Sandy offered. “You want some? We have enough, don’t we, Megan?”
A sharp reply trembled on her tongue, and then she sighed. They couldn’t run him off an island that didn’t really belong to anybody. And they’d wanted to meet other kids, hadn’t they?
It was clear she wasn’t going to have the island to herself, no matter what she did. Well, if Sandy wanted this boy for a friend, she supposed he was entitled to that. She didn’t think he was anyone she would want for a friend. Not like Annie. Every time she thought of Annie, she felt a painful tightness in her chest.
“Do what you want,” she said ungraciously, and pushed past the pair of them, headed for the cave.