Camp Pleasant by Richard Matheson Page B

porch and sat down on camp chairs, propping our feet on the railing.
    “That poor kid,” I muttered. “Jesus
Christ
.” I shook my head. “He tears my heart out.”
    Sid shook his head. “He’s confused all right,” he said.
    “What about his story?” I asked.
    “I think he believes what he says. But how much does a kid his age know of the facts? All he sees is his old man going away to war. His life is nice while his mother takes care of him. Then his old man comes back and starts beating him. That’s all he sees. It all sounds so simple.”
    He sighed heavily.
    “Well, it’s not simple; I’d bet money on that. How do we know what happened while Tony’s father was away? Christ, for all we know, his mother was sleeping with everybody.
She worked at night
—there’s a key phrase for you. And who’s this Uncle Charlie? I remember when I was a kid, my dad used to have me call all his friends Uncle—Uncle Bill and Uncle Ned and Uncle Mike.” He made a sound that was amused yet not amused. “None of them were related to me. And I’d lay money that Uncle Charlie is no relation of Tony’s either.”
    “And the money in the bank?”
    “Maybe Tony’s mother
told
him she put it in the bank. But how do we know?”
    I stared at the black woods around us, at the occasional pinpoint flare of fireflies.
    “It just doesn’t figure—the old man going away nice and coming back mean,” Sid went on. “There’s one point Tony doesn’t seem to understand. His old man got custody of him after the divorce. The woman always gets the kid unless she’s definitely proved to be unfit.”
    He exhaled wearily.
    “There’s one other thing,” he said grimly. “All Tony seems to remember is hitting his old man on the back. It’s not as simple as that.”
    There was a long pause and I think I knew what was coming before it came.
    “His old man is the one Tony tried to kill,” said Sid.
    Eyes closing abruptly; shivering. I sat slumped in the canvas chair feeling the cold night wind blowing across my face.
    “That’s great,” I muttered. “That’s just great.”
    It was decided to let Tony sleep on Sid’s cot until morning. Sid said it was all right since there was an extra cot in the tent that night anyway. Mel Kramer, the head of the Junior Division being on his day off. Sid also said he’d do whatever he could to get Tony back in my cabin again.
    As I walked slowly back to the cabin, I kept thinking about Tony. I thought of how he was going to grow up hard; like a flower transplanted from soft to rocky soil—the beauty gone, only the will to survive left. I might get him back in my cabin but, even then, there was only a little more than a month remaining to the season. In that brief time I might go on wrestling with his several devils, ousting some of them perhaps. But, when the summer ended, he’d go back to his father and, in no time, those devils would return, every damn one of them.
    It made me angry. I hated a world where such things could happen to children. Because children were the future. It’s a statement made in a million graduation deliveries, it’s dull, a cliche. It’s true. As I thought that, I sensed something in my mind—like the flare of a torch in deep night. It was something of import, something with a particular meaning for me.
    I didn’t catch it though. It passed away and was gone and all that was left was the memory of how Tony had looked in sleep—his face pale and drawn, one hand flung across his cheek as if someone were just about to hit him.
4.
    During clean-up period, the next morning, Sid came down the line with Tony. I went to the door and looked at them as they approached. Sid saw me and, as they went by, he just shook his head once, slowly. I stood in the doorway watching them go over to Mack’s cabin and up the porch steps. A moment’s inaudible mumble of conversation, then Sid reappeared.
    I met him in front of my cabin. “What did he say?” I asked.
    “He wants