I’m sure this is it.”
“Where?” John repeated.
Dani let the canoe drift to shore as a look of deep satisfaction spread across her face. “Tom Thomson’s favourite campground,” she said proudly.
“Oh,” John said, torn between continued objection and a sense of shared accomplishment.
The second canoe gently came to rest beside the first on sand and small stones. No one spoke or moved from the canoes. The wayward travellers took in the towering white pines, the sound of cascading water from a nearby stream, and the smell of ripe pine needles.
“No wonder this was Tom’s favourite camping spot,” Dani said, stepping from the canoe.
“Oh, it’s Tom now, is it?” John said with a raised eyebrow.
Bob grinned. “So just where is Uncle Tom’s cabin, anyway?”
“Look!” Dani cried. “There’s a fire pit already built. Come on, Caitlin, let’s grab our stuff.”
“Fire!” John leaped out of the canoe as if a fire had suddenly been put under his seat.
“Of course, we’ll need a fire to cook and to tell stories and to read…” Dani said in a rush.
“And to keep bears away,” Caitlin finished with a tad less enthusiasm as she brought up the rear.
John’s eyes widened and his Adam’s apple bobbed like a fishing lure nibbled by rock bass.
Bob smiled. “It’s a pretty safe-looking fire pit, built from stones, no roots showing.”
Nikki liked the fire pit, too. He sniffed furiously around it, his snout moving like a vacuum on a cleaning mission.
“We can pitch our tent here,” Dani said decisively. “The pine needles will make the ground soft for sleeping. These branches hanging overhead will give us cover in case it rains, and even if the seams of our tent leak, we’ll be okay. And we’re about the right distance from the fire, close enough to enjoy it, but far enough for safety. What do you think, Caitlin?”
Caitlin unceremoniously spat out one of her wet French braids and slurped, “Charming, I’m sure.”
Dani’s face reconfigured into a deep frown.
John saw his opening, put one arm around each girl, and said in a fatherly tone. “You know, girls, you really don’t have to do this. Twelve-year-old girls, after all…”
Bob winced and patted his friend on the back. “Good luck, buddy.”
Dani folded her arms in silent protest, while Caitlin looked around nervously for a washroom.
John peered at his daughter. “What?”
“Girls!” Dani stated emphatically.
“Washroom?” Caitlin asked in a softer voice to no one in particular. She vaguely wondered, If you said washroom in the forest and nobody heard it, did you really say it? But simmering campground discussion meant there was no more time for pondering philosophical questions.
“No, no, it’s your age I’m concerned with, not the fact you’re girls… really,” John pleaded to an unsympathetic jury.
Air snorted out of Dani’s nose in not-so-silent protest.
John looked at his determined daughter and her distracted friend and decided he was outnumbered. All at once he let out a great breath of air, his shoulders sagged, and his eyes watered ever so slightly. “Okay, girls, you win. You can camp out tonight.” And then, with his Adam’s apple bobbing, he added, “That is, all night, and you’ll be fine, I’m sure.”
Dani’s flaring nostrils relaxed, while Caitlin’s searching eyes fixed on a pile of pine needles she reluctantly conceded were to become their “natural” washroom.
“Well, John,” Bob began, “maybe we should leave these capable outdoorspersons to prepare their campsite and settle in for the night.”
Panic fluttered across John’s face, but then he calmed himself with a couple of deep breaths and simply said, “Okay”
As the men paddled into the Algonquin sunset, the girls could clearly hear one dad reassuring the other. With each assurance John asked, “But do you think they’ll really be okay, Bob?”
“Dad sure can be a pain sometimes,” Dani said.
“Sure hope my dad’s right,” Caitlin thought out loud.
“Of course he’s right,” Dani asserted, half believing her own words.
“Yeah, I guess,” Caitlin concluded, not believing a word. “What could possibly happen?”
A large raven pierced the summer silence with a shriek as it lifted from the limb of a pine. The girls jumped and laughed nervously as wings flapped overhead.
Dani giggled. “That’s right, Caitlin. What could possibly happen?”
“Oh, only everything,” Caitlin whispered, looking up into the shaking pine branches.
4 The Hour of the Dead
Caitlin’s trepidation increased as the distant canoe with the only adults in about a million miles faded from sight. And because they couldn’t go back until morning Caitlin felt real panic. Naturally she communicated this fear directly to her best friend.
“Guess we can’t get gelato here, huh?”
Dani understood her friend’s fear and harboured some anxiety herself. Naturally she communicated this back. “No, but I’ll bet we could paddle across Canoe Lake, then hitchhike to Ottawa and be back before it gets really dark.”
The girls looked at each other and smiled weakly.
“Come on, Caitlin, let’s set up our tent. It’ll be fine, really,” Dani said, meaning there was no way they could get back now, and besides, how could they face their dads if they went back early?
“Well, I guess the campsite is okay and the sunset is getting real pretty,” Caitlin said, meaning they weren’t nearly as pretty as an outhouse would be right about now.
The girls worked hard for the next thirty minutes, setting up their tent, gathering fallen branches, hauling a bucket of water, and setting it beside the fire pit. Nikki followed first Dani and then Caitlin around the campsite, sniffing and watching with keen interest as the girls fended for themselves. Caitlin struggled to figure our where the heck all the contraptions that came with the tent were supposed to go. Dani smiled to herself, thinking about her dad asking Bob for about the millionth time, “But will they remember to bring water up from the lake to keep from burning down the forest?” The moment the tent was finally erected Nikki plunged in for his beauty sleep.
As they sat beside a steady fire in the great outdoors, the girls thought their gourmet meal of hot dogs and marshmallows tasted especially good. Their dads had packed a large salad, but the
