The Courage Tree. Diane Chamberlain

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      Janine heard some movement of the phone. “Frank?” her mother called, her voice obviously directed away from the receiver. Janine pictured her father sitting in the leather recliner in the Ayr Creek library, his favorite perch, either reading or working on his laptop. “Go over to the cottage and see if Sophie’s inside. She might have been dropped off there.”

      “Thanks, Mom,” Janine said, once her mother was back on the phone.

      “Why would they bring her home if they were supposed to meet you at Meadowlark Gardens?”

      Janine tensed. Here we go, she thought. “There might have been a misunderstanding,” she said.

      “Well, if they could get something as simple as that wrong, what else could they get wrong?”

      “Mom, please.”

      “She’s only eight years old, and a very fragile little girl,” her mother said. “I wouldn’t have sent you off to camp when you were eight, and you were healthy as a horse.”

      It was true that her parents had never sent her to camp. She’d had to create her own adventures, and create them she did.

      “I think this was a terrific experience for Sophie,” Janine said, although she’d argued about this with her mother and father and Joe so much over the past few weeks that she knew anything she said now was pointless.

      Janine heard her father’s voice in the background, but she couldn’t make out what he was saying.

      “She’s not there,” her mother said into the phone.

      “All right. Please call me on my cell phone if she shows up there instead of here, okay?”

      “How late is she?”

      “Not really late at all, Mom. I was just checking in case they took her home. I’ve got to go now.” She hung up and walked back to the van, where Gloria and Suzanne were talking. Emily leaned tiredly against her mother, and Janine felt a pang of envy witnessing the simple, uncomplicated warmth between them. She wanted Sophie here with her, now.

      Gloria and Suzanne were looking toward the entrance to the parking lot. Janine followed their gaze, but there were few cars pulling into the lot this late in the day.

      “What color is Alison’s car?” she asked.

      “Blue Honda,” Gloria said. “Sophie’s not at home?”

      Janine shook her head.

      “They probably took a bathroom break,” Suzanne suggested.

      “We had to take three of them,” Emily groaned. “Tiffany had to pee twice.”

      “Shh,” said her mother.

      Janine turned to look toward the far corner of the parking lot, searching for a blue Honda. Maybe Alison had her southeast and northeast confused, but this was the same spot from which the troop had taken off. Besides, she surely would have noticed the van by now.

      “I’m sure they’ll be here any minute.” Gloria touched her arm. “They probably got stuck in a traffic jam.”

      “You would have gotten stuck in it, too, then,” Janine said. “Does Alison have a cell phone with her?” Her voice sounded remarkably calm despite the fact that she was furious with Gloria for allowing Sophie to ride with the young troop leader.

      “Yes, she does.” Gloria sounded relieved at that realization. “I have her number in the van. Hold on.” She walked quickly toward her van, stopping only a second to talk to her daughter.

      “Sophie’s just fine,” Suzanne said in a reassuring voice.

      Janine tried to nod, but her neck felt as if it were made of wood.

      “She had a really good time, Mrs. Donohue,” Emily said, somehow picking up her mother’s cue that Janine was in desperate need of reassurance.

      “What sorts of things did you do?” Janine tried to smile at Emily, one eye on the van where Gloria was making the call.

      “We rode horses,” Emily said. “That was my favorite part.”

      “Really?” Janine asked. “Did Sophie ride a horse?”

      “Yup.” Emily told her some of the other things they’d done, but Janine was stuck on the image of her daughter astride a horse for the first time in her life.

      Gloria moved the phone from her ear and started walking toward them.

      “Did you reach her?” Janine asked.

      “No answer,” Gloria said. “She probably has it turned off.”

      Brilliant, Janine thought.

      The other girls were getting grumpy. They slumped wearily against the van, begging to leave. Their cheeks were pink from the sun, their arms blotchy with mosquito bites.

      “Be patient,” Gloria said to them. “As soon as Alison gets here, we can divide up and start for home.”

      Gloria and Suzanne chatted calmly as they waited, but Janine could not follow, much less participate in, their conversation. Minutes passed, and her hand became slick with perspiration around the phone locked in her fist, while the world in the parking lot took on a dreamlike quality. Janine was only vaguely aware of the movement of the cars and the people and the tired Brownies, who now sprawled on the stretch of grass between the parking lot and Beulah Road. She glanced repeatedly at her watch as the minute hand made its steady fall toward three-thirty, and her mind raced with explanations for Alison’s tardiness. Maybe Sophie had gotten ill and they’d needed to stop. Or maybe they were simply caught in a traffic jam that Gloria had somehow circumvented. Or maybe Alison had decided to take them on some new, unplanned adventure. Janine wanted to ask Gloria what she had been thinking, putting Sophie in Alison’s car for the ride home. Did Alison have with her the three pages of instructions Janine had written outlining Sophie’s special needs? Did these women understand how sick Sophie was? She suddenly wondered if Joe had been right in not wanting Sophie go on this camping trip. Maybe it had been a foolish decision, after all. Thanks to Dr. Schaefer’s treatment, Sophie looked quite well right now. It would have been easy for the troop leaders to have forgotten how seriously ill she was.

      Gloria tried several more times to reach Alison’s cell phone, without success, and at four o’clock, Janine could take it no longer.

      “What’s Alison’s home phone number?” she asked Gloria. Her voice sounded curt, but she felt herself soften as she saw the look of concern in Gloria’s face.

      Gloria knew the number by heart, and Janine dialed it on her own phone.

      “Hello?” A woman’s voice answered.

      Janine gripped the phone. “Alison?” she asked.

      “No, this is Charlotte. Alison’s not here.”

      “Are you her…housemate?”

      “Yes.”

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