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It was a lovely late summer’s day.
The trees were filled with thick, green leaves.Acorns were growing on the
oaks. Ants were busily working, gathering food for winter, as were the
squirrels. They could be seen digging holes and hiding seeds and pine nuts
in them, then quickly covering them up. Ian and Mac were high in their
tree, looking down at the woods below. "What a lovely day, isn’t it, Mac?"
Ian said, taking in a deep breath of fresh highland air.
"Aye, it’s grand," Mac answered. He
turned his head when he heard sounds of people laughing. "What’s this?" he
said, looking down.
A group of six young women and two
adult women dropped bags, boxes and packages at the bottom of Ian and
Mac’s tree. "Who are they?" Ian whispered. "What are they doing at our
tree?"
"I don’t know. Let’s listen," Mac
said.
"We’ll set up our tents here," one
of the women, Lindsay, ordered. "I want Megan and Moira to go and look for
some firewood. Shannon and Lisa, I need you to help me with the tents and
Lauren and Mary to help Helen unload boxes. All right, you heard me. Let’s
get this campsite set up." The girls ran about and began their jobs.
"They’re camping at the bottom of
our tree. Now what will we do?" Ian asked. "What’s all this about a
campfire?"
"I’m sure they’ll be safe. They’ll
make one with rocks around it and the leaders will make sure it is out.
Don’t worry. I think as soon as we can, we need to sneak down and get some
food, enough to last for a few days," Mac suggested. When all the girls
were busy, the raccoons snuck down the other side of the tree, ran into
the woods, gathered nuts, berries and a few grubs, and then climbed back
up the tree.
It wasn’t long before the sun began
to set. "What are they cooking?" Ian asked. He smelled the aroma of
sizzling fish. "I smell fish and beans. I love beans. Do you think they’ll
have any leftovers?"
"If they do, they’ll just dump them
into the fire. There are no refrigerators around here," Mac said.
The girls ate the fish as the sun
set and darkness filled the woods. The campfire was glowing and the wood
was popping and sending little sparks up towards the two raccoons. "It’s
almost like a fireworks display, isn’t it?" Ian laughed.
"Let’s go snipe hunting," shouted
Megan.
Giggles and cheers rang out. Helen
and Lindsay grabbed the flashlights and the girls followed them.
"What’s a snipe?" Ian asked.
"I don’t know. Let’s follow them and
see," Mac said.
They climbed down the tree and
caught up with the girls, staying well behind. "Girls, look behind the
trees. Snipes like to hide there. You’ve all got your paper bags. Have
them ready," Lindsay said.
"We don’t have paper bags," Ian
gulped. "What do we need them for? Have you seen a snipe behind the tree
before?" He was scared.
"I might have seen one the other
night," Mac said, not really knowing what a snipe was.
Suddenly the girls stopped. "Shhh,
girls, I just saw a snipe," Helen said, putting her arm out to stop the
girls. "I saw its eyes. They were glowing, red."
The girls screamed. Ian and Mac
screamed. "I don’t want to catch a snipe, Mac. I don’t want to see it.
It’s got red eyes," he gulped again, "that glow."
Helen headed for the tree. "Stay
there girls and I’ll see if I can catch it." She opened her paper bag and
moved closer. "I see it," she whispered.
The girls were huddled together, all
afraid and Ian and Mac held onto each other. "We don’t have paper bags,
Mac. What if it runs towards us? What should we do?" Ian was nearly crying
with terror.
"If it comes, run," Mac said.
"I’ve got it! I’ve got the snipe!"
Helen shouted and held up the bag. Suddenly she shook the bag and then
dropped it. "Oh no! It got away. Look out!" she shouted. The girls ran
screaming towards their tents. Mac and Ian ran screaming, heading for the
tree.
"Yikes! The snipe’s on the loose,"
Ian shouted.
Helen and Lindsay started laughing.
"It works every time, doesn’t it?" Helen said. "They really believe
there’s such a thing as a snipe."
Lindsay laughed, "You fooled them
good this time. Did you see the look of horror on their faces?"
The leaders walked slowly back to
the camp. Ian and Mac were in the tree, holding onto each other and
shaking in fright. The girls were in their tents, which were zipped up and
closed tightly. "Good night, girls," Lindsay said. "Sleep well."
"I’m not going to sleep tonight, not
while there’s a snipe running around," Ian sighed.
"I don’t think snipes can climb
trees," Mac said, trying to calm Ian down. "I think we’re safe for
tonight. Watch your legs though. I think snipes like to eat toes," he
teased. Ian pulled his feet up and tucked them underneath his body.
It was a restless night for the
raccoons. While Mac wasn’t nearly as frightened as Ian, he jumped up
whenever he heard a sound. Finally, they dozed off. They woke up to the
smell of bacon frying in a big black pan. They looked down. The girls were
sitting around the campfire eating bacon and eggs. "That smells good," Ian
said. "I want some bacon too," he pleaded.
The raccoons were pleased when the
campers went to look for insects to make a bug collection and left a few
slices of bacon in the pan. "Quick. They’re gone. Let’s grab that bacon,"
Mac said. The two ran down the tree and took the bacon out of the pan. "Och,
that’s just too delicious. Let’s have a wee look and see what else they’ve
got to eat."
They rummaged through all the girls
things and found several bags of sweets, some potato crisps, a bag of nuts
and some fresh apples. "Let’s take these up the tree, before the girls
come back," Ian said. It was difficult for them to carry the food up, but
they eventually lifted the stash on their branch.
When the girls came back to camp
with their bugs, Shannon shouted, "Hey, someone’s been into my sweets!"
The other girls started checking and most of them had missing food.
"It was probably the snipe," Mary
said.
Ian and Mac laughed. "It wasn’t the
snipe. Not this time," Ian said.
As night fell, the girls gathered
around the campfire. It was a big one, with lots of orange flames. The
smell of burning wood floated into the air. "Let’s tell scary stories,"
Lauren suggested.
"Yeah. I know a good one," Lisa
said. "Do you want to hear it?"
The girls all shouted yes. "I don’t
want to," Ian whined.
"A long time ago, in a forest, just
like this one, lived a wee lass and her mum. One night, after her mum
tucked her into bed, the lass, Amy, started hearing noises outside. She
called for her mum to come through but her mum didn’t. Amy got up and
searched the whole house. Her mum was not there. She called her name but
she never answered," Lisa said.
"This is scary. What happened to
Lisa’s mum?" Ian said.
"Shhhh. Let’s listen," Mac said.
"Well, Amy put on her slippers and
picked up a candle from the table. She used a match and lit it and carried
it outside. She called for her mum, but there was no answer. Just then she
heard a noise behind her. It sounded like someone had stepped on a branch.
Amy turned around. There stood a huge monster. It had ten eyes and a huge
nose and four ears."
"Yikes! A monster?" Ian cried,
burying his head in his lap.
"The monster had blood on its mouth
and parts of Amy’s mum’s dress too. It moved closer and closer to Amy. She
could see its eyes glowing," Lisa said.
"Were they glowing red?" Mac asked.
"They glowed green and purple. It
reached out its arms to grab Amy and then…..AHHHHHHHHH!" Lisa screamed at
the top of her lungs. The girls jumped and screamed and Megan nearly
fainted. Ian started to fall backwards and Mac jumped so high that he hit
his head on the branch above him. "I got you. I got you," Lisa laughed.
She was delighted to have scared them all.
"Time for bed," Helen said. The
girls went to their tents and Lindsay put the fire out.
Ian and Mac were terrified. "Do you
think the monster will come tonight?" Ian asked.
"It’s not real. It was just a story.
The girls have gone to bed. Let’s go down to the camp. There are still
some embers glowing in the fire. Maybe there’s some food," Mac said.
Ian, more hungry than afraid,
climbed down the tree behind Mac. They went over to the campfire. It was
still warm. "What’s this?" Ian asked, picking up a bag of marshmallows.
"I don’t know, but the girls put
them on sticks and held them over the fire. Let’s give it a try," Mac
whispered. They each found a stick and put a marshmallow on the end and
held it over the glowing embers.
"It’s turning black. I don’t want my
to be burned," Ian complained. He lifted his stick and slipped the
marshmallow into his mouth. "That’s good. I’ll have another," he said,
putting another white puffy marshmallow onto his stick. Mac let his get a
little burnt and then ate it.
The two raccoons ate the whole bag
of marshmallows. They heard someone move in the tent. "I think there’s
something out there," Lindsay said. "I’m going to check." She started to
unzip the tent.
"It might be a snipe," Helen
laughed.
Ian and Mac darted up the tree as
Lindsay came out and went toward the fire. "Something ate all our
marshmallows. Looks like they roasted them," she said to Helen. "It was
probably just one of the girls. Oh well. Good night," she said, climbing
back into the tent.
Morning came quickly. Ian and Mac
watched them pack everything up and soon they were gone. The raccoons
climbed down and searched the ground for leftover food but there wasn’t
even a sign of the fire left. "I guess they’re not coming back," Ian
sighed. "I’ll miss them. It was sort of fun having them there."
"I’ll miss them too, but we did
learn a few things; marshmallows are good, bacon is delicious, and we’d
better not come down from the tree at night or the snipe will get us," Mac
said.
Ian nodded his head and they headed
into the woods to look for more nuts and berries. |
