Midsummer Murder by Shelley Freydont Page A

guardrail and he gazed out at a vista that rivaled the view from Marguerite’s sitting room. He turned as he heard her approach.
    “Good morning, Lindy. Lovely day for a hike.”
    “Morning, Ellis.” She sat down on a wooden bench that was supported by two boulders. She grabbed her foot with both hands and stretched her calf, then repeated the action with the other foot. “I expect it’s easier going down than it will be coming back up.”
    “Indeed. Though this is as far as I usually go. One of the best views you can find.” He took an invigorating breath. “I told Marguerite the weather would be good for the weekend.” He smiled as if he had been instrumental in bringing it about.
    They sat and stood in silence for a few minutes admiring the view.
    “Easton country,” he said with a sigh.
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    “You own all of this?” The landscape stretched for miles—
    and miles.
    “Most of it, except for the town, and where we leave off the park service takes over.”
    “It’s so big.”
    Ellis smiled. “You can see all the way to the Hudson River from the point right beyond this rail.”
    Lindy stood up and leaned over the rail, trying to catch a glimpse.
    “But don’t be tempted. We’ve had to close off the lookout. One too many mud slides.” He shifted uncomfortably. “They say that’s where the Cleveland boy lost his footing.”
    Lindy backed away. “What are those towers?” She pointed emphat-ically at one of the brown obelisks that rose above the trees, while she tried not to think about where they were standing. “There and there and over there?” Her hand moved to indicate each one.
    “Ranger stations. During the dry season—we do have one, you know—later in the summer—there is a real danger of forest fires.
    And when the weather is like this, they keep an eye out for rock and mud slides. There’s a sublayer of granite over much of the land. The camp is built on one. But the top layers of dirt and rock can be highly unstable.”
    “There was mesh over the rocks on the road.”
    Ellis nodded. “We still get an occasional boulder falling onto the road. Only last season, one barely missed a family on its way to the camp. No one was hurt, thank God. It doesn’t happen often. Usually we just get a lot of mud across some of the paths. The park service is good about clearing the main road. There are a lot of tourist attractions near here—near as the crow flies, anyway.”
    “None of your land is developed?”
    “Heavens no. Not that I have anything against tasteful development, ski slopes and golf courses, and the like, as long as they don’t get too close. But the land has been in our family for generations.
    Several hundred acres are held in trust for the camp. Marguerite would never let the homestead be ‘corrupted,’ as she calls it.” Ellis lifted his shoulders in an amused shrug.
    “A daunting job.”
    “Oh, she doesn’t have the sole voice. I get to put in my two cents worth on occasion. There is a board of trustees, mostly family 67

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    members.” He smiled, a wistful tilt to his head. “Unfortunately, there are not that many of us left. Only two out of the original six children. Two dead in World War II. One in childhood.
    Samuel of a heart ailment. Lord, how I miss him. He did leave a daughter, but she lives in London and is not much interested in the family business.
    “It doesn’t really matter. The trust practically runs itself. Our mother was very farsighted. When she saw her first performance of Ted Shawn and Ruth St. Denis, she fell in love with dance. She modeled this camp along the same philosophy as the one run by Shawn. Of course as an early suffragette, she included girls.” His eyes twinkled.
    “Our resident writers and visual artists have their living quarters and studios over that ridge, closer to the county road. They keep pretty much to themselves, communing with nature, and all that.”
    Lindy followed the direction of