The Witch is Dead by Shirley Damsgaard

river.

    Now the campground came to life. Families lit grills and campfires, bustling about, preparing their evening meal. And the sound of children’s laughter from the playground carried across the campground.

    Carl lit the Tiki torches and started our fire in the pit. We didn’t need a fire for warmth, but the smoke from the burning logs and the torches would keep bugs at bay once the sun went down.

    Taking the dogs with them, Nell and Tink left to join Nell’s little brother at the playground. While Carl grilled hot dogs and hamburgers, Chris busied herself by setting out paper plates, ketchup, mustard, and potato chips. I fetched my contribution to the evening’s supper—Abby’s homemade baked beans.

    Soon all was ready, and Chris rang a huge cowbell to summon the three kids. After everyone loaded their plates with food, we gathered around the table to eat.

    “Tink,” I said between bites of baked beans. “Where’s T.P.?”

    “Over there with Lady,” she replied, concentrating on her meal.

    I turned to where Lady lay sprawled in the shade underneath a tree. “No, he isn’t.” Craning my neck, I glanced around our campsite for the puppy. “I don’t see him.”

    With a groan, Tink set her hot dog on her plate and made a move to rise. “I’d better go find him.”

    Placing a hand on her arm, I stopped her. “No, eat your supper first.”

    Both she and Nell finished in record time, and left the table to find the errant puppy while Nell’s mom and I cleaned up the campsite. Twenty minutes later they were back.

    Concern etched lines on Tink’s face. “We couldn’t find him, and we looked all over the campground.”

    “Has anyone seen him?” I asked, shading my eyes against the setting sun.

    “No,” she replied as she scuffed the ground with the toe of her tennis shoe. “What are we going to do? Suppose he’s lost in the woods?”

    “Don’t worry, Tink,” Carl said as he got to his feet. “We’ll all help look for him.”

    A sudden gust of wind sent the whirligig spinning, and with it came an awful smell.

    “What is that?” I asked, wrinkling my nose. I turned to see T.P. gamboling across the field next to the playground, carrying a large ball in his mouth.

    Great. He’d snitched some kid’s toy. Irritated, I marched toward the puppy, with Tink right behind me. The closer we got to the dog, the stronger the odor became.

    “Yuck.” I covered my nose. “He’s rolled in something rotten, Tink,” I said over my shoulder. “You’ll need to take him to the bathhouse and hose him off. We can’t have him stinking up the tent tonight.”

    The words were hardly out of my mouth when T.P. ran past me to Tink and proudly dropped the ball at her feet.

    I heard Nell’s mother gasp, and I watched as Tink’s face lost all its color.

    “I knew it, I knew it,” she said in a voice that carried overthe campgrounds. “I should’ve warned Mr. Buchanan, and now I’m being punished.”

    Walking swiftly to her, I grabbed her arm and gave it a little shake. “Shh, everyone can hear you.”

    In horror I stared down at the ball at Tink’s feet. Only it wasn’t a ball. Two empty eye sockets gazed up at the summer sky, and crooked teeth protruded from what was left of the upper jaw.

    T.P. hadn’t fetched some kid’s ball—he’d brought us a human skull.

     

    When Bill and his deputy, Alan, arrived, they quickly dispersed the crowd gathered around the skull. T.P. was now safely tied to a tree, downwind, where he sat whimpering. Lady watched from a safe distance away. T.P. seemed perplexed as to why he was in trouble.

    I’d insisted that even though it was hot, Tink go inside the tent, away from the curious stares of the other campers.

    “So, Ophelia, now the bodies come looking for you?” Bill said as he strolled over to where I stood guarding the entrance to our tent.

    I didn’t appreciate his macabre sense of humor.

    “That’s not funny, Bill,” I replied,