Night Swimmers by Betsy Byars Page A

sending out their magical fragrance, today, luckily, in his direction.
    “I wish they’d close that plant down,” Retta said suddenly.
    Roy looked at her. He was as astonished as if she had proposed doing away with the Atlantic Ocean. “They would never do that.”
    “They should.”
    “Anyway, why did you say close it down?” he asked, puzzled. “You can chop down a plant, maybe, or pull it up, but you can’t close down a plant.”
    Retta turned her eyes from the television. She looked interested in Roy for the first time. “What do you think the Bowlwater plant is?”
    “A plant.”
    “What kind of plant?” she quizzed.
    “A big plant.” He was careful not to commit himself. Sometimes he got trapped that way and people laughed at him.
    “Well, you got it,” Retta said. “That’s what it is—a big ugly plant.”
    “It’s not ugly.”
    “Have you seen it?”
    “In my mind,” he said with a dignified nod. Roy felt as if he were moving toward something unpleasant. He felt himself on the edge of a step—one slip and he would descend into a world that was even less magical than it already was. He willed himself not to look down, willed the Bowlwater plant to be as he imagined.
    “Somebody told me they make army chemicals there,” Retta went on in a conversational tone. “That’s chemicals that kill people and leave the cars and buildings so that the army can use them.”
    Roy didn’t hear her. He had closed his mind. He was now interested only in what was happening in the yard.
    “Arthur is leaving again,” he said. “This time he’s really going.” Roy moved to the door and was waiting when Johnny stepped onto the porch. “What was so secret?” Roy asked.
    “Nothing.”
    Johnny crossed the room, taking his time. He plopped down in his father’s chair and slung one leg over the arm as his father did.
    “If it wasn’t secret, then why couldn’t I hear it?”
    “Don’t bug me,” Johnny said.
    There was a silence. Retta tried to concentrate on her television program, but she felt herself being drawn into her brothers’ conflict. She looked at Johnny.
    “I know you and Arthur are going to do something,” Roy was saying, “and I want to know what it is.”
    “It’s none of your business.”
    “I want to know! Are you going to fly the airplane or are you going to shoot the rockets?”
    “Neither.”
    “Then what are you going to do?”
    Retta said, “Don’t beg him. That’s exactly what he wants you to do.”
    “I do not,” Johnny said. He sat up straight in his father’s oversized chair. “What makes you think I want to be begged?”
    “Because you’re sitting there like the king of Arabia with that I-know-something-you-don’t-know sneer on your face. You’re disgusting.”
    “You’re the one that’s disgusting. You can’t stand it, can you, that I have a friend and you don’t?”
    Retta stared at him as if he were an ugly, offensive stranger.
    He got up slowly and walked toward the hall. At the doorway he paused and looked back at Retta and Roy. “I’ll tell you one thing,” he said, “whatever I’m going to do, I’m going to do it without the two of you.” He disappeared into his room.
    Roy hit his fist against his leg. “I knew they were doing something secret.” He turned to Retta. He sensed her helplessness, but he had nowhere else to turn. “Retta, make him tell me!”
    Retta looked at the empty doorway. “I can’t seem to make him do anything anymore,” she said.

R OY RARELY PLAYED WITH his food because he was always in a hurry to eat it. The one exception was mashed potatoes. Tonight he was making a volcano of his potatoes, smoothing the sides up to a pool of melted margarine in the middle.
    A trickle of margarine ran down one side, and he quickly repaired the damage. He wished they were having green beans so he could plant trees on the side of his volcano—that way the eruption would be more dramatic. But tonight Retta had only fixed one