Free Summer of Dreams by Elizabeth Camden Page A

around the hardier shrubs. Evelyn drained the waterfall pipes, and Clyde dismantled the generator, moving it inside.
    The koi were going to be a problem. Like many of Romulus’s ideas, they began with the grandest of intentions but collapsed under impracticality. Even Clyde wasn’t daring enough to try to build an electric heater for the water.
    “Could we let them go, like we did the hummingbirds?”
    “I suppose we’ll have to,” Evelyn said, and one Saturday afternoon they carted them to a park near the edge of town, setting them free in a deep lake where she hoped they wouldsurvive the winter. After releasing the fish, they sat on the park bench, and Clyde’s hand sneaked out to hold her gloved hand in his palm. They kept their eyes fastened straight ahead at the lake. It was considered unseemly for a cadet to show signs of affection in public, but their clasped hands were disguised in the heavy folds of her skirts.
    The contact was entirely chaste, but still thrilling. Clyde Brixton was the smartest, handsomest man she’d ever met, and the fact that he used his precious little free time to be with her was a compliment she didn’t take lightly.
    They spent every Saturday together. When she mentioned she’d like to learn how to distill elderberries for making her own perfume, he borrowed the equipment from the academy’s chemistry lab. They made the elderberry oil together. After they distilled the oil, they didn’t have the foggiest idea how to proceed with the perfume, but neither of them really cared.
    “Give some to me,” Clyde said. “I’ll wear it like it is.”
    For the next two weeks, he had the wonderfully woodsy scent of elderberries on him when she met him on the steps of the West Point library.
    She felt bad about Clyde spending Thanksgiving alone, but he assured her he always visited his friend Smitty Jones for the holidays.
    “He’s a lonely old man,” Clyde said. “He’s got no family, and I’m on my own up here, too. It works out well.”
    To her surprise, Clyde then invited her to Thanksgiving dinner at the janitor’s house. If she accepted, it would mean leaving Aunt Bess alone, and that didn’t seem right either. In the end, Clyde said both Evelyn and Bess were welcome at Smitty’s house for the holiday meal.
    Evelyn brought a big shank of ham, slowly cooked and glazed with maple syrup and honey. She brought enough so that Smitty ought to be able to eat for a week after they left. The ham washeavy as she carried it to the kitchen table, landing so hard it made the silverware rattle.
    The compact kitchen was barely large enough for the four of them to squeeze around the table, but Evelyn could not help being impressed with the fully operational sink and washroom.
    “I’ve got the fanciest house in the neighborhood.” Smitty preened, nodding his head to Clyde in warm approval, almost as if Clyde was his own son. Any man would be proud of Clyde’s accomplishments. Even her father would be impressed, and it took a lot to impress General Thaddeus White.
    Who was returning to town soon. Although she welcomed the chance to return to her own home while her father visited, he had far more rigid standards than Aunt Bess, and the opportunity to sneak Saturday afternoon jaunts with Clyde would have to come to an end.
    “My father is arriving back in West Point on Wednesday,” she announced. “He will stay until the first week of January.”
    In Evelyn’s eighteen years on the planet, she had spent a grand total of three Christmases with her father, so the month-long release was highly unusual. She looked forward to the visit with a mix of anticipation and dread. She rarely saw her father anymore, and he could be such a daunting man.
    Clyde met her eyes across the small table. “So General White is coming home?” The eagerness in his voice was as though he was asking after Santa Claus.
    She finished swallowing a bite of ham. “Yes, for a month.”
    Smitty leaned across the table to