Jenny laughed along with the others, although she noticed that they seemed surprised to be laughing at something Dean had said. He obviously wasn't the class comedian. But was he her secret admirer? His voice was soft, but slightly thin and a little on the high side.

"Give it up, Sally," David said. "I'm not sure why you have the urge to play this game, but I'm afraid it's a real dud."

"Okay, okay, I know when to quit," Sally said. *The nastiest voice isn't here yet, anyway."

Jenny was pretty sure she was talking about Diana. She couldn't see David's reaction, but Dean stared at the table as if he were embarrassed.

Sally wasn't embarrassed at all. Smiling brightly, she said, "So, Jenny, what did you think of our scavenger hunt?"

Jenny cleared her throat. "It was fun. I liked it."

Dean raised his eyes and looked at her. "How far did you get on the Ust before the rain came?" he asked.

"Oh ..." Jenny glanced sideways at David. He was busy with his Coke.

"Oh, that's right," Karen said. "You and David were together, weren't you?"

*They were at the beginning," Sally said with a grin. **Who knows about the end?"

Jenny blushed, but David just smiled tightly. *The end was a washout. Right, Jenny?"

"Right," she agreed, wondering if he was playing

H

a word game. "Fm afraid I'm not much of a climber, not even in good weather."

"Wait. Are you saying you were on the rimrocks when the storm hit?" Sally said.

"A lot of us went up there," Dean reminded her.

"Not me," Karen said.

'Well, sure," Sally said to Dean. "I mean, there's always at least one thing on the list that you can find on the rimrocks. Brad actually insisted that we go up there to find a bird nest, but we didn't go in the middle of the thunderstorm."

"I'm sure David and Jenny didn't plan it that way," Dean told her. He looked at Jenny again. "Did you?"

"Why don't you drop it. Dean?" David said suddenly. "We got rained on, and we didn't plan it, okay?"

"Yeah, you're embarrassing them," Sally said. "Especially David. After all, he's the number one climber around here. It must be very uncool for a good climber to get caught in a storm."

"Sure." Dean leaned back in his chair and smiled. "I was just curious, but I'll drop it. Didn't mean to embarrass anyone."

There was a short silence, and then Karen asked, "What about you, Dean? Where were you when the sky opened up?"

Before Dean could answer, a waitress came to take their food orders. Jenny snuck a look at David, wondering why he'd snapped at Dean. She didn't

believe he was embarrassed. Was there some kind of rivahy between these two? Dean had left on the hunt with Diana. Was David jealous about that? You don't know him, she reminded herself.

By the time they finished ordering, the tension had passed. Dean and Karen were discussing a college placement course they both were going to take, and Sally was bending David's ear about one of her horses. Jenny was trying to decide whether she should be apologizing to David or not. For some reason, he was awfully touchy about that night; maybe it would be better to just let it slide. Since everyone else was busy talking, Jenny was the first one to see Brad come in the door.