Dark Water Rising (17 page)

“Josiah’s sixteen, too,” I said, “and they took him anyway.”

Papa said nothing, but I knew what he was thinking, I knew what was truly in his heart. He thought Josiah and I were different.

“It’s late,” Papa said, squinting at the sun. “You’d better get on back or it’ll get dark on you.”

I nodded, ready to be done with him, but he stopped me.

“Did you tell your mama what I asked?”

I frowned, trying to remember, then it came back to me.

“Sure, Papa,” I said, bitterness in every word. “I told
her just what you said, that she was right about there being a reason for everything.”

“Good,” he muttered. “That’s good. Get on back to her then, and I’ll see you as soon as I can.”

He pushed himself up and went back to his sorting and stacking.

I turned toward home, and by the time I reached Thirty-fifth Street, the sun had disappeared, tempering the jagged wreckage and leaving a halo of pink and purple around bare trees and splintered rooftops. I climbed the stairs, trying not to think about my hard feelings toward Papa, trying to focus on what needed done tomorrow, but I couldn’t stop wondering why his message to Mama was so important to him.

20

I woke early Tuesday morning clinging to the edge of my mattress with a knee in my back. During the night, Lucas, Andy, and Will had traded their pallets for Papa’s empty side of the bed, and now they lay in a jumbled, sweaty mess from the headboard down. After all they’d endured, though, I couldn’t be mad at them.

I eased from the bed, leaving them room to stretch out, and while I gathered my clothes, thoughts of Josiah stabbed at me. I hoped the worst was over for him, that he’d be coming home today, yet seeing him again had begun to worry me some. What he’d had to do on that barge was bound to haunt him. Things like that had a way of tangling a man’s insides, changing the way he saw life, and I feared he might never be the same.

The awful stench that had swamped the island hadn’t eased, but as I dressed, I finally smelled something else. A faint, warm scent challenged each putrid breeze
from the window, drawing me to the kitchen quicker than any call to breakfast.

I hurried downstairs, my stomach already growling, and sat at the kitchen table while Mama tended a big skillet of pan bread. I’d been missing her warm, yeasty loaves, but Aunt Julia’s sourdough starter, kept by the sink, had been ruined when the wave swamped the house. Mama explained that it would take a while to produce another good starter, and that till then, we’d have to settle for pan bread and baking-powder biscuits. I wasn’t finding it hard to do. I watched, impatient, while she turned the round loaf onto a plate and called Ezra in to eat.

“I found him working by candlelight this morning,” she told me, slicing the bread into wedges. “He was scraping dried mud off the floors, and as soon as the sky brightened a bit, he headed off to finish up the outhouse.”

I glanced at the scraped floor, still dirty but ready for scrubbing when more water was available. “Aunt Julia is lucky to have him.”

Mama nodded. “Especially now.”

I reached for a steaming piece of bread. “Did you know he gathered lumber scraps yesterday for another tree fort? He thinks that giving the boys something fun to do will help with Andy and Will’s grieving.”

Mama smiled. “He’s a smart man. He sure deserves
more than his lot in life. Is there any chance that you and Josiah could rebuild his house?”

I stared at her. Just the mention of Josiah’s name plunged me back into that morgue. I pushed the grisly images aside, like I’d done a hundred times since yesterday, and thought about what Mama asked.

“I’ll add it to my list. Aunt Julia’s house has to be repaired before anything else, though.”

She nodded and started another batch of bread cooking. “So what’s on your list for today?”

“The roof. Gotta get it done before the next rain.”

She smiled and pushed a jar of fig preserves across the table to me. “Your papa would be proud. That’s exactly what he would do.”

I frowned while I spooned sweet preserves onto my bread. Proud or not, since Papa hadn’t seen fit to be here, I didn’t see why either of us had to give him another thought. I plunked the spoon back into the jar and took a big bite of my bread. “This is real good, Mama,” I said, changing the subject. “Oughta keep me fine for a few hours at least.”

She raised an eyebrow and shook her head. “You’d better hope our provisions hold out till they get the rails fixed, or we’ll all be going hungry for a while.”

Ezra came in about the same time I heard footsteps overhead. The boys must’ve smelled Mama’s pan bread, which meant the kitchen would fill up fast. I wolfed
down the rest of my breakfast and headed to the pile of scavenged lumber out back, but I wasn’t quite ready for work yet. Something had been tugging at my mind ever since I got back Sunday.

I searched the scrap lumber, found a small piece of scuffed mahogany, and pulled out my pocketknife. In rough block letters, I carved
SARAH LOUISE ELLISON
into the wood. When I finished, I wedged it into the bare branches of the small magnolia tree near the back of the stairs. I had no flowers, but even if I had, it would’ve still been a sad offering. I remembered Kate’s jasmine petals, emptied my pocket into my hand, and brought them to my face. Only the memory of their sweetness remained, but I sprinkled the tiny brown fragments on the ground below the tree anyway and stood back.

“It’ll have to do for now, Sarah Louise,” I whispered, “but I reckon you and God understand that better than anyone.”

I headed for the lumber pile and went to work, sorting and measuring, cutting and nailing. Through the hole in the roof, I heard Ella Rose singing nursery rhymes in the parlor with Kate and Elliott. I’d been seeing something dark in her ever since she’d gotten the news about her father, but now, hearing the happiness in her voice made me think that maybe I’d imagined it. I listened, hardly moving, till Mama and Aunt Julia
disturbed her, saying it was time to get some more mud out of the house.

The parlor and dining-room carpets had been ruined. So had the sofa and Uncle Nate’s favorite chair. Matt got home in time to help the boys haul them out of the house, but not before Mama had looked him over good. I knew she’d been worried about letting him travel across town alone. When she was satisfied that he was okay, I heard her ask him about Papa. Matt didn’t have much to say, only that the men were working twelve-hour shifts around the clock and that rebuilding the bridge might take a while. I’d already accepted that fact, and I was coming to realize I didn’t mind being without Papa at all. I could handle what needed doing around here just fine.

Later that morning, I looked up to see Ella Rose across the street with a stick in her hand, standing in the middle of the lot where her house had been. I rested my hammer on a rafter and watched. She pricked at the dried mud here and there, then after a long moment, she jabbed the stick into the soil and left it. Uneasy, I watched her stride back to the house.

This time I had no doubt. The darkness I’d seen earlier seemed to be growing.

Ezra finished the outhouse seat, put all four boys to pulling nails again, then worked with me on the roof.
Each time he climbed the ladder, I saw him searching the streets below for Josiah.

“He’ll make it home,” I told him more than once.

Ezra always nodded and said, “Yessir,” but I knew he wouldn’t breathe easy again till he saw his grandson with his own eyes.

I slid a board into place near the corner of the roof and nailed it to the rafters, but I couldn’t get Ezra off my mind. I couldn’t stop thinking of the shadow I’d glimpsed in his eyes when I’d told him about Josiah. It was easy to see he was worried, but I’d seen something else, too, something I suspected might come from never being master of your own fate. After straining at Papa’s leash for so long, that sort of thing wasn’t hard for me to recognize, but unlike Ezra and Josiah, I knew my life would change.

By midday, Aunt Julia ran out of fresh water, and before we could eat, she had to send Ezra down the alley with buckets to fetch more. He looked tired, and sweat glistened on his dark skin. He’d been working since before dawn and had made countless trips up and down the ladder, bringing me heavy lumber and slate. I’d have to see that he rested a bit when he came back.

I squinted toward town from my perch on the roof, trying to make out a trace of smoke I’d seen earlier. It
was hard to tell its source. At first there’d been only one fire, but now I saw several.

I put down my hammer, ready to quit for a while, and took one last look down the streets. Like Ezra, I’d watched for Josiah all morning, but this time, I thought I saw him walking beside a man pulling a kid’s wagon.

I started to yell for Ezra, then remembered he was gone. I blocked the sun with my hand and looked again. It was Josiah all right, and he had Henry with him!

I scrambled down the ladder and up the stairs, yelling for Ella Rose.

“What is it?” Mama asked. “What’s happened?”

“Josiah’s back,” I told her, “and Henry Covington’s with him.”

Ella Rose stood motionless in the doorway. “Did you say ‘Henry’?”

I nodded and laughed. “Come on!” I said, grabbing her hand. We raced down the side stairs while Josiah and Henry rounded the corner off Broadway onto Thirty-fifth.

“Henry!” Ella Rose shouted.

He dropped the handle on his wagon, broke into a run, and swept her off her feet. I stood back, watching, while her skirt and petticoats swirled around his legs.

While they hugged, I helped Josiah push Henry’s wagon into the washed-out yard. He let the handle drop and backed away, no doubt aware of the way he
smelled. The odor was truly terrible, but the smell of death clinging to him wasn’t what bothered me most. It was his eyes. They were full, too full, as if he’d never get shed of what he’d seen. I knew the horror had to be more than any one person should have to carry and wished I could help ease his burden, but I didn’t know how. Instead, I found myself pulling away, not wanting him to speak of it, not wanting him to even think of it. Thankfully, his eyes told me he felt the same. It was far too soon for words.

“Oh, Henry,” Ella Rose cried. “I thought you were gone.” She touched his face, his hair, his shoulders, as if she couldn’t quite believe he was there in front of her. “Are your mama and daddy okay? And what about Spencer and Beth and Amanda?” She sucked in a quick breath. “You have to tell me. Tell me everything.”

“Slow down, Ella Rose. Slow down. Let’s sit there on the steps so we can talk.” He tugged her toward the stairs, but she stomped her foot and stood her ground.

“Stop it!” She jerked her hand away, glaring at him. For a moment I saw the same fierce glint in her eyes that I’d seen when Papa reported that he’d found her daddy, but the anger quickly turned to regret.

“I’m sorry,” she said. “It’s just that your family is all I have now. I need to know.”

He gave her a slow nod and pulled in a breath. “It’s just me and Spence left, Ella Rose. When the wave
hit and the house broke apart, I grabbed Spence and jumped. We lost everyone else in the water, and I haven’t seen even one of them since. I’ve looked everywhere.”

She wrapped her arms around him and sobbed into his shoulder. “Your sweet mama and daddy. Beth and little Amanda. I’m so sorry, Henry.” She looked up at him, her cheeks wet with tears. “My daddy’s gone, too.”

He nodded. “When I ran into Josiah, he told me how things were for you and the Braedens. That’s why I brought the food. They’re rationing supplies in town today, and Chief Ketchum said I could take a share to all of you here.”

She wiped her cheeks with her sleeve and stared at the wagon, eyes suddenly vacant. “It will certainly be welcomed, Henry. Thank you.”

For a moment, they said nothing more, sinking toward that dazed and barren place I’d seen so many go when their loss became too sharp to bear. But Ella Rose blinked, like stirring from a dream, and pulled Henry toward the stairs where Josiah and I waited. “Come help get the food to the kitchen,” she said, “then you must meet the two Mrs. Braedens. They will be so pleased to see you.”