The Island - Part 2 (Fallen Earth) (6 page)

I didn’t bother with the anchor, but grabbed the rear dock line instead and jumped over the side into waist deep water. Before I leapt over, I’d thought my body complexly soaked. I found that not to be true, and stood with gritted teeth while cold water worked its way into every nook and cranny.

The hope in your mind is that you’ll get to the boat, find it empty, and see a trail leading off through the reeds. What I found was Zachary, underwater, his arms splayed wide and his mouth open. Where he died, when he died, I don’t know. He was too young to end up face down in a marsh, though.  That I knew for certain.

I pulled him out and struggled to get him into the cockpit. It took forever, with rain washing down from an angry sky and lightning tossing bright blue-white shards of light across the heavens. I finally gave up trying to be graceful about it. The dull thud when gravity eventually came to my aid nearly turned my stomach. I joined him a few seconds later, and stood in the cockpit, letting the rain pour down my face me while I caught my breath.

I couldn’t bring myself to leave him lying in the floor, but shoving him up onto the port seat proved no easy feat. Every time I tried to move him, the dead weight of arms, legs and body felt like I was trying to lift a monstrous balloon filled with Jello. With the task finally accomplished, I fired up the engine and pointed
Angel’s
bow north, toward the inlet again. Once I had her back out at the edge of the channel, I took a line and lashed the tiller as dead in the middle as I could. I let her run that way for a few moments, adjusting the knots until she kept a fairly straight course. She would eventually veer off to one side or the other, limiting the amount of time I could leave her that way. But I didn’t need much. A few minutes would suffice.

I stepped into the cockpit and turned on the radio. Three calls later the woman from Silver Lake answered.

“You can call off the search,” I told her. “I have located our missing camper.”

Static followed that announcement. When she finally came back, her voice carried the same official tones it had earlier.

“I read you
Angel
. I’ll notify the Coast Guard. I also have some news to pass on.”

I took a deep breath and flicked the send switch.

“Go ahead Silver Lake.”

“As of one hour ago, the President of the United States, citing an imminent danger to public health, and invoking authority granted by The National Defense Authorization Act, declared a state of martial law to exist in all US territories, effective noon today. National Guard units, along with specialized components of the United States military have been mobilized and will assist local authorities in enforcing the travel ban issued yesterday. Do you copy
Angel
?”

I stared at the microphone.

“You’re telling me no one can leave?”

“That is affirmative
Angel
. This order carries the full authority of the Office of the President. Violators will be detained, and if they resist, shot. You might want to impress that last fact on your camper. When the weather clears, he is not to attempt a crossing until such time it has been authorized by the appropriate authorities.”

So many emotions boiled up inside me that defining them all would take more words than I have. Anger rode high on the list however. I wanted to tell her that the wretched old windbags in Washington could go fuck themselves. I wanted to tell her we would cross the damned water any time we wanted.

Instead, I did what every good hive citizen would do.

I told her I understood. I turned the radio off at that point and stepped back into the gathering storm. Rain pelted the fiberglass. Already I could feel the temperatures rising as the warm front approaching from the south ran headlong into the cold air that had settled in the day before.

Massive black clouds boiled in the sky behind me. Lightning spat in thin electric fingers from the belly of the beast and arced toward the island in bright, jagged streaks. A few seconds later, thunder rolled across the heavens, deep and booming.

Zachary lay face up on the port side, his eyes open and mouth stretched unnaturally wide. I fished the tarp I’d used earlier to make a tent over the cockpit from one of the lockers and covered him with it, tucking the edges in around his body to keep the wind from blowing it away.

Angel
had deviated from her course, the wind pushing her into a more westerly tack that drove her farther out into the channel. Once I had the boy covered, I took the tiller and pulled her back toward Portsmouth. I had no intention of running the gauntlet of waves and current again. Instead I rode her close to shore, looking for the little opening where the three of them had set their camp and where he had launched his ill-fated voyage only hours before.

I’d take
the boat back up to the dock when the weather cleared. At that moment, with lightning scoring bright lines across the clouds behind me, I needed to find shelter and find it quick.

As fast as the trip down had been, it seemed to take forever to make it back to the campsite. When the tiny point that marked the entrance materialized ahead, I breathed a sigh of relief. That emotion quickly evaporated when I rounded the break in the trees.

The buggy sat in the clearing, with a figured huddled inside.

Surprised, I turned the boat toward opening in the reeds that led to the tiny stretch of sand beyond.

Angel
grounded only a few feet from shore. I flung the duffel bag I’d packed earlier high up on the island where it tumbled through the grass before rolling to a stop. Snatching up the bow line, I jumped off the bow and secured it to a gnarled pine near the water’s edge. When I turned, Kelly stood on the bank, shivering in the driving rain, eyes wide.

“Did you find him?”

Lightning flashed behind me.

“I did,” I said and left it there. “Let’s get out of here. That storm is going to break at any minute and life will not be good if we’re caught out in it.”

“Where is he?” she demanded.

“He’s dead,” I told her. “And we stand a good chance of joining him if we don’t get under cover. Let’s go. I’ll tell you what h
appened when we get to the life-saving station.”

She stared at the boat for a long time. When she turned, she pulled a strand of sodden hair away from her face. Rain dripped from the ends. I couldn’t tell if the water running down her face came from tears or from drops leaked from the dismal sky.

“You two close?” I asked.

She shook her head. “Not really. He’s Tyler’s friend.”

I nodded, still uncertain of the relationships.

She saw the question on my face.

“Tyler is my brother. The two of them had been planning on this trip for a year, waiting for Zachary to turn eighteen. I guess you could call me the chaperone, though I was just as excited about it as either one of them.”

She looked back at the boat. “I don’t know what I’m going to tell his mother.”

I motioned toward the buggy. “Why don’t we work it out somewhere drier and safer? There’s nothing you can do for him now. “

Electricity crackled in the trees to my left, close. I heard the sizzle before the thunder boomed. A great rush of wind sliced through the trees, pushing the tops into a tight arc.

She jumped, startled by the sound.

I looked up. Clouds boiled in the sky.

“Like now! Let’s go.”

The uncertainty in her face vanished. She raced toward the buggy and climbed in the driver’s seat. I snatched up the duffel bag I’d tossed out of the boat and followed her. The trip back took all of ten minutes, ten minutes with wind and rain lashing the buggy and adding more misery to bodies already drenched and cold.

The station had a ramp off to one side of the steps. A blue sign with a white legend depicting a figure in a wheelchair sat beside it. I motioned for her to take the buggy up under the covered porch. I had no idea if Dad had waterproofed the electric motor and didn’t want to walk out later to find a dead machine.

She parked near a big window. We both climbed out and raced for the door.

Inside, a fire crackled in a cast-iron wood heater situated on the right side of the room. Warmth flooded over me. Sleeping bags and people were sprawled out across the floor. Elsie sat in a rocking chair near the stove, a blanket across her lap. A teapot steamed on top of the heater. Behind it sat a coffee pot made for camping. I recognized both from
Angel
.

Everyone looked up expectantly when we burst in. I stood framed in the doorway, glancing from face to face, seeing anxiety in some, questions in others. I had a lot to tell them.

None of it would ease the worry. Nothing I had to say would generate happy thoughts either.

Chapter VII- The Station

The storm raged all through the afternoon. The century old station trembled and shuddered, but held strong against the howling wind and the driving rain. Time after time, I stood near rain-streaked windows, sipped at coffee, and watched the storm-tossed waves crash into the island. Visibility ran no more than a mile or so. Beyond that, the clouds and ocean merged into one solid gray-black wall.

They had taken the news of Zachary’s death as well as could be expected. Tyler slumped over at the long, low table where he had been sitting, burying his head in his hands. Kelly sat with him, speaking in low tones until he finally straightened up.

The tall blonde with Joshua’s group gasped and put her hand to her mouth. The rest sat in silence while I relayed the news.

Elsie rocked in her chair, her gray eyes peering at me over her wir
e-rimmed glasses, and then glanced at Daniel. I stared at him too, thinking about the odd remark he had made earlier when he said Zachary made him think of bats. Something about those words hung just at the edge of comprehension, like I had a puzzle piece in my hand that didn’t fit, but should.

When I looked up, Elsie’s gaze had turned into a frown. She reached down and pulled him closer, the move so obviously protective that it left me with more questions than answers. Barely twenty-four hours earlier, I‘d protested her plan to ride across with me, noting that she hardly knew me. The sudden chill in her demeanor had me wondering what I knew about her, or better, what I didn’t know.

The life-saving station had been laid out in such a way that the entrance way opened into a huge room that ran half the length of the building. From walls paneled with rough-sawn pine to oak floors, the building imparted a solid sense of strength as if the men who built it had understood that it didn’t need to withstand a storm, but centuries of them. The main room contained little in the way of furniture. The few items that did exist looked to have been strategically placed by the Park Service in an attempt to recreate an atmosphere of square-rigged ships and swaggering sailors. A pair of rocking chairs sat near the soot-blackened iron stove, matching those out on the porch in shape and design. A handful of stools occupied the far wall where a long, low bar divided the living space from the kitchen. A rough wooden table surrounded by another half-dozen ladder-backed chairs graced the center of the room.

The walls bore equally sparse furnishings. A picture of an old woman sewing by candlelight hung near the stove. A wide oil-on-canvas painting hung over the bar, the scene depicting Christ with his hands outstretched to calm rough seas. Glass lamps had been spaced apart throughout the room, their globes still dark from whale oil burned in a past when the world still accepted the commercial killing of the earth’s largest mammals.

Big picture windows ran across the front. With the storm raging outside, the weak light filtering through them faded before it reached the bar, leaving the kitchen area dark and gloomy.

The rain came hard for two hours or better. Bright streaks of lightning blazed through the clouds and arced toward the earth with such frequency and intensity it felt like God had turned on a strobe light and cranked it to the crazy setting.  The wind also went insane for a while. Twice gusts hit the station so hard that dust puffed from the walls. 

News of Zachary’s death left them somber.  I let that sit until the worst of the storm had passed and then told them about the president declaring martial law. I don’t think I could have elicited a stronger response if I’d poured gasoline on them and struck a match.

Joshua stood up. The movement sent his bushy hair sprawling across his face. The beard forming below stood out dark and thick. I couldn’t decide if he looked more like a terrorist, or one of those kooky, doomsday fanatics who wandered around with wooden signs draped down both sides of their body.

“Are you kidding me? They announce a ban on travel then basically say, if you try, we’ll shoot you?”

“What do they expect us to do?” Jessie cried out. “Stay here?”

I shrugged at them both. “I’d say that’s exactly what they expect. In fact, it sounds like they’re going to see that we do.”

Even jittery Devon joined the chorus of voices rising in protest.

“They can’t just leave us here. We’ll starve.”

I raised my hands. “Whoa, slow down. We’re not going to starve. I’ve got food.”