Without a Grave (11 page)

‘We pause here to let new listeners know what's coming up next on the Net. First, we will have some invitations from some great places here with special activities you need to know about. Next, are mail call, then trivia, and our open mike session . . .'

‘Break, break!'

Someone was calling with a priority message. I immediately interrupted the script. ‘Caller, this is the Cruisers' Net. Go ahead.'

‘Uh, this is the
Raging Queen
out of Key West, and I'm looking for cabin boys.'

Oh, great. I flipped through Pattie's bible, but there wasn't anything listed under ‘Assholes,' so I'd just have to wing it. I pressed down on my talk button, stepping on his transmission, hard. ‘Well, somebody's had his Wheaties for breakfast! Moving along now . . . after open mike, we have a very special section where new arrivals can announce and introduce themselves, after which we will cover departures. Finally, as close as we can make it to nine a.m. we will have a recap of today's weather.'

‘Our invitations are coming up first so you can plan on not missing any fun while you are here. First on the list is Curly Tails Restaurant and Bar at the Conch Inn in Marsh Harbour. Come in, Harriet.'

After Harriet finished announcing her lunch specials, I called on the other restaurants in order – Wally's, Snappas, Mangoes, and the Jib Room where Boo's description of the baby-back ribs made my mouth water.

‘I don't know how popular you are back at home,' I concluded, ‘but here in the Abacos, everyone wants you!'

I breezed through mail call and spent about five minutes on open mike answering questions about where to get a haircut, find someone who could repair an alternator, and to celebrate the fortieth birthday of Mindy on
LunaSea
with Net listeners each singing a line of the song, round-robin style.

‘New arrivals are next. Do we have any new listeners this morning who are not afraid of the radio and who would like to take this time to introduce yourselves and tell us where you are from? Call signs twice, please.'

Not many
sane
folks invade the Abacos during hurricane season.
FunRunner
, a charter powerboat from the sound of it, had just cruised into Marsh Harbour and the all-male crew of recent graduates from West Point said they were in search of patriotic young women with no visible tan lines. Some bonehead from Key West blabbed on for so long about the ‘inedible' meal he'd had at a restaurant in Treasure Cay that I wanted to break his transmitting thumb, but Mimi Rehor from Buck-a-Book did it for me.

‘Break, break!'

I recognized her voice at once. This could be serious. ‘Go ahead, Mimi.'

‘Avener just called from the preserve saying that the brush fire is out of control. It's spreading rapidly toward the preserve, and could threaten the horses. We need help moving fences, cutting firebreaks, and beating back the fire.'

I started to hyperventilate just thinking about it. The fires in southern California had occupied the airwaves on CNN for weeks and weeks, and I pictured our precious herd of Abaco Barbs fleeing before the flames, wild eyed and panicked.

While Mimi described the desperate situation they seemed to be facing out on the preserve, I flipped frantically through Pattie Toler's bible. There was information on the Buck-a-Book container and its opening hours, details on how to arrange a visit to the preserve, and how to contribute to the rescue effort at
www.arkwild.org
, but nothing about wild fires. What the heck was a Net anchor supposed to do? I'd have to wing it.

I pressed the talk button. ‘Mimi, this is Hannah at
Windswept
. I imagine you need to get on out to the preserve, so I wonder if there's anyone in charge of organizing the volunteers.'

Windswept
had a pretty good VHF antenna clamped to the roof, but I knew it wasn't tall enough or powerful enough to reach to all the out islands, or even as far north as Treasure Cay where the preserve was located. If I was to coordinate, I'd need a relay, which would be cumbersome and result in the waste of valuable time. So, I was relieved when Mimi said, ‘Anyone who wants to volunteer should contact Susan Bliss at
Outer Limits
on seven-three starting now and anytime after the Net. In the meantime we have taxis lined up to pick up volunteers at both ferry landings – the nine forty-five out of Hope Town and the eleven thirty out of Man-O-War and Guana Cays. Just show up wearing long pants, long sleeves and sensible shoes and socks. Bring a machete if you've got one.'

While Mimi was talking, I checked my watch. Two and a half hours until the ferry from Man-O-War could stop by for us.

‘Can we take
Pro Bono
?' I called out to Paul who had suddenly disappeared. He was, as usual, on top of things. He emerged from the bedroom wearing a long-sleeve T-shirt, zipping up a pair of grease-stained chinos.

‘Sure.' He threaded a belt through the loops on his pants, cinched it up tight and fastened the buckle. ‘Where are the bandannas, do you know? If there's smoke . . .'

‘Top drawer of your dresser,' I said. ‘Bring some spares.'

My hands were so sweaty by now I could barely hold on to the mike. While I recapped the weather for the listeners on the Net, Paul pawed through the utility drawer looking for batteries for the spare hand-held radio he'd laid out on the counter. That would be for me. He'd already strapped the one we used on
Pro Bono
to his belt. If we got separated at any time during the day, we could still communicate. Paul and I had cellphones, of course, but who knew if there'd be any cellphone signal from the interior of the island. For short distances, the radios were more reliable.

I was nearing the end of the script.

‘Clearing up now, is there anyone with any unfinished business for the Net this morning?' I removed my thumb from the talk button and waited, holding my breath, listening to white noise, counting one one-thousand, two one-thousand, three one-thousand, before rushing on with the rest of Pattie's script.

‘Thank you for taking the time to listen. We hope that you enjoyed yourselves. Now please feel free to join our tradition of using this channel as a kind of spare calling channel, so that 16 can be used for hailing, distress and safety as intended by law. Remember to switch to another channel for your conversations and listen first. In Abaco we never switch to 22, 70, 72, 77, or 80. And 06 is reserved for taxis. Please respect these channel reservations. Don't forget to switch back to low power when calling nearby, and if there is nothing further . . . ?' I paused, hoping I'd be done for the day. ‘The Cruisers' Net is clear!'

With blood still pumping hotly through my temples, I rested my head against the back of the chair and let my breath out slowly through my lips.

‘Hard work, huh?' Paul commented from behind me. He rested his hands on my shoulders and began massaging the tension out of my muscles with his thumbs.

I leaned into him. ‘Wait until I get my hands on Pattie.'

‘I thought she said that anchoring the Net would be a piece of cake.'

‘She did, my love. But she neglected to mention it'd be devil's food.'

SEVEN

THE OLD SETTLEMENT OF NORMAN'S CASTLE . . . IN DAYS GONE BY . . . WAS A BUSY LOGGING CAMP, BUT IT WAS ABANDONED IN 1929. TODAY FEW TRACES OF THE SETTLEMENT OR THE INDUSTRY REMAIN AND THE ONLY INHABITANTS ARE HERDS OF WILD HORSES . . .

The Yachtsman's Guide To The Bahamas
,

1992, p. 235

P
 
ro Bono
seemed to enjoy her outing, skipping jauntily over the waves for the three and a half mile journey from Bonefish Cay to Marsh Harbour. I sat near the stern, keeping one eye on the smoke that was rising over Abaco, thick as Los Angeles' smog. The sun made a valiant effort, but only managed to hang high in the pinkish-gray sky like a pale-yellow dime.

I was excited about volunteering, but worried, too. Everything I knew about wildfires I'd learned from watching CNN, so I fretted about wind shifts, sudden gusts, back drafts, and smoke inhalation. But most of all, I worried about the horses.

It was Chloe who told me they'd been named after constellations. Stallions Achenar, Hadar, Mimosa and Capella; and the mares, Nunki, Acamar, Acamar's daughter Alnitak, and the princess of the herd, at least in Chloe's wise, eight-year-old mind, the winsome, blue-eyed pinto, Bellatrix II. Chloe would hate me forever if I let anything happen to Bella.

Paul charted a crazy course through the maze of docks at the Conch Inn Marina, then tied
Pro Bono
to the floating dock moored in the slip closest to Curly Tails restaurant. As usual, taxicab vans were waiting in the parking lot that served both the restaurant and the Guana Cay ferry landing. We had already charted a course for the van nearest the road when a vehicle pulled in that I recognized. I grabbed Paul's arm. ‘It's “Papa Lou.”'

I have no idea who Papa Lou is (was?) but the driver of cab #11, Jeff Key, is a Man-O-War resident, a driver who'd cheerfully rearranged his pickups in order to accommodate our trips to and from the airport, or help schlep my groceries between Abaco Grocery, Price Right and the ferry dock whenever I made a major grocery run.

We were about to inconvenience him even further.

Paul quickened his pace, reaching the van just as Jeff opened the hatch to begin unloading his passengers' luggage. ‘Hey, Jeff, let me help you with that.' From all the duffle bags and boxes of provisions the two men hauled out on to the pavement, I guessed the passengers piling out of his cab were about to meet up with the sailboat they'd chartered.

‘Where to?' Jeff asked us as the cruisers trundled away with a pyramid of luggage and groceries piled precariously in one of the marina wheelbarrows.

‘Heard about the wildfires?' I asked.

‘Did. Sounds serious. Usually the caretakers can handle it, but the weather's been so dry.' He sucked air in through his teeth. ‘Must be bad if they're asking for volunteers.'

Something had been bothering me ever since Mimi's early morning Mayday; I figured Jeff, as a native, might know the answer. ‘Where's the Treasure Cay fire department while all this is going on?'

Jeff slammed the hatch shut. ‘They rely on volunteers, too. They've got one pumper truck, but they still don't have a tanker, so unless the fire's near the sea or a blue hole, not much point. Besides, if Colin's got everyone out in the boonies fighting a brush fire, who will respond in a real emergency where property and lives are in jeopardy?'

‘Seems to me that saving the eight most endangered horses on the planet constitutes a real emergency, don't you?'

‘There's many who would agree with you, Hannah, including me.' Jeff waved an arm toward the passenger door, still yawning open. ‘Want me to take you up there?'

I tossed the canvas bag carrying our machetes on to the floor of the van and climbed in. ‘I thought you'd never ask.'

Jeff's cab was immaculate, smelling like fresh-peeled oranges. He drove east along the familiar road that skirted the Marsh Harbour business district, turned left at the one and only traffic light in all of the Abacos, then carried on out the S.C. Boodle Highway in the direction of Treasure Cay. After driving for what seemed like hours, we left the main road and turned on to a dirt track surrounded by pines, tall and straight as telephone poles. From my spot in the back seat, I gripped the ‘Help me, Jesus' bar with both hands as we porpoised over the road, bouncing and dipping over teeth-jarring potholes so numerous they were impossible to avoid. After this trip, I figured we'd owe Jeff more than cab fare; we might have to pony up for new shock absorbers, too.

I hadn't expected an upmarket horse farm like Middleburg, Virginia, of course, but Mimi's base, when we reached it, was still a surprise. Carved out of a clearing in the middle of four thousand acres of pine at the end of an old logging road, it more closely resembled a rough-and-ready cattle station in the Australian outback. Instead of parched clay pan desert, however, the camp was dense with palm, briar, poisonwood and Brazilian pepper, luxuriously leafy, lush and rainforest green. Steam rose from the forest floor. No, not steam, I corrected. Smoke. Smoke hazed the air, obscuring the forest canopy and any glimpse we might have had of the sky.

Jeff pulled in next to an outbuilding, one of three shipping containers Mimi used for storage and staff accommodations, and braked hard. Through my window I noticed an oversized dog pen where Mimi housed her rescued dogs. I recognized one of the animals from Buck-a-Book – Bianca, a laid-back potcake with more than a little bit of white lab somewhere in her family tree. ‘Why is there a solar panel in the middle of the dog pen?' I asked Jeff as I stepped out of the cab.

Jeff slid the passenger door closed behind me. ‘Would you steal a couple of solar panels with those fellas on guard?' He pointed to the dogs.

Solar panels. Another hard-to-get item. Silly me to overlook the obvious. ‘Uh, I guess not.'

Seeing us approach, the dogs set to barking like crazy until they were shushed in rapid Creole by a Haitian dressed in a white T-shirt and torn jeans, carrying a blue, five-gallon water jug.

‘Bi-lingual dogs,' Jeff commented in an aside before turning to wave at the Haitian. ‘Hello, Jean! We're here to help. Where's Mimi?'

Jean set the jug he was carrying next to a couple of others, wiped sweaty soot from his face with the hem of his shirt. ‘She's gone in the truck with Avener and some volunteers. They're running down the logging road, looking for breaks.'

Jeff hustled to the rear of his cab and wrenched open the hatch, reaching inside for a small duffle bag. ‘The two logging roads run more or less parallel,' he explained. ‘There's a crossroad cut perpendicular to the two, like an “H.” The road serves as a firebreak, but it's a constant battle for the caretakers to keep it clear.'