Without a Grave (27 page)

‘He just wants to curry favor with the locals,' Molly grumbled.

‘Curry away,' I said, delighted. ‘Any port in a storm.'

‘Not quite any. My late husband was a builder,' Molly told me. ‘Let's check the Tamarind Tree out.'

‘What I really want to check out, is that shack in Kelchner's Cove. Since we'll have free access to the grounds, do you think . . . ?'

‘Snap out of it, Hannah! Hurricane? Remember?'

‘There's a party pooper in every crowd.'

Twenty minutes later, it seemed odd to find the turnstile up and the gate to the exclusive resort unattended. When we found him, Lou, the gate attendant, was dragging pool furniture into the fitness center with the help of another staffer. Sitting on an empty planter ten feet away, watching, was Alice Madonna Robinson Mueller.

‘Hello, Alice,' I said.

Her tears had dried, but they'd left tracks of blue-black mascara down her cheeks. I was going to ask her what was wrong when she said, ‘Oh, hi, Hannah. Who's your friend?'

‘This is Molly Weston. She lives over on Bonefish Cay, too. We're hoping to ride out the hurricane with you.'

‘Oh, goody! It'll be nice to have a friend staying here.'

‘Looks like you've been crying. What's wrong?'

‘Nothing, really. It's just that Jaime can be such a
stinker
! I wanted to go home,
begged
him, but he said if he had to stay, I had to stay.' She folded her arms across her bosom. ‘And now it's too late.'

‘Well, if it's any consolation, Alice, I'm stuck here, too. My husband's back in Maryland, totally pissed off that I didn't make it out in time.'

Alice hopped off the planter, seemingly cheered by this news. ‘Jaime says this place was built to withstand winds up to one hundred and eighty miles an hour. Can you imagine? I've already got my space picked out. Come and see.' Like a camp counselor on a field trip, she led us into the dining room where I'd last eaten lunch after my talk with Gabriele, down a narrow corridor and into an elegant, mahogany-paneled club room decorated in British Colonial style, more reminiscent of the Raj than the West Indies. Small items that could easily become projectiles – silverware, glassware, vases – had been stored away, leaving only tables and chairs. Ceiling fans circled slowly overhead.

‘I'm behind the bar,' Alice said. She pointed out her mattress, pillows and blanket; a pile of
Vogue
and
People
magazines; and something that made me want to take her in my arms and whisper
there-there
into her hair – a teddy bear so well loved he was nearly hairless.

‘What a lovely little nest you've made for yourself, Alice,' said Molly.

‘I couldn't bring everything, of course.' She started to tear up again.

I picked up her hand, squeezed and held on to it. ‘We're going back home to pick up our things now, but after we return and get settled in, let's sit down and have a nice chat. Okay?'

Alice managed to dredge up a smile from somewhere and plant it on her face. ‘I'd like that a lot, Hannah.'

‘What a sad little creature,' Molly said after Alice had scampered off to retrieve something else she'd forgotten from her cottage on the point. We were wandering around the club room, casing the joint. ‘Poured concrete floors,' Molly said, testing the carpet with her toes. She laid a hand flat on the wall. ‘Solid concrete construction here, too.' She leaned back, checking out the ceiling. ‘Reinforced trusses, two-by-six and not two-by-four, that's good.' She pointed. ‘And they're nicely camouflaged, but can you see where they used hurricane straps to tie the roof to the walls? That should prevent lift-off!'

Even I could see that except for the picture window overlooking the pool, all the windows had been constructed, Bahamian-style, out of wood and high-quality plexiglass. They became their own hurricane shutters when lowered and dogged tightly down. ‘And another plus?' Molly added. ‘The doors open out, and not in.'

As we strolled back toward the main gate, Molly pointed out that in a town where trees, telephone poles, boats, golf carts, air conditioners and even other buildings could rise up and fall down on you, the Tamarind Tree had an advantage. It sat practically alone.

It was a no-brainer.

On the way back to Bonefish Cay, we stopped at Hawksbill Hardware – ‘If we don't have it, you don't need it' – and bought spare batteries for my flashlight and the last two cans of Sterno.

‘What's CNN saying?' I asked Molly on the VHF radio a bit later.

‘It's coming, it's bad, and it's tomorrow. Over.'

‘I'll come and help you, then we can secure
Windswept
. Over and out.'

When it was
Windswept's
turn, everything that was outside had to come in. A flying coconut can do damage enough – I'd heard of people being killed by them – but a flying barbecue grill?

I disconnected the gutters from the cistern to prevent wind-driven waves of salt water from sweeping over the roof and contaminating our drinking water. With Molly's help, I lowered all the windows and dogged them down tight while she hooked them to the window frames on the inside. I flipped all the breakers and turned off the power. And I hauled down the flag.

Molly went to fetch her ditch kit, but I had one last task to do.

Pets weren't allowed in shelters, I'd heard, and I wanted to say goodbye.

The last time I'd seen Dickie had been that morning. I'd been sitting on the back steps doing kitty shiatsu along his spine, when he suddenly stiffened. The fur on his tail puffed out as if it'd been stuck into an electric socket, then he leapt from my arms and streaked off into the bushes, a coonskin cap on four legs.

‘Dickie!' I called now, hoping he'd come back. ‘Here Dickie, Dickie, Dickie!'

I'm not sure why I was bothering to call as I'd never known the skittish animal to answer to his name. I filled a bowl with kibble and wandered around the back yard, rattling as I went. ‘Dickie!' But he failed to appear.

I followed the path that led from my house to Molly's and back again, rattling and calling, but the silly cat was AWOL. Still holding the bowl, I sat down on the steps and began to cry. ‘Damn you, cat,' I sniffled. ‘
Please
come out!'

Did Dickie know a hurricane was coming? Did some electrical charge in the air tip him off? Was he off in some hurricane hole of his own?

Swiping at my eyes, I clumped back into the house and rummaged around in the cupboards until I found a couple of mixing bowls. I filled one with kibble and the other with water and crammed them in the crawl space under the house where Dickie liked to hide. He'd survived more than one hurricane, and I hoped he'd survive this one, too.

Finally, I locked up.

As I clicked the great big padlock in place on the front door of our home away from home, I felt an overwhelming sadness. I was abandoning this friendly house to the mercy of the wind, and I wondered if I'd ever see it again.

With tears still in my eyes, I plodded down to the end of the dock to wait for Molly.

Looking out over the water, I began to worry. It was still sunny, but the Sea of Abaco was kicking up; the wind blew whitecaps off the tops of the waves like heads of foam off beer. We'd left it too long.

‘Here, put this on,' I said, handing Molly a life jacket. While she strapped herself in, I put one on, too. Michelin Man and the Pillsbury Doughboy, we bumbled down the dock and scrambled aboard
Pro Bono
. As an extra precaution, we threaded lines through our life jackets and tied ourselves to cleats just in case
Pro Bono
decided to throw us.

‘Hold on!' I shouted, pulling back on the throttle.

‘Wheee!' Molly hollered. ‘Hi ho, Silver!'

Pro Bono
roared out of its slip, reared up and took the reins in its teeth,
thrump-thrump-thrumping
over the tops of the waves, getting us to Hawksbill Cay in one piece, but leaving us feeling bruised and battered.

Once inside the harbor, the wind abated. Gator had suggested I tie the boat in a thicket of mangrove near the island's dump, so after dropping Molly off on the dock with all our gear, I headed for the dump. I aimed
Pro Bono
into the mangroves, revved up the engine and rammed her in, head first, as far as she would go. Then I tied her off to the thickest branches with every rope I'd been able to find.

When I finished,
Pro Bono
looked like something out of a bondage fantasy. To be on the safe side, though, I dropped an anchor off the stern and tied it on tight. Just as I was finishing up, Gator came alongside in his dinghy and ferried me back to the government dock.

When we got back, Molly had already loaded our gear on to the back seat of Gator's golf cart. She perched on top of the pile, flexing her muscles like Superwoman and singing into the stiffening breeze,
I am strong, I am invincible, I am woman!

Forgetting about everything for a moment – Paul, Dickie, Frank and Sally Parker, even the approaching storm – I laughed until my sides ached.

TWENTY

HURRICANE HELEN STRENGTHENED OVERNIGHT TO A CATEGORY 3 HURRICANE WITH WIND OF 100 KNOTS. CONDITIONS IN ABACO SHOULD BEGIN TO DETERIORATE THIS EVENING. EXPECT 100 KNOTS OF WIND FROM THE NE, WITH STORM SURGE TO 12 FEET, FOLLOWED BY SOUTH WIND TO 80 KNOTS AND CONTINUING STORM SURGE AS HELEN EXITS TOMORROW.

Chris Parker,
Wx Update
, Bahamas, Thur 4, 10a

I
t seemed odd to be preparing for a hurricane when the sky was blue, the sun shone, and the winds blew no more strongly than usual. If you didn't listen to Barometer Bob, download your weather from the Internet, or have CNN nattering away
ad nauseum
, you'd think it was a fine day for sailing. Hey, ho, the sailor's life for me! Out you'd go, then
blammo
!

At one o'clock, however, Radio Abaco reported that Hurricane Helen had made landfall on Eleuthera with wind gusts up to one hundred miles per hour. She continued to steer our way.

Most of her staff had evacuated over the weekend, but Gabriele Mueller had stayed behind with a skeleton crew of volunteers to help prepare the resort for the coming storm. Although she was holed up in her father's office rather than in the club room with the rest of the peasants, she appeared around two o'clock on Thursday just as everyone was getting settled in. She wore a beige, v-neck, button-front Calvin Klein sundress I'd seen in the window at Nordstrom, and Tommy Bahama flip-flops with a flower on the toe.

‘Welcome, everyone,' began her walk-and-talk. ‘I'm Gabriele Mueller. My father asked me to apologize for not being here with you today, but he's returned to San Antonio to be with his young children. I speak for my father and my brother – who's out with some staff securing our grounds but hopes to be with us soon. I speak for everyone at Tamarind Tree Resort and Marina, when I say I hope you will consider this your home for the time you are with us.'

Gabriele had reached the bar. She continued talking, trailing her hand along the polished wood as if checking it for dust. ‘Of course we're hoping that the storm will pass through quickly and do as little damage as possible, but in the meantime, the bar is open.' She spread her arms gracefully, like Vanna White on
Wheel of Fortune
, showing off a prize. ‘There's plenty of ice, water, and a limited supply of fruit juice and cold beer, and although the kitchen isn't available, Jeremy Thomas here . . .' – a big smile for Jeremy, one of the college boys who had shucked his TTR uniform in favor of shorts and a wife-beater tee and had been busily schlepping bags into the shelter for Alice Madonna – ‘ . . . Jeremy will do what he can to make you comfortable.'

She smiled, bowed slightly, and wafted off in a cloud of ylang-ylang and patchouli.

After Gabriele had retreated to her sanctuary, Molly and I helped the staff move the outdoor furniture inside. We turned patio tables upside down, nested chairs and placed them on top, then used the tables to barricade the double doors leading out to the patio bar.

Two of the canvas loungers we saved for ourselves, dragging them to a corner of the club room near the gas log fireplace where Molly and I had set up camp. ‘This feels like Girl Scouts,' Molly said as she unfolded the lounger, adjusted the back and spread her blanket on top. ‘Maybe we should sing “White Coral Bells.”'

I arranged my lounger next to hers, retrieved a paperback novel and a flashlight from my duffle, then slid the bag underneath my chair. ‘I vote for “Do Your Ears Hang Low.” Can you believe they still sing that in Scouts? My granddaughter, Chloe, was driving me nuts with it not too long ago.'

I tossed the paperback on the lounger, sat down, and arranged my rolled-up sleeping bag behind my back like a pillow. I wriggled in, testing for comfort. ‘This should do nicely,' I said, plumping up the bag with my fist, ‘but it'd be nicer if I were wearing a bathing suit sitting by the side of the pool.

‘Where
is
everybody?' I asked after a moment.

Molly shrugged. ‘“If you build it, they will come.” Gator went off to fetch Justice. I saw him a while back building a cave underneath a table. And Alice Mueller seems to have gone off to hire a decorator to spruce up her little spot behind the bar.' She frowned. ‘Which brings up an interesting point. What happened to all the booze? Those shelves behind the bar used to be lousy with it.'

‘They make good projectiles. Wouldn't want to be killed by a flying bottle of Jack Daniels. You'd never live it down in North Carolina.'

Molly chuckled. ‘There's Gator, now,' she said, pointing.