Islands: A Novel Part 7

"Shall we?" Lewis said, pulling me over him.

"Yip-yip-yip!" I cried.

Before dawn of the day we were to leave, Dr. Mendoza wrung our hands and p.r.o.nounced himself ready for any kind of medical emergency, and capered away into his hospital. Carmella came to hug us good-bye.

"I will let you know about this outreach," she said.

Henry and Lewis and I walked to the Land Rover with our arms around one another's shoulders.

"What was all that about?" Henry said.

"Blackmail," I said serenely.

When we roared out of the square, there was nothing left behind but a cloud of dust and Carmella, faintly visible through it, waving.

We slept most of the way from Chihuahua to Mexico City, and then to Atlanta. When we came into the Atlanta terminal, everything seemed too bright and too big and too loud, a sensory a.s.sault. I felt thickheaded, stupid. It was like coming up from underwater.

Henry handed the ticket agent our tickets to Charleston, and the man looked at us strangely.

"You're kidding, right?"

"No, why?" Henry said.

"Where have you all been? Charleston's closed down tight. Hurricane Hugo went through two nights ago and just flattened it. Part of it's under martial law."

It was September 23, 1989, and all our lives had changed.

4.

LATER, PEOPLE CAME to call Hugo the most destructive hurricane of that century. Despite the fact that Andrew, which ground up and spat out the Miami area a few years later, was technically a more destructive and expensive storm, Low Country people knew in their hearts that Hugo, in an odd way their own hurricane, changed more than lives, it changed a way of life.

Oh, Charleston and the islands did eventually clean up and rebuild and paint and fix up, so that the casual visitor saw only what historians had always said about us: the most beautiful historic district in the country. The horse-drawn tour wagons rolled again, and the tour buses clotted the narrow downtown streets, and flocks of drifting visitors blocked driveways and streets, led by straw-hatted long-skirted mother hens of approved local guides.

But to this day, Charlestonians speak of "before Hugo" and "after Hugo." From the morning of September 22, 1989, vulnerability walked with us on our narrow, beautiful streets as it never had before. Beauty and gentility no longer protected us. No one forgot what Hugo had done. We knew another frivolously named monster could come unbidden to us out of the waters off Cape Verde, where the great Atlantic hurricanes are born. Everywhere, in those first days, people walked with the uneasy need to keep looking over their shoulders.

That day in Atlanta, at the Delta counter, we all stared at the reservations clerk blankly, as you do at one who has demonstrated some patent insanity. Then we began babbling at him.

"What's left?" "How do you get there if you can't fly?" "Are there many fatalities? Many hurt?" "What's the worst damage? What is it: wind? water?" He lifted his hands wearily. He had obviously answered this question before.

"That's all I know," he said. "That you can't fly in there. The rest is hearsay. About the National Guard and the looting and all. There's a newsstand over there. I'm sure some of the papers will have something about it."

We looked at each other out of white, empty-eyed faces. Then Lewis and Henry dashed for the bank of telephones across the concourse and I headed for the newsstand. As I ran, I muttered over and over to myself, a witless mantra, "Let the beach house be all right. Let the beach house be all right." And then, guiltily, "Let our families and our houses be all right. Please let us get through this."

Lewis came back and we sat in the waiting area devouring the Atlanta Journal-Const.i.tution. It had little detail and much sensationalism. Devastation. No power perhaps for weeks. Gas leaks, downed live wires, severe flooding from a seventeen-foot storm surge that occurred with the high tides. Everywhere, trees down, windows out, roofs torn off, whole houses demolished. Looting in the downtown business area. Utilities workers from eight states pouring into the city. Food and water situations desperate. President Bush declares disaster area. Boats tossed onto highways and jammed among houses.

Whole beachfront sections obliterated.

I began to cry. Lewis put his arms around me and rested his chin on the top of my head.

"Wait," he said. "Wait till we know. Henry got the last free phone. Downtown has stood for three hundred years. We can clean up a few tree limbs and s.h.i.+ngles. Just wait and see if Henry can get through."

Soon we saw Henry's tall figure, incongruously still clad in scrub pants and a wrinkled Hawaiian s.h.i.+rt and sandals, loping across the waiting area. People turned to stare at him. One or two drew back from him. My sobs turned to hiccups of insane laughter.

"He looks like Ichabod Crane," I choked.

"Got through," he said. "Apparently a good bit of south of Broad still has phone service. I think we're in the same grid as the hospitals, and their phones are up. I called Fairlie first, and then Charlie at the hospital. It could be worse, I guess."

We looked at him, breaths held.

"Bedon's Alley is pretty much okay. Fairlie didn't leave, but she said it was the most horrifying night she'd ever spent. Camilla stayed with her while Charlie was at the hospital. Tradd Street has some trees down, but their house kept its roof and the storm surge just missed it. Lila and Simms weren't quite so lucky. The Battery took a direct hit. But the house stood, even though there was about a foot of water in their downstairs, and they lost their windows. Lewis, I think you've got a mess on the Battery. Two live oaks through the roof, and the portico and veranda gone. I don't know any more than that."

"It's the historical society's problem now, not mine," Lewis said wearily. "What do you hear about Bull Street?"

"n.o.body Charlie knows has gotten over that way yet, but the College of Charleston is pretty much okay, and you're right there. They got the storm surge on the ground floors, but your house is set pretty far up. A few trees down. That's all I know..."

"The storm surge...," I said. I had never thought of that. I had always a.s.sumed that the great teeth of a hurricane would be wind.

"It went clear across the peninsula," Henry said. "Boats from the city marina are sitting on Lockwood Avenue. Low-lying streets are underwater. When it receded, the mud and debris left behind were unbelievable. I don't think any of us got that. But Lewis...Charlie thinks that maybe that bas.e.m.e.nt operating suite of yours flooded. Everything along Rutledge did."

I looked at Lewis. He looked off into the middle distance and then sighed.

"There go my insurance rates," he said. "Well, that's what it's for, I guess. What about Edisto? And Wadmalaw?"

"I don't know. Charlie said he's heard that the people over on the river side were safe, but the beach got blasted. You and Simms might be okay."

Finally, because no one else would say it, I did.

"What about the beach house?"

Henry looked down.

"I don't know. n.o.body does. The Ben Sawyer bridge is completely out and the National Guard is not letting anybody onto the islands. But Charlie said there were some aerial photos in the Post and Courier, and it looked...like there had never been houses there. Just gone. Bare beach, with the dunes flattened out. But he said he heard that there were a few houses that were completely untouched. There must have been some mini-tornadoes, to flatten one house and not the one next to it. People are getting over to the Isle of Palms on a ferry, but Sullivan's Island isn't letting anybody on yet."

He paused, and then said, "Fairlie said that Leroy came walking up to the house the next morning in tears, and said that the police made him leave our place at the last minute, but that he hadn't been able to find Gladys, and they wouldn't let him look. That's not so good. The place lies low."

"Oh, Henry," I said, the tears flooding back. Beautiful, foolish, loving Gladys. The best dove dog in the Low Country.

Lewis said, "I'm sorry, Henry. She could be fine, though."

"Sure she could," Henry said, and turned away from us. "If the b.a.s.t.a.r.ds would just let us go over there and check. I'm going when we get back. What are they going to do? Shoot me?"

"I'll go with you," Lewis said, in a roughened voice.

We went out of the waiting room then, and went down to rent a car and go home to Charleston.

We said little on the five-hour drive. There seemed to be nothing to say. The vivid, surreal past two weeks had no place where we were headed. And the place we were headed had no reality. What you are unable to imagine you cannot easily speak of.

It is warm, even hot, in the Southeast in September. Outside, no color had tinged the leaves; they seemed dusty and used looking. Truck traffic was steady and maddening. Inside the rental car, the air-conditioning labored mightily, was.h.i.+ng us in stale, frigid air. I felt desperate for sleep, but could not rest.

Henry drove the whole way. When Lewis or I tried to relieve him, he said, "I need something to concentrate on." So did we all, but we sensed that Henry needed it most. Gladys was a piece of his heart.

When we got within fifty miles of the Low Country, we began to see Hugo's stigmata. At first, it was simply fallen branches and the litter of leaves, and water standing in roadside ditches. Then the first fallen trees, pines with shallow roots, mostly. On the flat plain that bordered the coast, whole forests were down, leveled as if by a giant scythe. Fifteen miles out of Charleston we began to see collapsed houses, caved-in roofs, blasted windows. Wet furniture stood in yards. Many houses were open to the sky. Everywhere, trees were down across the secondary roads, though the interstate had been cleared. We saw no evidence of people. There were few cars; the ones we saw were mostly mangled.

We had come down Interstate 26. Long before it curved into East Bay, we could see that the devastation was past our imagining. When we finally made the turn toward East Bay, at seven o'clock in the evening, it was to see phalanxes of National Guardsmen stopping motorists, streets littered with branches and debris, power lines swinging crazily from downed poles, silent storefronts with their windows boarded, if they had windows at all. Many were roofless. The harbor warehouse facilities on our left were empty. Everything was silent.

There were no lights anywhere.

A young guardsman stopped us and looked into the car.

"What's your business here?" he said. "Curfew is in an hour."

Henry handed him the physician's identification that most doctors keep in their cars, and Lewis pulled his out, too. The young man studied them and then said, "Where will you be going?"

"Bedon's Alley," Henry said. The guardsman looked at his clipboard.

"You can go all the way down East Bay," he said. "It's been cleared. Watch out for Calhoun, though. It's flooded. Looks like there's lots of trees and debris blocking upper Tradd and Church Streets."

"What about Elliot?" Henry said.

The guardsman looked again.

"Seems to be open. But watch out. There's emergency vehicles all over the place, and they don't stop for intersections. Plus you've got a lot of gawkers wandering around."

We said nothing. Those gawkers were our friends and neighbors grieving for the mutilation of their city.

It was in a still, eerie green dusk that we turned onto Elliot Street, crept slowly through a couple of turns, and drove down Bedon's Alley to Henry and Fairlie's house. On the entire trip we did not hear a sound, or see a light. All windows seemed to be boarded. Leaves and branches were everywhere. As we pulled up to the huge old stucco pile that dominated the alley, a pungent smell reached us.

"Christ, that smells like barbecue," Lewis said. "Has somebody gone nuts?"

Henry pointed silently. Plumes of fragrant smoke were rising against the milky sky. They seemed to be coming from the back gardens of several of the houses. Through the iron gates we could see people milling around.

"I know," I said. It was the first thing I had been able to say since we turned onto East Bay. "They're all cooking their meat. None of the freezers would be working."

"It smells very festive," Henry said tightly.

"Well, why not cook it and share?" I said. "What else are you going to do with it? Feed it to the dogs?"

He did not reply, and I winced.

"Henry, I'm sorry."

He made a don't-mention-it motion with his hand and braked the car to a stop in front of his house. It, too, was boarded up and silent like the others, but in an instant the ma.s.sive old door was thrown open, and Fairlie whirled down the steps toward us. Henry unfolded himself from the driver's seat and took one long stride and gathered her into his arms. She buried her head in the hollow of his shoulder, and they stood that way for a long time. I could see the last of the sun turning the crown of her head to flame. She wore cutoffs and a halter and flip-flops. Even at seven-thirty, the car's thermometer had read ninety-two degrees. Behind them, on the top step of the house, Camilla stood, her face pale and tranquil, a little smile tugging at the corners of her curly mouth. She, too, was in shorts.

We got slowly out of the car, our limbs cramped, and felt the wet smack of the heat. It was no hotter than in Ciudad Real, I thought, but it was much, much wetter. And then I thought, How could I have thought of Ciudad Real in this moment?

Camilla pattered down the stairs and came to Lewis and me and put her arms around us. We stood silently, hugging. I could feel the lovely tensile strength of her long arms, the bird's ribs in her slender torso.

She pushed us a little away and looked at us.

"Thank G.o.d you're here," she said softly. "And thank G.o.d you didn't have to go through this."

Her coppery eyes were wet.

She turned then to Henry and Fairlie. They had broken apart and were looking up the block, at the tattered roofs and broken tree limbs. Camilla went silently to Henry and put her arms around him and pressed her face into his shoulder as Fairlie had done. She said nothing, nor did Henry. He just held her, smoothing back the strands of hair that were pasted to her forehead with sweat.

"It will be all right, Cam," Henry said presently, and she stepped back and smiled up at him. Tears stood on her cheeks.

"It will now," she said.

We sat for a long time in Fairlie and Henry's back garden. It was larger than most of Charleston's pocket gardens and comfortably littered with mismatched chairs and a round wrought-iron table and a hammock on a stand. It was also littered with palm fronds and drying leaves stripped from the live oaks that sheltered it, and branches, and even a couple of s.h.i.+ngles. Lewis and I had sat here many times before, in candlelight, with the Scrubs lounging contentedly around after one of Fairlie's amazingly awful cold-pasta suppers. Because it was so large, both house and garden had become an in-town rallying spot for the Scrubs. I loved the mossy, s.h.a.ggy old garden. It would never be on a tour.

This night, we sat in the light of a dozen guttering candles and a kerosene lantern. There was no light anywhere but that of other flickering candles along the alley, and the huge white moon that rode above the wounded rooftops. Even without electric lights, we could see quite clearly in the drenching moonlight.

"It's as if G.o.d or whoever is in charge of hurricanes is trying to make it up to us," Fairlie said. She shook her fist heavenward.

"No dice," she shouted.

We had eaten perfectly grilled beef tenderloin and the last of Fairlie's John's Island tomatoes, and had drunk quite a lot of burgundy, brought over by Simms, who had a wine cellar in his Battery bas.e.m.e.nt.

"Or did," he said wryly. "I found these floating in the bas.e.m.e.nt. There were a couple more on the first floor, sitting on the sofa. The former sofa, I should say. The surge left them there. There's a lot more if anybody wants to snorkel for it."

"I hate even thinking about your beautiful furniture," I said. "Most of it belonged to your grandparents, didn't it?"

"Tyrell and a couple of the guys from the plant and I got most of it upstairs," Simms said. "We boarded up the windows, too, but we might as well have used Kleenex. We're luckier than most of Charleston. I have a crew ready to get to work in the morning. We ought to be able to get back in there in a few days."

Lila and Simms were staying with Henry and Fairlie. We stayed, too, that first night. We had no idea if we could get onto Bull Street, and I was suddenly and totally exhausted. Even as we spoke of damages and changes and nevermores, I nodded off.

"Poor sweetie," Camilla said. "You've come a long way today, haven't you?"

Lewis brushed my chaotic hair back and said, "This time last night she was asleep in the best room in a Mexican ho' house. Had a TV, by G.o.d, and flowered sheets. Pretty fancy, even if it didn't do to think where those sheets had been."

Camilla laughed her rich, throaty laugh.

"I can't wait to hear about that. In fact, I can't wait to hear about the whole trip. Come on, Lewis. We need something to distract us."

"Another night, I promise," Lewis said. "There's something we need to do, and it may take a while."

"What on earth can you do with no lights and all this junk in the streets?" Lila said. In her lap, Sugar woke up and gave a peremptory treble bark. It was answered from somewhere in the top regions by deeper barks.

"Boy and Girl are staying with us, too," Fairlie said. "It's what we talked about out at the beach, isn't it? All of us together under one roof. Maybe we could just stay here."