"How kind of you," he replied.
"I know there's some pieces of furniture there that were brought over from Vienna by your mother."
"I don't have any sentimental attachments to that stuff," Garrison said.
"There's nothing wrong with a little sentiment now and again," Loretta replied.
"I haven't noticed much of it from you."
"I do my grieving in private."
- "Well you'll have all the privacy you want when he's buried," Garrison remarked. "I'm surprised you're selling the Washington place. Where are you going to live?"
"I'm not planning to quietly fade away, if that's what you're hoping," Loretta replied. "I've got a lot of responsibilities."
"Don't worry about all that," Garrison said. "You deserve a rest."
"I'm not worried," Loretta said flatly. "In fact, I'm looking forward to getting a better handle on things. I let a lot of details slip in the last few months." Garrison gave her a tight little smile. "Goodnight, Garrison." She pecked him on the cheek. "You should get some sleep, by the way," she said as she departed. "You look worse than Mitchell did."
It was only when Garrison was back at the Tower, and sitting in the chair where he now preferred to sleep (his bed made him feel uneasy, for some reason) that he thought again of the Washington house, and of Loretta's suggestion that he look for some keepsake there. As he'd said, he'd had no great desire to have anything from the house, but if it and its contents were indeed to be auctioned off then he would have to find a day in his schedule to go down and walk around. He'd had happy times there, as a child: in the dog days of summer, playing under the sycamores at the back of the house, where the shadows were cool and blue; Christmases when the place had been warm and welcoming, and he'd felt, if only for a few hours, part of the family. Such feelings of belonging had never lasted very long; he'd always in the end felt himself an outsider. He'd had years of analysis trying to untangle the reasons, but he'd never come close to understanding why. What an utter waste of time that had been: sitting hour after hour with those stale-headed men examining his navel fluff, looking for some clue as to why he felt like a stranger to himself. He knew now of course; now that he could see himself clearly. He didn't belong in that nest because he was another order of being.
It put him in a fine, dreamy mood reflecting on that; and he slipped into sleep sitting in the chair, and did not move until the first sirens of the new day woke him.
The storm lasted well into the night coming ashore as predicted along the southeast coast of the island. The chief town to suffer was Poi'pu, but a number of smaller communities in the area were also badly struck. There was some flooding, and a bridge outside Kalaheo was washed away; so were some small huts. By the time the wind carried the storm clouds off into the interior of the island-where they hung over the mountains for the rest of the night, slowly dissipating-there had been three more fatalities to add to those lives lost at sea.
Rachel didn't retire to bed until after one; she sat up listening to the roar of the wind-filled trees around the house, the palms bending so low that their fronds scraped the roof like long-nailed fingers. She had loved rainstorms as a child-they'd always seemed cleansing to her-and this storm was no exception. She liked its din, its violence, its showmanship. Even when the power failed, leaving her to sit by the light of a couple of candles, she was still quite happy. She had only one regret: that she didn't still have Holt's journal. What a perfect time and place this would have been to be reading the last section of the book. She would never see it again, she assumed: now it was in Mitchell or Garrison's hands, and the chances of her reclaiming it were slim. No matter. She'd find out from Galilee what had happened to Holt. Maybe he'd turn it into a story for her; hold her in his arms and tell her how Nickelberry and the captain and himself had fared together. There wouldn't be a happy conclusion, she guessed, but right now, listening to the downpour lashing against the windows, she didn't much care. It wasn't a night for happy endings: it was a night for the dark to have its way. Tomorrow, when the clouds had cleared and the sun was up, she'd be pleased to hear about miraculous rescues and prayers answered. But right now, in the roaring, pelting heart of the night, she wanted Galilee there to tell her how death had come to Captain Holt, and how the ghost of his child-yes! surely the child came back-had stood at the bottom of his deathbed and called him away, just as he'd called Holt's horse. Beckoned to his father from beyond the grave and escorted him into the hereafter.
The candle flickered a little; and she shuddered. She'd actually succeeded in spooking herself. She picked the candle up and carried it through to the kitchen, setting it down beside the stove while she refilled the kettle. There was a scuttling in the shadowy roof above her head, and she looked up to see a large gecko-the largest she'd seen either in or around the house-scuttling across the wooden slats of the ceiling. It seemed to sense her gaze, because it froze in its tracks and remained frozen until she looked away. Only then did she hear its scrabblings resume. When she looked up again it had gone.
She went back to refilling the kettle, but in the time it had taken her to look up and see the gecko her desire for tea had disappeared. She put the kettle back on the stove, unfilled, and picking up the candle, she went to bed. She started to undress, but only got as far as taking off her sandals and jeans. Then she slipped under the covers, and fell asleep to the accompaniment of the rain.
She was woken by an impatient rapping on the bedroom door. Then a voice, calling to her: "Rachel? Are you in there?"
She sat up, the dream she'd woken from-something about Boston, and diamonds buried in the snow on New-bury Street-lingering for a moment. "Who is it?"
"It's Niolopua. Nobody answered the front door so I came in."
"Is there a problem?" She looked out of the window. It was day; the sky was a brilliant blue.
"You have to get up," Niolopua said, his voice urgent. "There's been a wreck. And I think maybe it's his boat."
She got up out of bed, and wandered across the room, still not fully comprehending what she was being told. There was Niolopua, spattered with red-brown mud. "The Samarkand," he said to her. "Galilee's boat. It's been washed up on the beach." She looked back toward the window. "Not here," Niolopua went on. "Down at the other end of the island. On the Napali coast."
"Are you sure it's his?"
Niolopua nodded. "As sure as I can be," he said.
Her heart was suddenly racing.
"And him? What about him?"
"There's no sign of him," Niolopua said. "At least there wasn't an hour ago, when I was down there."
"Let me just get some clothes on," she said. "And I'll be with you."
"Have you got any boots?" he said.
"No. Why?"
"Because it's hard to get to where we're going. You have to climb."
"I'll climb," she said, "boots or no boots."
The effects of the storm were to be seen everywhere. The highway south was still awash with bright orange runoff water, the heavier streams of which carried a freight of debris: branches, boards, drowned poultry, even a few small trees. Thankfully, there were very few other vehicles on the road at this early hour-it was still only seven-and Niolopua negotiated both streams and debris with confidence.
While he drove he offered Rachel a short explanation of where they were going. The Napali coast was the most dangerous and beautiful portion of the island, he explained. Here the cliffs rose out of the sea, the beaches and caves at their feet hard to reach except from the sea. Rachel was familiar with images of the coast from a brochure she'd glanced at on the short flight from Honolulu: one of the most popular tourist trips was a helicopter flight over the cliffs, and the narrow, lush valleys between the cliffs, which could only be reached by those foolhardy enough to trek down from the summits. There were rewards for those who dared such journeys-waterfalls of spectacular scale, and dense, virgin jungle-but the trip wasn't to be taken lightly. According to local legend some of the valleys were so hard to reach that until recent times small communities had existed there, completely isolated from the rest of the island.