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
It 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.
We watched as Gator shook the folds out of a blue tarp and held it over one of the shuttered windows while a staffer secured the tarp to the wall with generous lengths of duct tape. One done, they moved on to the next window. Taking it down would be hell on the wallpaper, I thought.
‘What’s Gator done with Justice?’ I asked. ‘I thought pets weren’t allowed in shelters.’
Molly chuckled. ‘Everybody breaks that rule.’ She pointed. ‘Justice is under the table. You can just see his nose.’
‘I thought there’d be more refugees by now.’
‘There’s hours to go yet,’ Molly said. ‘But we’ve got some powerboaters in the corner over there. They put blankets down to reserve the spot, then went off to get their stuff together.’ She grinned. ‘I hope it’s beer. Ever been confined with a bunch of stink potters when the liquor runs out?’