“I guess so, but I hate it. I want some clean clothes, but all I have is what I wore when we got off the ship.”
“Maybe we can figure out how to bathe later on.”
“Thanks. That would be nice.”
“Won’t you have a little something to eat before going to work?”
“Yes, I guess I’d better. I guess bacon.”
“There is bread and butter and jelly here. And I know there are eggs, but I don’t know that I can handle cooking both eggs and bacon at the same time.”
“Bread and butter and jelly to go with my bacon and coffee then, thanks.”
Maria produced a loaf of bread, a tub of butter, a jar of mango preserves and a knife. They ate together for a few moments in silence.
“I guess I’ll have a refill on coffee and go see how the sick folks are doing.” With her refilled cup in hand, Julia walked away in the direction she had pointed toward the tents where the ill were housed. Maria went back to sorting and storing food.
In a few moments, Valerie joined her, rumpled nightgown, unkempt hair and strained expression testifying to the fact that she, like Paul, had stayed awake.
“How are our patients?”
“About as expected. Roger and George are almost catatonic and neither has slept. Jim slept well and doesn’t seem to have developed any significant symptoms of botulism. The Kirkpatricks have stopped vomiting and having diarrhea, but both of them are having some early nerve effects of the botulism.”
“Oh, no!”
“Yes. One can hope, but I fear the outlook is not good.”
“I’m so sorry.”
“There isn’t much we can do.”
“Would you like coffee? Bread, butter, jelly? Bacon?”
“Yes. All of that. Do we have cream and sugar? I suppose I could get used to black coffee. I’d rather cream and sugar.”
Maria poured the coffee and produced cream and sugar. She put more bacon on to fry and offered Valerie some of the cooked strips, showing her the bread, butter and preserves. Valerie looked haunted and exhausted; food seemed to do a lot to restore her.
“It’s a pretty simple breakfast but it sure is good. Thanks.”
“You’re welcome. I’ve been sorting through the food. I think we’ll eat pretty well for a couple days, but there are a lot of perishables that won’t last at all well in the heat. In a couple days it will be beans and rice and canned goods.”
“You and Doc are so calm and organized. How do you do it?”
“I don’t know. There are things that need to be done. You do them. Isn’t that what you have been doing?”
“Yes, but until the two of you took over, I could feel myself beginning to panic. I don’t know what I might have done.”
“I’m sure you would have been fine.”
“Don’t bet on it.”
“Well, we never have to find out.”
“Good thing.”
“You probably ought to get some sleep.”
“I think I will.” She wandered off to one of the tarp lean-tos and disappeared.
Maria returned to organizing food. She piled the cans into piles of soup, vegetables, fruits and meats. There were a lot of cans. The supplies had been intended to last for 30 passengers, the captain and a crew of 7 for another 8 days or so; there were only 16 of them now. But how long would they be here? Surely someone would come looking for them.
She located the box of utensils she had assembled in the galley, throwing knives, spatulas, small pots and pans and flatware all together in a box. She pulled things out and tried to decide what to do with the individual items. She wished for a table. She looked around for something that would do as one, and didn’t find anything. But she did find that some wire coat hangers had somehow been tossed into one of the boxes. She put her muscles to work and soon had bent them into hangers so that she had pots hanging on them from a beam of the tent. And there were loose ends enough to hang up spatulas and large spoons.
She looked at her watch, realizing that she had not looked at it before. It was 8:14. It seemed to her she had been up for hours. She looked again at her organizational handiwork and was pleased with it. She poured another cup of coffee and looked around to see Michelle emerging from the lean-to into which Valerie had disappeared. Michelle was dressed oddly. Maria clearly remembered everyone being in sleeping clothes last night except Michelle, who had managed the time to get dressed in a dress. That dress was now rumpled from having been slept in, and her hair was even more unkempt than Valerie’s. Maria wondered if she didn’t look just as untidy.
“Good morning, Michelle.”
“Mornin’.”
“Sleep well?”
“No. the ground is too hard. We should’ve brought mattresses.”
“We couldn’t bring everything.”
“No, I suppose not.”
“Coffee?”
“Yes, please.”
“I’ve got bacon, bread and jam.”
“That sounds really good.” She accepted the food offered and began to eat. “Val woke me. Says I should help.”
“Oh.”
“Anyone else awake?”
“Yes. Julia went to help with the sick folks. I think she relieved Valerie.”
“Well, Val’s asleep now. She woke me up, told me to help, lay down and was asleep before I could get up.”
“I imagine she’s pretty exhausted.”
“Yup. How’s Doc this morning? I heard he had to swim out of the ship. He was pretty tired too, I guess.”
“Yes. I’ve never seen him so drained. He’s sleeping.”
“Good for him. I must have tossed and turned a lot. Suppose I slept, but I’m not sure.”
“Well, coffee and a little food will help.”
“Yup. I think I’d better be done and go help Julia.” She accepted a refill of coffee and walked off in the same direction that Julia had gone.
Maria went back to her organizing. In another box, she found plates and bowls and cups. As she removed them, she came to a laptop computer, and suddenly remembered taking it from her stateroom and shoving it into a box in the middle of the night. There had to have been a reason in her mind at the time, but she had no idea what it might have been – but what she had now was a means of keeping a journal of the events that had and would transpire. She got it out and turned it on. It had a full charge on the battery, which was good. It would run for several hours before running out of battery, and she ought to be able to record events to date pretty quickly and keep a daily journal.
She sat down on the box and began to type.
James awoke to find himself in a strange bed, disoriented, haunted by a very strange dream he had had of a shipwreck and many people dying of botulism. Opening his eyes to look around, he noticed blankets, sand and sun, his bathrobe hanging on a stick, palm trees. His brain began to focus. It had not been a dream. Panic seized him. Where was Maria?
Crawling from the blanket into his bathrobe, standing, looking around, he looked at the same vista Maria had seen earlier – a number of lean-to shelters, some made of tarpaulins, others of overturned life rafts. Farther down the beach, a large tarpaulin was providing shade to several people in it, a fire, and maybe food. His concern about Maria and his hunger competed. Both might be resolved at the larger tent, so he went there.
“Hi, Doc.” The voice of Ron Haskell was clear and friendly – but also with the hint of formality in the titling. James was having his dream confirmed for him. “Sleep well?”
“Actually, I guess I must have rested, but I doubt anyone slept very well.” His eyes scanned the group – Ron, wearing sweat pants and a tee shirt, Ralph Carney wearing a bathrobe over his pajamas, Mark Winters wearing short sleeved, short legged pajamas, and, rising to come to him, Maria in her bathrobe, looking healthy if tired and in somewhat of a disarray. “My dear, are you OK?”
“Yes, my love, I’m OK. And I am glad you are finally awake. We need to do some
work to consolidate our position here. I think we need to improve our fire pit and lay in a supply of firewood for it.”
“How is our food and water supply?”
“We have water for drinking but not for bathing or washing dishes. We have much of the food from the ship, but there is a substantial amount of it that will go bad before we can eat it.”
“Well, as I recollect, the priorities were water, shelter and food. You seem to have done very well.”
“With the help of the gentlemen, we did. We even found some snorkeling equipment.”
“I wonder how long we will be here.”
“If it is going to be more than 24 hours, we have some chores to do to support the kitchen. And I suspect many of us will want to eat.”
“Speaking of which, is there any food available? I’m hungry.”
Bread, butter, jam, coffee and bacon appeared before him, an effort in which Maria apparently played no part.
“Paul is missing from this group – where is he?”
“Sleeping. He was still awake, tending the fire and making coffee and bacon when I woke up about three hours ago.”
“Ron, do you know how Jim is doing?”
“No.”
“I had better wolf down some of this food and go see.”
“Dear, we still need to organize for the day.”
“Yes. Well, I think the three of you ought to stick together. The first priority is improvement of the fire pit. Maria, what do you need?”
“First, containment. Second, enough structure to be able to cook on.”
“That sounds like rocks to me. I hope the whole island isn’t sand. Guys, see what you can do.” He finished his second slice of bread with jam, polished off his sixth strip of bacon, passed his coffee cup for refill. “I will go see to the casualties.”
Ron, Ralph and Mark started around the island counterclockwise to scout out rocks and to look for likely sources of firewood. James asked Maria if she knew which tents housed the invalids and walked away following her pointed finger.
Maria watched him walk away, shook her head and turned back to the computer. A few moments later, Marcella appeared at her side, dressed in a long nightgown.
“Bonjour Maria.”
“Good morning, Marcella. Are you hungry? There is bacon, bread, butter, jam and coffee.”
“They smell very good. I will eat.” She ate in silence for a few moments, then approached Maria again.
“Maria, one cooks. Mrs. Thorpe never permitted me to cook because she hired her own cook, but at home, I spent my childhood cooking over a wood fire. That is what our stove was. It would please me to help with cooking and managing the kitchen.”
“Thanks. Let’s go over what is here.”
Together, they went over again the supplies that Maria had organized earlier. At the end of the inventory, Marcella agreed that they should eat the perishables first – which probably meant leaving the bacon for later. She said she would start making preparations for lunch.
“Do you need any help?”
“No, thank you.”
Maria shut down her computer and walked after James.
Marcella began preparing fresh ingredients for a thick soup, using many of the fresh vegetables that would spoil first, and chicken from one of the cooler chests. There was a large pot available, which she placed on coals at one edge of the fire. A frying pan and butter gave her what she needed to sauté vegetables and sear the chicken. It did not take her long to have the soup beginning to bubble by the fire.
Lunch
Maria found James looking in on the Kirkpatricks. James was talking quietly with Lord Richard, who was alert and responsive. Lady Richard was apparently asleep. As Valerie had described them, Lord Richard was calmer and quieter now, but showing some of the facial weakness, and mouth drooping that had characterized the progression of the botulism in the others. Maria felt physically ill at the thought that there might still be more victims.
James moved on to check on Jim, who was in the next tent. Jim thought his nausea was less. He had not vomited at any point. As James examined him, he could find no neurologic signs of botulism; though Jim was sure he was having occasional double vision, on examination, his eyes tracked together normally. They talked. James indicated that Ron was out helping scour the island for firewood, but that he would ask Ron to visit when he came back. Jim seemed relieved by this reassurance, but was still anxious about dying of botulism. James reassured him that not everyone who gets botulism dies of it, and that Jim had a very mild case of it at worst, and the prognosis seemed good.
Maria had stayed behind to talk some with Michelle, who had been sitting with Lord and Lady Richard. Michelle was pretty clueless about what to do, but was good hearted and well meaning, so was easy to instruct in the basics of bedside care for the patient who is near death. It appeared that she had actually been doing a better job than she had thought.
James had moved on to George Fuller, who had not slept, and was continually repeating the phrase: “It’s all my fault.”
James sat with him for some time, trying to disabuse him of this notion. It had not been his fault that the botulism had happened. Running into the reef was a risk of running at night in unfamiliar waters without adequate navigational assistance. And Joan had been dead before they hit the reef anyway, so it had not made any difference in Joan’s outcome. George was not listening very well, but the contradiction to “It’s all my fault” was apparently heard, for he stopped saying that and lapsed into a stupor.
James moved on to Roger Applebee. Roger was curled up into fetal position, rocking back and forth, crying. James sat with him, putting a hand on his shoulder. Slowly, the crying came to a halt, then the rocking stopped. In about ten minutes, Roger was snoring lightly.
James rose, spotted Maria, walked to her. “What a lot we have here, my dear.”
“Yes?”
“Yes. The Kirkpatricks are both in grave danger. If their symptoms continue to progress, we are in danger of losing both of them. Jim, on the other hand, has no apparent signs of botulism and is convinced he is going to die. George is sure it is his fault and Roger can do no better than grieve. I think Roger has the best prognosis of the group.”
“Goodness.”
“When did Valerie go to bed?”
“About seven. It’s now eleven.”
“I’ll let her sleep a bit longer. Paul too. Have you seen any of the others, Marcella, Jeanne and Julia?”
“Yes. Marcella has volunteered to cook. I left her beginning something for lunch. I think we will be eating French cooking for a while. Julia came to help several hours ago. I suspect she is still around somewhere. Jeanne I have not seen. I’ll check on them.”
“Good. I will go the opposite way around the island from the other men and look for rocks and fire fuel. I should be back inside of an hour.”
They shared a hug and a kiss, then James turned off in his direction and Maria went to find Julia, who was sitting with George Fuller, having disappeared when James came in order to avoid the embarrassment of being seen in such a state of disarray.
Jeanne was still sleeping, but was up and alert as soon as Maria said her name. Yes, she was hungry. She had been up half the night attending George and Roger, but Valerie had eventually sent her off to bed. She was adequately rested. How was Ralph? Reassured that Ralph was fine, Jeanne agreed to help Marcella and Maria in planning improvements to the fire pit.
Ralph and Ron came with hunks of lava rock from the interior of the island. The rocks were not terribly heavy though they were large and difficult to carry. They had left Mark, complaining of his knees, collecting smaller rocks that they would all bring back together. Maria sent Ron to visit with Jim. Ralph, Jeanne and Maria worked to get the rocks into good position for Marcella’s cooking area. More work would be needed, but Marcella was clearly pleased that she might have some control over how much heat was applied to a pot by choosing where t
o put it.
Ron returned from his visit with Jim as Marcella was giving final approval to the current arrangement of the rocks and talking about what shapes and sizes would do best for the completion of the job. Ron and Ralph set out to bring Mark and another load of rocks. A few moments later, James appeared, carrying several medium sized pieces of driftwood to be food for the fire. Smelling Marcella’s creation for lunch, he indicated that they needed to gather everyone for lunch in about half an hour.
Ron, Mark and Ralph returned with armloads of rocks for the fine-tuning of the fireplace, but Marcella indicated that their placement should wait until after lunch. Jeanne went to waken Valerie; James went to awaken Paul. Except the ill and invalid, everyone but Julia was present at lunch.
Stormy Destination Page 2
