I shouted again.
I thought I heard a response.
I bellowed louder.
Definitely voices responding. I thought I heard the creak of a door hinge. Dim light entered the room.
“Tom?” a voice called.
“Violet?” I couldn’t see to the doorway, but I thought I recognized her voice.
“Tom!”
“Get me out of here!” I yelled. I could see the water eddy and swirl. Pockets of filth spun by.
I heard sloshing. Cody came into view. He was holding on to Violet, who had a rope tied around her waist.
“I told you he was in here,” Violet said.
Cody said, “Wainwright Richardson told me you’d been moved. We’ve got to hurry.”
Violet wore hip-wader boots and a jacket zipped to her throat. Her hair was soaked.
“Thank you for coming,” I said.
Cody wore unbuckled knee-high boots. His pants were soaked to the crotch. A red-and-yellow-striped emergency jacket covered his uniform shirt. He fumbled with the key ring. Tried four different ones before the lock clicked.
“Hang on to Violet,” he said. “If the building goes while we’re in here, just hold on.”
He grabbed the rope and began walking hand over hand back the way they had come. I clutched the rope tightly and imitated his gestures. Violet came behind.
The doors to the front were open and I could see gray outdoor light. Chunks of raw sewage drifted by my legs in the water, which was now halfway up my thigh.
In the doorway I saw a boat with men in the same red-and-yellow-striped jackets as Cody. One of them had the other end of the rope tied around him while another held the throttle for the motor of the boat.
“Hurry!” a man in his fifties called. The building seemed to tilt around me.
Cody splashed through the counter door. I heard the building groan. The three of us pulled ourselves through the vile fluid.
Out the front door, I looked back for Violet.
“Go!” she ordered.
In the water outside, I could feel my feet beginning to be swept away by the torrent. The current sucked away my laceless shoes.
I clutched at the rope. Hands grabbed me and lifted me into the boat.
Cody, Violet, and I sat in the middle of a twelve-foot craft. As soon as we were in, the motor roared louder, and we pulled away from the building.
The jail slowly turned sideways, drifted in the current for a minute, collapsed on itself, and then was swept away.
I felt occasional raindrops on my head.
I looked around. The water was at the base of the courthouse. A cop car was covered by water up to its Mars lights. The water had reached the first-floor windows of the police station. I gazed back at the river itself as the boat neared the new bank. I saw swing sets, yard furniture, tires, and tree limbs swish past in the mud-dark water. The creek was at least fifty feet across by now. In one of the deeper parts the top of a truck was sweeping by, along with logs, branches, and whole trees, revolving and dipping in the flood.
We arrived ten feet from Della’s Bar-b-que, stepped out of the boat into water up to our knees, and were pulled to dry land by a number of hands.
Forty or fifty people stood on the bank. Four or five of them had video cameras recording the destruction.
“Thank you again,” I said to Violet and Cody.
He shrugged.
A kid about ten rushed up to me with a pair of knee-high boots. He clutched three other pairs in his left hand. “Here, mister,” he said. “We got these for everybody.”
I thanked him. He dashed off to his next person.
Violet said. “You probably saw me follow you. They refused to answer any of my questions. I went back and forth between the police station, the jail, and the hospital for hours. Scott and I placed about a million calls last night. So did your lawyer in Chicago and the one in Atlanta. It was impossible to get you out in the middle of the night. We couldn’t even get an answer about why they arrested you.”
We inched back from the edge as the water continued to rise.
Violet continued. “When I came back this time, there was no one in the jail and the keys were gone. The water was up to the doorway. I ran to the police station, but no one would listen. I finally found Cody and made him look.”
“Am I still under arrest?” I asked her.
“I don’t know. I didn’t ask.”
We turned to Cody.
Violet put her hand on his arm. “Richardson wanted him dead, and you know it. That’s murder.”
“Maybe he thought someone moved him.”
“Do you believe that?”
He shrugged.
A truck pulling a boat turned into the square from the dry end. It halted several feet from us and turned so that the boat slowly entered the water. One of the emergency workers in the cab yelled, “Come on, Cody! This is the last boat to be found. We’ve got to move on those folks north of town in the trailer park!”
Cody hesitated, looked around for assistance.
Violet said, “He can’t go anywhere. The town’s cut off. He can help load sandbags at the hospital. You know Richardson tried to kill him. Tom didn’t hurt anyone.”
“Let’s move, Cody! People are hurtin’ real bad.”
“We’ll get answers to these questions later,” Cody said, and hurried off.
A large snake slithered out of the water. One of the people standing near the edge grabbed a sandbag from a small pile and crushed the animal.
“Why aren’t they building a levee?” I asked.
“Not enough sandbags in the county,” Violet said. “They’ve never had a flood like this. Highest the water ever got before was up to the jail back last century. They’re keeping the sandbags to try and save the water treatment plant and the hospital and a few other places.”
“Can they evacuate Scott’s father?”
“The town’s cut off. Help can’t get in or out. The roads are completely flooded. They have an emergency helicopter from Macon. Don’t know how soon it could get here. When the storm lets up some more, it’ll be used for rescuing stranded people. No place can send more help. It’s awful for miles around.”
“Can we still get to the hospital?”
No one challenged my walking away, getting into Violet’s car, and driving off down the road.
“Rain seems to have let up,” I said.
“We’ve had at least fifteen inches. If it hadn’t been so dry in the first place, we’d probably all have floated away already. They evacuated as many people in town as they could overnight.”
“How long was I in jail?”
“About six hours. Water came faster than anybody imagined.”
“Will it overrun the whole town?”
“I hope not.”
About three hundred people clustered in the hospital parking lot. I saw Hiram, Shannon, Nathan, and Mary, along with Clara Thorton, Wainwright Richardson, and Al Holcomb.
Inside the hospital the lights were dim but still working. We took the stairs up. The air-conditioning was off, but the hospital was not yet uncomfortable.
Scott was in the hall with his mom.
He hurried to me. “You smell awful,” he said. He embraced me tightly. “How’d you get out?”
I told him the story of my incarceration and rescue. When I finished, I got another fierce hug. Then he asked, “Are you still under arrest?”
“Everybody’s too busy with the flood to notice me right now. How’s your dad? Are they going to move him?”
“The emergency generator can hold out for several days. They don’t want to move him if they don’t have to.”
I looked at his mother. “Can you get back to the farm?”
Scott said, “We don’t know if the road is still open or not. I made it last night and I got you a change of clothes. The farm is on a rise in the forest, and there’s only a little fishing crick at the far end of the place.”
Violet said, “I’
m not sure they could spare anybody to try and make it back to the farm now. And if something went wrong and she had to evacuate, help would be too far away.”
“I’m going to make sure there’s space here,” Scott said. “I don’t want her in some shelter if I can help it.”
“We may all be in one before this is over,” Violet said.
“I’ll be fine,” Mrs. Carpenter said.
A woman came around a corner and hurried toward us. Her name badge identified her as a hospital administrator. She said, “They’re starting to sandbag on the west side of the hospital. We need all the help we can get.”
Mrs. Carpenter said she could take care of herself and her husband. I changed into the clothes Scott had brought me, and Violet, Scott, and I hurried down the stairs.
The west side of the hospital was the farthest away from where I’d found the sheriff’s body. Bags, sand, earth-moving equipment, and hundreds of people worked purposefully. In the middle of a group of men stood Clara Thorton, making decisions and giving orders.
Because of his groin injury, Scott was assigned to the less strenuous jobs.
The creek ran along a small parkway on this side. All the houses and businesses on the far side of the creek were under water. Because of the slope, the water had been forced away from the hospital. Now, however, the water was rising toward us. The barrier we had to create was at least four hundred feet long. I joined a line of people passing sandbags to the new levee.
All of us worked with the mindless enthusiasm of those with a purpose and a chance to be heroic. We might be saving a few buildings in an insignificant town, but these were people’s homes, the hospital, and the businesses that people lived in, worked in, and cared about.
At noon, word passed among the workers that the water filtration plant was safe for now. As a precaution some were given duty to fill every possible container with water. No one could predict if the water plant would last, and every drop was precious.
At one, word spread that the ten-foot levee we were building wasn’t enough; another five feet were necessary, if not more. Weariness gave way to total aching and beyond. You wanted to take a break, but it was impossible. Someone had thought to salvage all the bottled water and soft drinks from the grocery store before it was inundated. We drank sparingly.
At two, the rain stopped altogether. By two-thirty the sky was bright blue. People cheered the first rays of the sun. By four o’clock we wished for any kind of cover from the painful brightness. The heat rose and the stench increased.
At one point I found myself on top of the levee. They’d had to extend it on both ends by two hundred feet. Slowly the ends had begun to turn on themselves. Eventually I thought we might totally encircle the hospital. There was a ten-foot ridge running several hundred feet along the east side of the hospital. Each end could meet that if we had to. If the water overtopped the ridge, we were all going to have to be rescued by boats.
I flung down sandbags upon sandbags. The water was six feet below where I was standing. I looked out over the rushing water.
Up and down the line people were stopping and staring, and I followed their gaze. I saw a man sitting in a tree, holding a German shepherd in his arms. We watched the drama unfold. The water was three feet from his legs. Firefighters on a hook-and-ladder truck were trying to reach him.
The fire truck was on a slight rise in the front yard of the last house about to be inundated, about two hundred feet from the far right of the levee. The way out was still clear of water. They extended the ladder as far as it would go. It was five feet short of the man. The water was still rising rapidly, so the truck could go no farther into the water, and would have to move back itself if it and its rescuers couldn’t save him in the next few minutes.
I saw men speaking into portable phones and walkie-talkies. I assumed any boats nearby were already in use making other rescues. None appeared on the horizon. If the man was going to be saved, this was his last chance.
The fireman at the far end of the ladder threw him a rope. The man in the tree tied the end around his dog and shoved the animal into the water. The man stepped farther up into the tree. The branches swayed. He could go no higher up. The firemen pulled the dog to safety.
Again the rope was thrown. It fell short. The water reached the front wheels of the fire truck. A third time and the man caught the end of the rope. He tied it around his waist and hung on to the end. The fire truck pulled away, taking man and beast with them out of harm’s way.
We cheered and returned to work.
At six o’clock, as they had at noon, people gave out sandwiches and cans of pop. We could drink half the can and were given a plastic cup with which to share our bounty with a neighbor. For this feast I found myself next to an African-American woman in her early twenties. We smiled at each other as we savored our food and brief respite.
I bumped into Shannon and Hiram Carpenter about half an hour after this. He aimed a nearly full sandbag at my foot. I yanked it out of the way. Shannon sneered. Hiram glared at me, muttered “Fuck you,” and walked away.
All that day none of the other workers had chosen to respond, positively or negatively, to my presence. Plenty of time for hate after the flood.
By the time night fell, one road still led out of the parking lot and connected us to the rest of the town. A report came that five feet of water was swirling through the courthouse. A helicopter flew over.
We had a snake, alligator, and verminous critter patrol set up. Sightings had been made of all of the above. Plus there was a fear of rabid animals.
The water still rose, but at a slower rate. Three shifts of workers were set up to alternate work during the night.
Scott and I stood on the top of the levee and watched the full moon rise. The dark turned to soft gray, and silvery patterns flickered on the water. Stars shone brightly and reflected in the surface of the rushing torrent.
“Is the farm okay?”
“I don’t know. I’d hate to see the house gone. We should be okay, but I’m not sure about Nathan’s and Hiram’s places. I haven’t seen them to talk to them.”
“How is Violet?”
“I think she left just before sunset to check on the library. The books should be safe. She was concerned about the building itself.”
“What did the lawyers say last night when you and Violet called them?”
“Todd had it all lined up to get tons of media coverage down here. Some of the networks, the New York Times, the Washington Post, and he didn’t know who all else, were on their way. I’m sure they’re covering the flood now.”
“And they have no way of getting into town anyway. Outside help isn’t going to be concerned about saving my butt while most of the countryside is trying to float to the Gulf.”
While Scott went to look in on his mom and dad, I tried to locate Cody to check on my official status. I couldn’t find any officials to talk to. The boots I had been given were clunky and uncomfortable, but every bone in my body hurt, so sore feet were hardly noticeable.
Violet found me at the entrance to the hospital.
“Library okay?” I asked.
“Water’s at least seven feet deep. Building is probably ruined. Thank God the books, computers, and files are safe.”
Hospital workers passed out blankets for those of us sleeping on the floor in the hallway or outside. Most everybody chose to sleep under the stars. The halls had begun to smell of sweat and lack of deodorant. Outdoors we had the smell of flood, but the air wasn’t as close. A group of nine- and ten-year-olds walked around with spray cans of mosquito repellent.
Scott reported that his father rested peacefully. His mother was napping on a couch upstairs with his sisters on guard. He hadn’t seen his brothers.
Violet, Scott, and I found a patch of ground to sleep on. All the cars in the parking lot were filled with kids bedded down on front and backseats. Trunks were open with infants placed carefully inside.
I hoped it wouldn’t start
to rain. We’d all have to cram ourselves into the hospital. A road was still open to the high school, but reports said it was already filled to capacity with refugees.
I still had no watch or identification, all lost in the destruction of the jail.
The cement of the parking lot gave not an inch in my attempts to find a comfortable position and fall asleep. Violet and Scott began reminiscing. I’d thought of making sure I lay between them, and then I thought I’d better grow up and get a life. I listened to them talk softly of warm nights like these in summers long past, of whispered secrets that now seemed remote and comfortable. They spoke of teenage tragedies, couples who broke up, people they wish they still knew, people they were glad they hadn’t seen in years and hoped never to see again.
The moon was almost directly overhead. The gray light was enough to show one crew working at the far end of the levee closest to the ridge. Another team was filling sandbags near the center where we had started that morning. Watchers walked the top of the levee.
I lay on my back and gazed at the stars. Scott and Violet talked about the time they were king and queen of the senior prom.
“I was so proud to walk down the center of the gym with you,” Scott said. “I was just terrified that you’d expect something later.”
Violet laughed. “You don’t know how desperately I wanted something later.”
They both chuckled.
Someone shouted from the far side of the parking lot. In seconds people were up and running toward the levee. Water rushed through a three-foot gap in the dike. Every second it grew wider. People raced to help. Lines formed quickly. Sandbags flew. I found myself between a hunky teenager and a woman in her fifties with enormous breasts and huge arms. They handed us sandbags from our right, and from our left water poured onto us. The woman, the teenager, and I competed with at least forty other hands slinging bags of sand into the breech. Water sluiced around us.
Someone shouted, “Move back, it’s going to go! Run!”
I whirled my head around. No one around me retreated. The water was up to my waist. People on top of the dike hurled sandbags from the sides. Twenty of us were right at the opening. I turned for another bag and something bumped into my left hand.
Rust on the Razor Page 18
