Ashes (15 page)

"You ever go back?" I asked. "To have a look
around, to walk through the houses that your folks used to live
in?"

He studied the swirling foam and shook his
head. "Nope. The past is best left dead and buried. You'd be wise
to remember that."

I took my baggage from him, and I thought he
might at least help me carry it to dry land. But he didn't move
from the helm.

"You'll meet me here at four o'clock on
Friday?" I asked.

He nodded, avoiding my eyes. "Unless a
hurricane blows up, I'll be here."

"I trust the check came through okay?" I knew
that publishers' checks could sometimes be excruciatingly slow in
arriving, and I didn't want my ticket back to the mainland to be
voided. This man was my only link with civilization, unless I
somehow gained access to the short-wave radios.

"The money's good," he said. "I reckon that's
the only reason you're doing this."

"That, plus I'm curious," I said. "There's
not many places where a person can get lost in time anymore."

"Just make sure you don't get too lost," he
said. "See you on Friday. Be sure and stay out of the houses, and
for the Good Lord's sake, don't go in the graveyards."

He untied and shoved away, then turned the
rudder until his back was to me. I waved, but he didn't turn
around. The boat was out of sight by the time I had wrestled my
bags up to the sandy hills that protected the island from the worst
of the wind.

As I crested the dunes, the dead homes of
Portsmouth lay sprawled before me. They were as gray-white as the
ground, the paint flaked from the Colonial-style houses by decades
of natural sand-blasting. The houses were hundreds of feet apart,
all perched several feet off the ground by concrete or brick piers.
A few water oaks and scrubby jack pines filled the expansive gaps
between the structures. I set down my bags on the first porch I
came to, at a three-story home that was the tallest on the
island.

I didn't believe the boatman that the island
was completely lifeless. Even if the ranger stations were
abandoned, surely a few campers or day-tripping sailors were on the
island. I didn't think my equipment would be stolen, but my laptop
was worth several thousand dollars. And if my food supplies were
stolen, I couldn't walk around the corner to a convenience store
and replenish them.

Despite the boatman's warning, I entered the
house, the old dark pine boards groaning under my feet. The shade
was a relief from the August sun, and the narrow windows broke the
breeze until it was comforting instead of brutal. The several rooms
on the bottom floor were empty. I found the stairs to the left of
the parlor and climbed the well-dried treads. On the second floor,
I found a couple of old chairs, one a rocker. I then explored the
third floor, which was barely more than a gabled attic. The view
was spectacular from the lone window, and I could see most of the
town as well as both the lee and Atlantic shores, since the island
was scarcely a mile wide. The window also had a small ledge
suitable for typing. I determined to make the room my headquarters
for the brief duration of my visit.

Under park rules, visitors could tour the
homes but were forbidden to stay in them. I was usually scrupulous
about such matters, but if even the rangers had left this place to
the elements, then I rationalized my squatter's rights by the fact
that I myself was a natural force. Besides, after my article came
out, perhaps renewed interest in the place could generate some
users' fees for the National Park Service. Good publicity never
hurt come budget time.

The sun was sliding rapidly behind the sea to
the west. I stuck my supplies in a dark doorless closet, carried
the rocker up to the room, and sat before the window to rest.
Looking down, I imagined the town as it must have been a
hundred-and-fifty years ago, with a bustling trade down by the
shore, children running through the rutted sandy streets, women in
long dresses going about their business. Perhaps a horse or two,
certainly no more, had plodded along pulling carts laden with
shipping goods, kegs of water, thick coils of rope, and sacks of
meal or flour. I could almost hear the sailors' cries and shanties
as they loaded and unloaded their longboats.

Behind an old drooping oak to the north lay a
gated cemetery. Some of the markers had fallen over, and the few
angels and crosses that still stood against the wind were pitted
and worn. I thought of the boatman's words, how the cemeteries
should be avoided. But nothing wrote out the history of a place
better than the names and dates of its dead, and I knew I could not
resist visiting them.

I may have dozed, though I rarely slept
before the sun did. The next thing I knew, I was walking in the
cemetery, feet bare against the wiry grass. The sky was a deep
azure, moving toward a nearly starless twilight. The sea breeze
moaned between the marble markers, the air tasting of salt and
seaweed and driftwood.

She arose from nowhere, as pale as the sand.
Dark hair spilled across her pretty face, and her eyes were in
black contrast to her skin. Her dress was Victorian-era,
long-sleeved and elegantly white, the waistband high, the shoulders
and hems sewn with lace. She came forward from the shadows and held
out her hands.

She was young, probably eighteen, though her
hair was not at all of modern fashion. For a moment, I thought she
and some of her friends might be having a costume party on the
shore, gathered round the bonfire with guitars and wine and
laughter before coupling off for sandy sex. But her expression was
far too serious for a beach party refugee's.

"Please, sir, there's a wreck in the bay,"
she said, her voice tremulous but strong. "Can you help?"

"Pardon me?" I said.

"They're out there," she
said, waving a wild hand to the east. "The
Walker Montgomery
ran aground, forty
hands on her, sir. Our men shoved off in the boats, but now I fear
they, too, have found trouble. They have been gone so long, sir, so
very long."

Her eyes brimmed moistly in the glimmer of
the sallow moon. I shook my head, sure someone was playing a prank
on me. They must have seen me and taken advantage of the isolation
at my expense. I fully expected her companions to emerge from the
darkness, laughing boisterously, then inviting me for drinks.

But her eyes stared,
beautifully haunted eyes, eyes that bore into me like harpoons. No
mirth was hidden in them. She touched my arm, and her fingers were
cool. "Help them," she said. "Help
him
."

"Him?" I said stupidly.

"My Benjamin," she said. "At helm of the lead
rescue boat."

I held my hands apart. "I . . . I don't
understand."

She pulled on my sleeve, her hair shielding
her eyes. "There's another boat by the bay," she said. "Perhaps you
and I, working the oars together, can reach them in time. Please
hurry, before the storm takes them all."

There was no storm. The waves broke on the
shore in their eternal, soft wash of sound. The wind was hardly
strong enough to raise a kite. But something in her voice made my
heart beat faster at the same time that my blood chilled. The moon
was suddenly swallowed by the high clouds.

"Follow me," she said, turning and heading
between the gravestones into darkness.

I stood where I was, then glanced back at the
three-story house where I was staying. A dim light shone there,
perhaps the candle I had used for reading. When I looked back, she
was gone, and though I ran some distance through the sand, I
couldn't find her.

Just then the wind gained speed, the clouds
divided, and the quarter-moon's glare bathed the beach. The bay was
barren and calm. There was no sign of the lady in white, not even a
footprint in the wet sand.

Somewhat disconcerted, I finally made my way
back to the house. I went upstairs to the room where I had spread
my sleeping bag and laid out my books and laptop. The candle had
burned down to half its length. I must have been out on the beach
for hours. Numb, I crawled into the bag and sought refuge in sleep,
images of her beautiful face dominating my restless thoughts.

In the morning, I laughed at my strange
dreams and laid out a few more of my supplies. I opened a tin of
fish and ate an apple, then spent an hour at the keyboard, typing
my impressions of yesterday's debarkment. Satisfied that I had
given my editor a good start for her money, I changed into shorts
and a light shirt and headed into the heart of the ghost town.

As I walked past the vacant homes and blank
windows, I felt as if eyes were upon me. I even shouted once, a
great questioning "Hello," still not convinced that the island was
completely uninhabited. Nothing answered me but a keening gull's
cry.

I found the ranger station, but it was
securely locked, the doors and windows barred with steel. Next to
it was a building that must have been a general store, for it had
benches and a watering trough out front, and assorted rusty hooks
and hangers covered its front wall. The interior was desolate,
though. I walked past the long, collapsed counter to where the rear
of the building opened onto a pier.

I pushed the door aside from where it dangled
on warped hinges, then went to the end of the pier. The Atlantic
was laid out before me, bejeweled and glorious, a million diamonds
on its surface. I looked out across the bay to the protective cup
of dunes four hundred yards away. Then I recalled the previous
night, and for the briefest of moments, I saw a clipper, its
bulkheads shattered, the prow tilted toward the sun, the sails like
tattered ghosts. I blinked and the illusion passed. I laughed to
myself, though sweat pooled under my arms.

The day grew rapidly warm, and since the tide
was calm, I removed my shirt and shoes and jumped into the water.
After a swim, I returned to my makeshift studio, regretting the
lack of a shower. I ate a ready-made lunch, then gathered my camera
to make the four-mile journey to the island's southern tip.

As I walked that narrow barrier island, I
discovered why all the settlement was on the upper end. The land
was little more than a grim cluster of dunes, with swampy pockets
of trapped water scattered here and there along the interior. They
weren't the vibrant, teeming swamps such as those in Florida. These
were bleak, lifeless pools where only mosquitoes seemed to thrive.
The parasitic insects set upon me in clouds, and I spent more time
beating them away than I did finding suitable photography
subjects.

I gave up barely halfway to my destination
because the scenery was so hopelessly unvarying. I decided I'd
capture some sunsets and sunrises instead, to focus more on the
grandly archaic buildings and the Portsmouth beaches. I slogged
back to the abandoned town, hoping to write a little more before
dark. But I couldn't concentrate on my work. Instead, I stared out
the window as the fingers of night reached across the town,
thinking of my dream woman and comparing her beauty to that of all
the other women I'd known.

Restless, I walked the beach at gray dusk. I
kept to the Atlantic side, along the bay. I was nearing the old
store when she came from the darkness beneath the pier. She wore
the same dress that had graced her gentle curves on the previous
night. Her fine hair fluttered in the wind, and rarely had I seen
such a fine creature. Her pallid skin was the only flaw, the only
thing that separated her from perfection.

Once again her dark eyes searched me,
silently begging. "Can we go now?" she said. "They must surely be
near drowning."

I had decided that perhaps she had lived on
the island for some time. And though I had convinced myself that
the night before had been a dream, a part of me had been hoping it
was real, that I might have a chance to gaze upon her lovely
likeness again. And there she was before me. "Where are they?" I
asked, nearly breathless.

She raised her hand and pointed across the
bay to where a streak of moonlight rippled across the water. "See
them, oh, what a terrible storm."

And for an instant, I saw, waves rearing
fully fifteen feet high, the rain falling in solid silver sheets,
the longboats tossed on the angry ocean like bits of cork in a
storm grate. I felt the blood drain from my face.

"Please hurry, sir," she said. "My poor
Benjamin is out there."

She brushed past me, grabbing my hand. She
was solid, not a mere captivating vision. My senses swirled, sound,
touch, and sight all confused. I was as enthralled by her beauty
and nearness as I was mortified by the vision of the storm. I let
her pull me along, her hurried entreaties competing with the roar
of the vicious wind. In those moments when I could take my eyes
from here, I glanced at the shoreline ahead of us.

A boat lay beached on the sand, the tide
frothing around the stern. The waves grew in force, slapping
angrily and reaching farther and farther up the beach. The first
drops of rain needled my skin, but the sky was nearly cloudless. I
didn't question any of the impossible events. I thought of nothing
but the delicate yet strong hand that gripped mine, and how I hoped
it would never let go.

We reached the boat, and she made to shove
off. The rain's intensity had increased, and her wet dress clung
closely to her corseted body, her hair draped in wild tangles about
her shoulders and back. I must have watched transfixed for some
moments, because she turned to me and shouted, "Come, help me.
We've not much time."

I ran to her side, bent my energies against
the bow, and felt the boat slide into the water. A tremendous wave
lapped up and pulled it free of the sand. She clambered over the
side, motioning for me to follow. The storm raged about us, the
wind now so strong that I could scarcely stand against it. In the
darkness, I could no longer see the broken, tilted ship or the
would-be rescuers.