Her Name Will Be Faith (51 page)

"What do we do to make ready?" Owen Michael
wanted to know.

"First we decide which bathroom to use..."

"Tamsin's
and my bathroom," the boy interrupted. "There's no win
dow in there to get
broken."

"Good thinking."
The bathroom the two children shared was between
their rooms and had only an extractor fan let into the wall of the building.
"Let's all go see how we'll
manage it." They stood in the bathroom
doorway as if seeing it for the first time. It was cream; cream marble
round
the bath and shower stall and across the vanity top surrounding the twin marble
basins. The paintwork and carpeting were cream, and by contrast the towel and
bathmats were chocolate brown.

"Let's fill the vanity cupboard with food for a
start," Jo said. "How will we cook it in here?" Tamsin wanted to
know.

"We won't. Cold soup.
Cold ham..."

"We've
got picnic flasks. Can't we heat the soup and some coffee now?"
The
little girl seemed excited at the thought of this new adventure –
providing the roof wasn't
going to blow off.

Her
mother tried not to let her anxiety dampen her enthusiasm. "Sure.
Why not? The soup, at
least. We can't make any coffee because we have no water."

"Water?
There's water in the bathroom..." Owen Michael turned
on the tap while he spoke,
gazed at the rusty trickle.

"You
wouldn't believe it, would you, with all this rain coming down?
No, what you have to do is
go to the bar and collect all the mixes we
have,
all the orange juice and pineapple juice and ginger ale and lemonade
and
soda water you can find."

"Hey,
Mom, we could make coffee with soda water," Tamsin cried.
Jo raised her eyebrows, but
could not suppress a smile; Tamsin's suggestions were all so positive.
"Why not?"

"There's
bottles and bottles of soda water in here," Owen Michael
shouted, dashing into the
bar. "If we take the electric kettle into the bathroom..."

"It won't do us much good
when the power goes off," Jo told him. "Anything we're going to boil
has to be done right now."

Tamsin's
eyes were wide. "You think there could be a power outage?
In New York?"

"It could happen. I guess there was one in
Eleuthera, huh?" "Oh, yes. That was scary too."

"It's going to be
pretty boring, sitting in the dark all evening," Owen Michael declared.
"I know, I'll get my flashlight."

"That's a great idea.
Do you have spare batteries?"

"Of course I have
spare batteries, Mom. How long do you reckon we'll be without power?"

"It's
a big storm and moving slowly. Could be the best part of 48
hours."

"48 hours!
Heck!" Owen Michael commented.

"I'm hungry. I'm sure
it's breakfast time," Tamsin complained.

"Of
course it is," Jo agreed, realizing that she was pretty hungry
herself.
"Let's make a really good, big, solid meal," she suggested. "We
can
eat what's left over later, even if it's cold. I'm going to put
some meat in the microwave
to thaw and see if we've got any fresh vegetables."

While
the meal was cooking, they hauled two single mattresses into
their refuge, together
with pillows and blankets; there wasn't actually room for them, and Tamsin
suggested putting one in the bathtub and
sleeping
in there herself, while Owen Michael and Jo shared the other.
Jo found
some fancy candles she used for dinner parties, and soon had the immaculate
bathroom looking like the inside of a camping tent. By now, the howling of the
wind, the roar of the thunder, the shuddering of the building in the gusts,
seemed almost normal.

When they had eaten and
cleared up, Owen Michael disappeared. Jo suddenly remembered the bag she had
left in Washington's office. She
thought she
would take both Owen Michael and Tamsin down with her to collect it – she
did not want to be separated from them for a moment
– but when she went looking for the boy she
found him standing on a
chair
carefully placing his beloved model aircraft in the storage cupboard over his
closet. Poor kid. He obviously was far more aware of the possible
extent
of storm damage than she realized. But only she had the almost
terrifying feeling of claustrophobia of knowing that they
were, so far as
she was aware, alone in
this huge building.

As the lights had flickered once or twice during their
breakfast she
decided against using
the elevators to get down to the lobby; the thought of their being trapped in
one of the cars throughout the storm by a power
outage was traumatic. Instead they used the stairs,
hurrying down all
thirty-eight
floors. On the thirty-third she was sure she heard music, but
the sound of the wind whistling outside was so great the
noise was
surrealistic, and
she certainly had no intention of going to investigate;
they arrived in the foyer panting as much with
apprehension as
exertion.

Washington's office was locked, the light off. Jo and the
children could
look
through the glass door and see the suitcase, but there was no way
they could get at it short of breaking the lock. And
presumably it was safe in there anyway – at least as safe as in the
apartment. Besides, Jo
was
suddenly anxious to regain the safety of her own home,
nor did she think she could face the climb back. She stood
in front of the
silent
elevators, chewing her lip for several seconds, while Tamsin held
her hand, before pressing the ascent button, feeling her
heart give a
pit-a-pat of relief
as the light glowed normally. Then she glanced round
to see Owen Michael standing in front of the street door.
"Hey, Mom,"
he called. "Come
look at this."

She left Tamsin at the elevator, hurried to his side, to
gaze through the
glass
at the street, just as jammed with vehicles as before, but now
deserted by humans, save for the single lane which had
been cleared and along which cars were proceeding in a steady stream, and for
the police
men
and National Guardsmen huddling in groups on corners and intersec
tions, only dashing forward whenever there was a hold up
or a driver
seemed uncertain which way to go.

"Ain't that something?" Owen Michael asked.
"All those automobiles…
what happened to all the
people?"

"I guess they must live above the flood level, and
the police have sent
them
home," she said. "Like us," wondering why the three of them had
to be numbered amongst the unlucky ones who hadn't got
out before the
martial
law went into effect. "New York," she said. "A ghost city.
Now..." Before she could finish, a tremendous gust
of wind forced open
even
the electrically controlled and now locked doors. "Owen!" she
screamed, as she was blown back, staggering and then
falling, rolling
across
the tiled floor. So was the boy, fortunately, because the doors had
been hurled back so hard on their hinges that they had
shattered against
the
walls – glass splinters showered the foyer, carried on the wind, but
miraculously neither of them were hit by flying glass,
though the soles of
their
shoes crushed the shards into the floor and a few small pieces had
pierced
their hands and knees when they fell.

Neither was Tamsin hurt, sheltered behind the square block
of the
elevator shaft, but she was screaming her
terror.

Jo grabbed Owen Michael, bundled both children into the
now waiting
car, and pressed the
ascent button, praying it would work. It did, and a
few minutes later they reached the thirty-eighth floor,
breathless and
frightened,
listening, and indeed feeling, the wind whistling up the
stairwell,
but in comparative safety, at least for the moment.

They jostled into the apartment and closed the door,
looking at each
other,
still too breathless to speak. Jo found the First Aid box and dabbed
antiseptic on their cuts, then she poured herself a drink
and gave each of
the
children a soda. Every so often the apartment door rattled, but she didn't dare
think what the wind might eventually do. Surely, if all the
apartment doors, and more important, the door on to the
roof, were firmly
closed…
as the minutes passed her heart settled down, and she decided
it
was going to be all right.

Now it was just a matter of waiting, and of restoring
normalcy, as far
as
that could be done in the frighteningly abnormal conditions. Jo
suddenly remembered that in another hour or so she was due
at Pinewoods
for breakfast. She
picked up the phone to call them and tell them she
wasn't going to make it, but it seemed all the lines even
in the New York
telephone
exchange were busy and she could get no replies at all, although
she tried Marcia's number as well – but Marcia would
surely be safely
in
Connecticut by now. Then she tried Complaints but they were engaged
too, so she gave it up for a while, and instead busied
herself with removing
pictures,
ornaments, everything in fact for which she could find safe storage. Plants and
photo albums joined them in the bathroom, along
with a precious antique tea service which had belonged to
her
grandmother.

"Have
we got a can opener in there?" Owen Michael asked.

"Yes," she called loudly, to be heard above the
storm. But she didn't
know
where it was – or care, for the moment. She was staring at a ghost:
the fearful apparition of a woman, hair matted into
disheveled points,
shoulders
drooping under damp crumpled clothes, while from deep, dark
shadows, the terrified eyes gaped back at her through the
bathroom
mirror.

My God! Is that really me? Already? And Faith hasn't even
got here,
yet. She swallowed, took a deep breath,
and squared her shoulders. What
confidence could
the children have, seeing her like that? She opened a
drawer and pulled out a hairbrush, rushed into the
dressing room for a
fresh blouse,
moistened a tissue in soda water and rubbed it over her face
and hands.
Forcing a wide smile she said, "Let's see what's on TV."

They sat in silence, half watching some filler program
being relayed
between
announcements, being promised a full weather update as soon
as
possible – Jo praying for a glimpse of Richard's face – while the
picture
was
constantly broken up by flashes of lightning, and the building shaken
by gusts of wind.

But for the children, she would actually have wanted
to be here in the city, close to Richard, sharing, even at a distance, the
danger with him. And suddenly she was reminded of the people she had
interviewed after he started his 'hurricane chat' spots. There was that funny
old girl, Lila something, from Florida. She knew all about hurricanes —
they didn't frighten her, she'd said. Not even this one? She was probably
huddled in her sister's bathroom, eating her words. And what about that cab
driver who never stopped swearing? Muldoon? And Nancy, of course, her
hairdresser? She'd have fled at the first
suggestion of a storm. Washington
had left early, too; she hoped he'd
got all his family to safety by now.