Widow's Tears (14 page)

“That it was a gift from heaven, I suppose,” Ruby said.
From heaven? If there was a ghost involved, did heaven have anything to do with it?

“Exactly. A gift from heaven.” Claire nodded emphatically. “I figured I could live here, build up my ghostwriting and editorial work, maybe even write that novel I've been thinking about. But the writing won't bring in enough money. The house itself will have to produce an income. That's why I thought of a B and B.”

Ruby thought about what Monica had told her and what she had read in the newspaper. “Do you own the mineral rights as well? You could sell them, couldn't you?”

“Yes, but that's not the answer,” Claire replied. “It doesn't matter what the oil companies are paying for a lease. The chemicals they use for fracking can get into the groundwater, not to mention the huge amounts of water they pump out of the aquifer to force up the gas. And there's all the noise and the trucks tearing up and down the roads, and I wouldn't have any control over where they put their wells.” She shook her head violently. “No. No lease. Period. End of story.”

“I see your point,” Ruby said.

Claire was going on. “I've
got
to make this work, Ruby.” Her eyes filled with tears, and she reached for a paper napkin on the table. “It's my last chance.”

Ruby's heart went out to her. She knew exactly how Claire felt, for she had gone through the same thing after Colin was murdered: the sense of hopeless loss, of despair, of nothing left to look forward to. Grief was a terrible thing. It could drown you. It could flood your soul. It could suck out every bit of hope you had for the future and shriek for more.

After a moment, Claire blew her nose. “I'm sorry,” she muttered, balling up the napkin in her fist. “It's just that I'm desperate, Ruby. No family, no income, no home—except for this place.” She wiped her eyes with the back of her hand. “But to make it work, I have to get rid of whatever or whoever is in this house.”

Ruby was silent, wondering whether a haunted house was the best place for a recovering alcoholic to live. But it sounded as if it might be Claire's last, best hope. They might not have seen each other often in the last few years, but Claire had been a friend for a very long time, and she needed help.

And there was something else, too. Deep down inside, Ruby was scared—not just tense or nervous but truly terrified—at the thought of somehow using her gift to explore the energies that seemed to have collected in this house. But at the same time, she realized that there were questions here she wanted answers to, mysteries that needed solving, things she urgently wanted to
know
. Who was the woman she and Claire had seen? Why was she here? The things that Claire had heard and seen in the house, and those headstones out there in the graveyard—what was all that about? She was surprised by the insistent power of the curiosity that had suddenly seized her.

The silence stretched out. The noise of the wind had disappeared, but the sky outside the kitchen window was darker and in the distance, there was another long, low rumble of thunder.

“Finish your pie,” Ruby ordered. “And then you can give me the tour
of the house. Assuming we're not frightened off by your ghost, that is.” Playfully, she raised her voice. “You hear that, house? Behave yourself! No harp, no bell—”

Behind her, in the rack over the table, pans rattled loudly.

Startled, Ruby turned in her chair. The two pans in the middle of the rack banged together once again, violently. Then the movement subsided and the pans hung innocently, side by side. The wind? But the kitchen door was shut, and so was the window. And outside, the trees were still, the leaves pale in the peculiar light.

“You see?” Claire's smile was crooked. “That's what I'm talking about. Just a few little everyday noises. The wind blowing, pans banging, a ball bouncing. Nothing to be afraid of—right?”

“I think we should find ourselves a priest,” Ruby muttered.

There was another rumble of thunder. Ruby thought it almost sounded like a chuckle.

Galveston
Afternoon, September 8, 1900

Hunched over his desk on the third floor of the Levy Building, Joseph Cline spent a few precious moments encrypting his telegraph message to Willis Moore at the Washington Weather Bureau so that it could not be easily read along the route. If it were known (in Houston, for instance) that Galveston could be flooded by a storm, the city's reputation as a port might be damaged. By the time he ventured out to the Western Union office, the surging water along the Strand—the street that
ran along the western side of Galveston, beside Galveston Bay—was already knee-deep, filling his rubber boots. The wooden paving blocks had popped up and were bobbing in great flotillas along the street, so that Joseph had to fight his way through them as well as through the water. The wind, gusting at over fifty miles an hour, was ripping slates from the roofs of buildings and sending them hurtling through the air. There was a fateful irony here, for after a great fire had swept through the city in 1885, the city fathers had mandated that the roofs be constructed of slate instead of wooden shingles. Now, the slates designed to protect the city from fire had been turned into deadly missiles by the wind, and Joseph found that he had to duck and whirl to avoid being slashed.

It was only a few blocks, but every step was a battle, and Joseph, still a young man at twenty-nine and strong, was near exhaustion when at last he reached the Western Union office. He was astonished to learn that the wires had been down for two whole hours. What's more, the clerk told him, the railroad bridge across the bay was now underwater and the trains had stopped running. In fact, a relief locomotive had had to be sent out to rescue the passengers on the 9:45 from Houston. They were safe, but the noon train from Beaumont hadn't been heard from and was feared stranded—or worse. Normally, it stopped at the tip of the Bolivar Peninsula to transfer its passengers to the
Charlotte M. Allen
to be ferried across the two-mile-wide ship channel. But today, the wind had prevented the ferry from docking at the Bolivar pier. Later, it would be learned that ten passengers had abandoned the train and made for the Point Bolivar lighthouse, a quarter mile away. It was constructed of brick sheathed with metal plates, and it already housed some two hundred refugees, crammed into the staircase that spiraled a hundred feet to the top, where the kerosene-fueled light still shone out through the storm. Eighty-five passengers stayed with the train,
trusting that its massive weight would withstand the winds and surging waters. It was the wrong choice. By Sunday morning, when the survivors emerged from the lighthouse, the train was gone, and with it, all sign of their fellow passengers.

But Joseph was determined to send his telegram. Thinking that the Postal Telegraph might still be operating, he struggled to the nearby post office, where a woman, white-faced and tense, told him that he was too late. Their wires were down as well. There was no telegraph service out of Galveston. He had heard about the second floor of Ritter's Café smashing in on top of the first-floor restaurant, had he? So many dead, even more injured and some couldn't be pulled out because the rescuers were afraid that the rest of the brick building would be blown in at any moment, or the building next door would go down, and even more would be killed. She was closing the office right now, collecting her sister and her children, and seeking refuge in City Hall, where they would be safe.

Joseph was incredulous at the news of the collapse. At first he doubted the woman, but because the restaurant was less than two blocks from the Weather Bureau, he went to see. He was horrified by the sight of the wreckage, and even more by the helplessness of the dazed and rain-soaked onlookers. Wasn't safe to go in to get the dead and injured, they muttered, shaking their heads. Nothing could be done until the wind dropped. Seeing Joseph and recognizing him, they gathered around him eagerly. What did the Weather Bureau say, eh? How bad would it get? When would it be over?
When?

“It doesn't look good, boys,” Joseph replied grimly. “Afraid it's going to get worse before it gets better.” And with that, he made his way back to the Weather Bureau offices. Now desperate to get his message to Washington, he took his last shot: he picked up the phone and tried to call the Western
Union office in Houston. The Galveston long-distance operator was adamant: there were thousands of calls ahead of him. Joseph would simply have to wait his turn.

But after putting his case to the telephone office manager and pleading that this was a vital Federal government message that had an emergency priority, Joseph at last got through to Houston. He dictated his telegram, stressing that it was highly confidential. He didn't want officials in the rival port city to know about Galveston's dire plight.

A few blocks away, at the John Sealy Hospital, the anonymous letter-writer added one more paragraph to her letter: “Am beginning to feel a weakening desire for something to cling to. Should feel more comfortable in the embrace of your arms. You hold yourself ready to come to us should the occasion demand?”

Shortly after the writer finished her letter and Joseph completed his telephone call, the long-distance wires went down. No rail, no telegraph, no telephone. Galveston was now completely cut off from the rest of the world. The horrors that were to come that night would be remembered only by those who witnessed them—and who lived to tell the terrible tale.

*   *   *

A
T
the Blackwood house on Q Avenue, Rachel was holding the fort as best she could. Augustus still had not come home, so she had directed Pokey, the man who did their outside work, to fasten the wooden shutters over the windows and secure anything that might be blown away. The electricity had gone out, and while there was still light, she and Patsy, the children's nurse, gathered the household supply of kerosene lamps and set them out on the round oak pedestal table in the kitchen. Rachel and Matthew and the twins made a game of lighting one after another in turn to make sure
that they still worked, while Ida carefully polished the chimneys and Angela looked on from Patsy's arms, clapping her hands—although Patsy herself was white-faced and frightened.

That chore done, Rachel focused all her efforts on behaving in as ordinary a way as possible. But as the wind rose, the rain lashed the windows, and the house trembled more noticeably than ever, she, too, could feel the panic rising inside her. She needed her husband. And Mrs. O'Reilly, who had a way of calmly managing in a crisis. Colleen had gone home several hours ago, but she had left a plate of chicken salad sandwiches—cut into tiny shapes to please the children—and sugar cookies and a pitcher of lemonade.

Now, Rachel laid the dining room table with a pretty cloth and crystal plates and glasses and the morning's bowl of white roses—the last she would likely see this year, for the garden was already inundated by the surging brown water. Then she poured the lemonade and put on a shawl. She would go out on the front gallery to watch for their father, she told the children. He would surely be along any minute now, and when he came, there would be such fun! Matthew could open his presents and blow out his candles and they would all have a piece of birthday cake—two pieces, if they liked, for it was a large cake and the storm would keep the neighborhood families from joining them for the party. And after that, they would have music.

But when she went out onto the gallery, Rachel could see how much higher the waters had risen around the house, and she grew more frightened. The wind had shifted farther to the east and was blowing much harder. Where in the world was Augustus? It had been noon when they'd talked, and his lunches—even his leisurely businessman's lunches at Ritter's—never took more than an hour. He had promised to come straight
home if the storm hadn't let up by the time he was finished eating. The bank could do without him for one afternoon, he had said, and Rachel had fervently agreed.

Well, the storm had definitely
not
let up. The water was lapping at the fourth step of the gallery, a good five feet above the ground. Then, with a gasp of sheer terror, she saw the roof—the entire roof, all in one piece!—snatched from the single-story Baxter house, down the block on the Gulf side of the street, and sent tumbling over and over like a giant's open book. A moment later, the Baxter house slumped into the surging water.