Isaac's Storm (41 page)

THEY
DRIFTED
FOR
hours
aboard
a
large
raft
of
wreckage,
first
traveling
well
out
to
sea,
then,
when
the
wind
shifted
to
come
from
the
southeast
and
south,
back
into
the
city.
For
the
first
time
they
heard
cries
for
help,
these
coming
from
a
large
two-story
house
directly
in
their
path.
Their
raft
bulldozed
the
house
into
the
sea.
The
cries
stopped.

A
rocket
of
timber
struck
Isaac
and
knocked
him
down,
but
only
dazed
him.
Joseph
saw
a
small
girl
struggling
in
the
sea
and
assumed
that
somehow
Esther
had
fallen
from
Isaac's
grasp.
He
plucked
her
from
the
water
and
gathered
her
close
to
the
other
girls.
Allie
May,
the
eldest,
cried
out,
"Papa!
Papa!
Uncle
Joe
is
neglecting
Rosemary
and
me
for
this
strange
child!"

Stunned,
Joseph
took
a
close
look
at
the
girl.
It
was
not
Esther
at
all.
He
looked
over
his
shoulder
and
saw
Isaac
bent
over
his
baby,
shielding
her
from
the
flying
debris.
This
girl
was
a
stranger.

Their
raft
ran
aground
at
28th
and
Avenue
P,
four
blocks
from
where
they
once
had
lived.
They
saw
a
house
with
a
light
in
the
window,
and
climbed
inside.
Safe
—
although
one
daughter
had
injuries
that
Joseph
considered
life-threatening.

A
miracle
had
occurred,
Isaac
knew.
Nothing
else
could
explain
why
he
and
his
three
daughters
were
still
alive.
Yet
the
enormity
of
what
he
did
lose
now
came
home
to
him.
His
children
wept
for
their
mother,
but
soon,
out
of
sheer
exhaustion,
they
fell
asleep.
Isaac
lay
awake
for
a
time,
hoping
his
wife
somehow
had
survived,
but
knowing
heart-deep
that
she
had
not.

She
had
been
very
close,
as
it
happens.
Later
it
would
seem
to
Isaac
as
if
she
had
been
watching
over
her
family
during
the
entire
voyage,
guiding
them
in
their
passage
through
the
night
until
they
were
safely
back
home.

AND
THERE
WAS
this:
In
the
midst
of
the
Clines'
voyage,
a
beautiful
retriever
climbed
aboard
their
raft.
It
was
Joseph's
dog.
Somehow
in
the
storm
it
had
sensed
them
and
swum
after
them.
The
dog
was
delighted
to
see
Joseph
and
Isaac
and
the
children,
but
sensed
too
that
someone
was
missing.
He
went
one
by
one
to
each
of
them,
as
if
marking
a
checklist.
One
scent
was
absent.
The
dog
raced
to
the
edge
of
the
raft
and
peered
into
the
water.
Joseph
called
him
back.
The
dog
stood
scrabbling
at
the
edge,
obviously
torn
by
conflicting
needs.
But
it
was
clear
where
his
passion
lay.
The
dog
ignored
Joseph
and
prepared
to
jump.
Joseph
lunged
for
him,
but
the
dog
entered
the
sea,
and
soon
he
too
was
gone.

TELEGRAM
 

Houston,
Texas
 

11:25
P.M.

Sept.
9,1900

To:
Willis
Moore,

Chief,
U.S.
Weather
Bureau
 

First
news
from
Galveston
just
received
by
train
which
could
get
no
closer
to
the
bay
shore
than
six
miles,
where
Prairie
was
strewn
with
debris
and
dead
bodies.
About
two
hundred
corpses
counted
from
train.
Large
Steamship
stranded
two
miles
inland.
Nothing
could
be
seen
of
Galveston.
Loss
of
life
and
property
undoubtedly
most
appalling.
Weather
clear
and
bright
here
with
gentle
southeast
wind.
 

G.
L.
Vaughan
Manager,
Western
Union,
Houston
 

THE
PENSACOLA
DRIFTED
in
the
old
seas
of
the
storm
throughout
Saturday
and
Saturday
night.
About
dawn,
the
remains
of
the
anchor
caught
something
in
the
seabed,
and
again
the
ship
swung,
again
her
beams
and
plates
began
to
bind
and
flex.
But
the
barometer
showed
a
steady
rise
in
pressure.
The
storm
had
passed.

Captain
Simmons
ordered
the
crew
to
haul
in
the
stern
hawser
and
the
anchor
chain-cable,
and
to
restart
the
engines.
He
ordered
another
sounding
and
found
the
ship
in
only
eighty
feet
of
water.
Given
the
slope
of
the
seabed,
he
estimated
through
dead
reckoning
that
Galveston
was
now
about
fifty-five
miles
to
the
northwest.
The
ship
had
drifted
over
fifty
miles.
He
set
a
course
back
to
the
city.

About
noon
on
Sunday,
Simmons
spotted
the
coast
and
followed
it
west,
looking
for
landmarks,
but
found
his
view
blocked
by
squalls.

In
the
afternoon,
the
clouds
began
to
break
and
the
sea
to
gleam
a
rich
royal
blue.
Simmons
spotted
the
Galveston
grain
elevator,
and
turned
toward
it,
but
as
the
ship
entered
the
Bolivar
channel
he
and
his
guests
fell
silent.

They
entered
a
changed
world.
Nothing
was
as
it
had
been
when
the
ship
left.
"We
found
a
line
of
breakers
where
the
jetties
were,
but
everything
on
them
washed
away,
beacons,
bay
lights,
lightship,
buoys
here
and
there
out
of
position,"
Menard
said.
"We
discovered
steamers
ashore,
the
forts
and
barracks,
torpedo
casemate
all
gone,
and
as
we
entered
we
began
to
see
the
terrible
destruction
to
the
city,
and
we
knew
not
what
news
to
expect
when
we
landed
of
our
loved
ones
at
home."

Where
buildings
had
stood
they
saw
great
mounds
of
timber.
Whole
neighborhoods
seemed
to
have
disappeared,
and
the
immense
bathhouses
were
simply
gone.
Now
and
then
a
peculiar
scent
drifted
to
the
ship
from
the
city,
and
some
aboard
recognized
it
immediately
as
the
odor
of
putrefaction.
But
to
smell
it
at
this
distance
—
what
did
that
mean?

No
one
worried
much
about
the
loss
of
physical
property,
Menard
said,
"but
our
anxiety
about
the
loss
of
life
was
terrible."

It
was
about
five
o'clock,
the
evening
a
lovely
summer
amber,
when
Simmons
docked
the
ship
at
the
foot
of
23rd
Street.
Menard
and
Carroll
thanked
the
captain
for
his
great
skill
in
getting
them
through
the
storm,
then
set
off
in
search
of
family
and
friends.

The
scent
of
putrefaction
was
overpowering.

THE
TRAIN
LEFT
Houston
at
dawn
and
for
the
first
few
miles
made
easy
progress.
The
grass
on
the
lowlands
had
been
blown
flat,
the
few
visible
trees
stripped
of
all
leaves,
but
otherwise
Col.
William
Sterett
saw
little
of
note.
The
sky
was
a
pretty
mix
of
clouds
and
vivid
blue,
with
that
washed
quality
that
so
often
came
after
a
storm.
Big
dragonflies
patrolled
the
grass.

Sterett,
a
writer
for
the
Dallas
News,
had
been
in
the
newspaper's
office
on
Saturday
when
its
telegrapher
reported
losing
all
contact
with
Galveston.
That
in
itself
was
not
surprising.
Telegraph
lines
were
always
being
blown
down,
but
the
telegraph
companies
were
adept
at
fixing
breaks
quickly
and
routing
telegrams
through
alternate
pathways.
Even
minor
storms
caused
communication
to
suffer.
What
made
the
silence
at
Galveston
so
troubling
was
its
duration.
The
last
telegram
had
come
on
Saturday
afternoon.
Now
it
was
Tuesday
morning
and
the
lines
were
still
down.

Wild
stories
had
filled
the
silence.
There
was
talk,
clearly
exaggerated,
that
the
storm
had
submerged
the
entire
city
under
a
dozen
feet
of
water
at
a
cost
of
a
thousand
lives.
Saturday
evening
someone
in
Galveston
managed
to
cable
a
report
via
Mexico
to
a
resident
of
San
Antonio,
notifying
him
that
the
storm
had
drowned
his
brother.
On
Sunday
a
small
party
of
exhausted
men
from
Galveston
had
arrived
in
Houston
estimating
five
hundred
dead,
surely
another
exaggeration.
At
a
fundamental
level,
however,
all
the
rumors
and
reports
agreed
on
one
thing:

A
powerful
storm
had
struck
Galveston
without
warning
and
done
the
city
great
damage.

Soon
Sterett
would
see
for
himself.
He
was
riding
in
a
crowded
passenger
coach
attached
to
a
Great
Northern
relief
train
bound
for
Virginia
Point,
the
last
railroad
stop
on
the
mainland.
As
one
of
the
region's
best-known
newsmen,
and
a
Civil
War
veteran,
Sterett
had
experienced
no
difficulty
gaining
permission
to
board
the
train,
nor
had
his
friend,
Tom
L.
Monagan,
dispatched
by
an
insurance
company
to
assess
the
damage
to
its
interests
in
Galveston.
In
Houston,
Monagan
had
volunteered
to
help
prepare
the
train
for
departure
and
was
assigned
the
task
of
making
sure
that
everyone
on
the
train
had
an
official
pass.
Relief
officials
did
not
want
any
sightseers
sneaking
aboard.
The
train
carried
soldiers
and
two
commanders:
Brig.
Gen.
Thomas
Scurry,
adjutant
general
of
the
Texas
Volunteer
Guard,
and
Gen.
Chambers
McKibben,
commander
of
the
Texas
Department
of
the
U.S.
Army.
It
also
carried
ordinary
citizens,
and
Sterett
knew
just
by
the
look
in
their
eyes
that
they
had
families
in
Galveston.

At
first
Sterett
and
the
other
passengers
joked
and
talked
of
minor
things,
but
soon
dread
filled
the
car.
The
wounds
in
the
landscape
became
more
evident.
Here
and
there
a
house
rose
from
the
grass
at
a
cockeyed
angle,
its
curtains
blowing
free
through
jaws
of
fractured
glass.
The
swollen
bodies
of
drowned
cattle
lay
in
the
pampas
like
huge
black
balloons.
As
more
and
more
debris
appeared
along
the
right-of-way,
the
passengers
grew
quieter
and
quieter.
In
places
water
covered
the
tracks.
The
train
slowed
until
it
seemed
to
make
no
noise
at
all.
The
slowness
amplified
the
dread.
For
Sterett
it
brought
to
mind
a
funeral
cortege.