Forever, For Love

by Becky Lee Weyrich

  An hour later, Ward had still not returned. Pandora went about her duties as calmly as she could. Cassie was upstairs with Meraiah and Miriam, doing her best to entertain them and allay their fears. Meraiah considered the storm a great adventure, but even downstairs Pandora could hear her other daughter’s terrified wails.

  Pandora had ordered the horses turned out of the stable. Otherwise, at the rate the water was rising, they would be trapped inside to drown. The castle was quickly filling with strangers—people whose houses were gone or so badly damaged that they’d been forced to leave. The other servants helped their mistress cook a meal and distribute it, handing out dry clothing and blankets as well.

  Two hours later, Pandora was at her wit’s end. She went to the telephone for the dozenth time to try to ring Angelica’s house. She put the receiver to her ear and gave a small cry. Only a dull silence issued from the instrument. The lines were down. She was cut off from the rest of the world.

  When someone banged at the front door, Pandora dropped the useless phone and hurried to see who was there, praying that it would be Ward with Angelica. Instead, she found old Nettie and Daniel, standing in the water that now lapped onto her high porch. Both were drenched to the skin, and Nettie’s hat had blown away. Their clothes were shredded, hanging in tatters on their wet, shivering bodies.

  “Lord, Miss Pan, I ain’t seen nothing like this since way back in 1818! Our shack got washed to kingdom come. Me and Dan’t just hung on to that old door and let it wash us right to you. We reckoned if we could make it here you’d take us in.”

  “Oh, Nettie!” Pandora hugged the old woman. “I’m so glad you’re safe. Now if only Ward would get back here where he belongs!”

  “You mean your man’s out in that?” Nettie cried. “Well, me and Dan’l will just have to go fetch him.”

  “That’s right!” Daniel agreed, turning back toward the door.

  “You’ll do no such thing!” Pandora scolded. “You’re going to come right in here and get some dry clothes and some hot food.”

  The two bedraggled survivors did as Pandora ordered, blessing her all the while for her kind hospitality.

  A dozen or so other survivors arrived and, in the crush, Pandora lost track of the pair. When she searched the house for Nettie and Daniel an hour later, they were nowhere to be found.

  Everyone moved to the upper stories of the castle. The water was halfway up the stairs. Pandora made sure all the others were safe, then went to speak with Cassie in the nursery.

  Several other babies had joined her own two children. Cassie was watching over all of them. The twins were both sound asleep at last. By the clock on the bureau, Pandora saw that it was after seven. Ward had been gone for almost six hours.

  “Cassie,” she whispered, not wanting to wake the children, “I have to go find him.”

  “No, Miss Pan!” The servant rose as if she meant to physically restrain her mistress. “Ain’t no sense your going out there. You got to stay here with these babies.”

  Pandora glanced at her beautiful daughters and leaned down to kiss each in her turn. She knew what Cassie was saying. There was a chance that Ward was already dead. If she went out to search for him, their children, in all likelihood, would be orphaned. She couldn’t bear to think about what life would be without Ward. Somehow, she felt sure she could find him. And when she did, they would both be safe.

  “I have to go, Cassie. I can’t explain it. But I have to!”

  “You can’t even get out,” the servant argued. “The water’s done up past all the doors.”

  Pandora didn’t answer. Turning, she went to her bedroom and donned a pair of Ward’s britches, rolling up the legs and cinching the waist with one of her own belts. She pulled on a warm sweater, then opened the door to the bedroom balcony. The black water swirled only inches below. Carefully, she eased herself over the railing, shivering as the water seeped through to her skin. She gripped a board that floated by and began paddling toward Angelica’s house. She would go directly there, then back. Surely, she would find Ward along the way.

  Only minutes had passed before she realized what a truly dreadful mistake she had made. Once she was out of the sheltering lee of the castle, she was lost. Rain pelted her like frozen bullets; the wind raged and howled. Pandora clung to her board, praying that she might live to see the morning as the wild currents drove her off course. Would she ever find Ward?

  Between noon and eight-thirty that fateful Saturday, weatherman Issac Cline’s barometer dropped from 29.48 to 28.48 inches. Early that day, the wind began blowing from the north, flooding the island with water from the bay. As it shifted throughout the day—northeast, east, and then from the southeast—the angry waves of the Gulf were picked up and hurled over Galveston. The storm tide, reaching fifteen feet, struck the island with full force between eight and nine o’clock that evening. By that time, Pandora’s plank had carried her far beyond Broadway, beyond anything except her wildest nightmares; nightmares that now seemed all too real.

  She felt perfectly alone in a world of death. Horses, cows, chickens floated by, and twice she was forced to shove human corpses out of her way. She wasn’t sure where she was. Her hair, plastered by the wind and rain to her face, obscured what little vision she had in the black night. Three times she thought she spotted a light in the distance. Each time the wind and the pull of the current drew her in the other direction. Cold gripped her body. Her arms ached from hanging onto the rough board. Her hands were raw and filled with splinters. Only the glimmer of hope that she might find Ward kept her from giving up her hold on the plank and sinking into blessed oblivion.

  Ward was clinging to his own piece of flotsam at the same time. Angelica was still tied to him by the curtain rope. He had no idea where they were or in which direction the raging waters were carrying them. There was little time to think of such things as they struggled to survive. Suddenly, the drag on the curtain tie lessened and Ward gave it a tug. To his horror, the rope flew toward him, wrapping about his shoulders.

  “Angelica!” he yelled into the wind. “Can you hear me?”

  No answer.

  “Angelica, answer me!” He thrashed about in the water, searching wildly, but she was gone. When and how they had become separated, he had no way of knowing. Going back to look for her would be useless and deadly. The swift currents could have swept her in any direction. All Ward could do was hang on and hope that he was still alive when the storm blew itself out.

  Concentrating on his vain attempt to find Angelica, Ward didn’t see the huge shape moving toward him through the water. It struck him in the ribs, knocking the breath from him momentarily. He reached out with one hand to feel a large, solid object.

  “Climb aboard, mate,” some unseen figure called out in the darkness. “There’s plenty of room on my roof.”

  Ward’s heart pounded with relief. At least one other person was still alive in this nightmare. He pulled himself out of the water, inching up the slippery piece of shingled wood. “Where are we?” he asked the roof’s captain.

  “Damned if I know! When the storm surge came I was just climbing out of my upstairs window. Next thing I knew, I was off and sailing. That fearsome rush of water broke my house right smack in two.”

  “Where was your house?”

  “10th Street, just off Broadway. But it sure ain’t there no more! Thank the Lord my wife and kids are in Dallas visiting her mother! You got anybody missing, mister?”

  Ward ground his teeth, trying not to think how close his own house was to the destruction. “I don’t know,” he answered. “I just don’t know.”

  For several minutes the two men remained silent, fighting for a hold on the slippery roof. The water tossed them about like a toy boat in a whirlpool. Ward suddenly realized, as the rough shingles bit into his thighs, that he was completely naked. The water and wind had stripped his clothes from him. He heard a cry in the distance and shouted to the man with him, “Th
ere’s someone calling for help. Maybe we can make it over to save them.”

  His companion didn’t answer. Ward turned to look. The fellow who had rescued him was gone, swept off their shaky craft. Ward leaned his head down on his hands and offered up what seemed a futile prayer for the stranger’s deliverance and for his own. It was unlikely that anyone would survive this storm. Pandora had been right.

  “Help me, please!” came a pitiful moan from somewhere near.

  Ward leaned off the roof as far as he dared, stretching his arm out toward the woman’s voice. “Here, catch my hand!” he yelled.

  “Ward?” The voice was stronger and familiar. It couldn’t be, but it was.

  Their fingers touched, sending a charge through their naked bodies. Ward gripped Pandora’s hand, pulling her through the water. At last, they were lying side by side on the punishing shingles, but neither of them noticed the pain.

  “Ward,” Pandora sobbed. “I thought you were dead! I’d almost given up. I’ve been clinging to a board for hours. I was losing my hold; I couldn’t have stayed up much longer.”

  “Hush now, darling,” he whispered. “Save your strength to hold on. This can’t last forever. The worst is over, I’m sure.”

  The long night stretched before them. As they clung to the roof and each other, the wind shifted, drawing the water back out into the Gulf and them with it. All night, the sea tossed them, the wind battered them, and the cold rain pelted their naked bodies.

  “It’s no use, Ward.” Pandora’s voice was only the hoarsest whisper. “I can’t make it.”

  “Hang on, dammit!” he cried. “I don’t mean to lose you now. Not after all we’ve been through. We survived the storm of ’18, didn’t we? It was worse than this! I won’t let you die! You left me last time. I mean to live through this and you will, too!”

  Pandora had closed her eyes, resigned to her own death. Now they shot open. By the angry, phosphorescent light in the sky, she saw his face, his green eyes glittering with love and determination. Both of them—Ward and Laffite—were here with her! A moment later, she spied the hands—black, skeletal fingers reaching out for them, the same beckoning hands she had seen so many times in her nightmares. Her dream was real and it was now!

  She lay frozen on the hard roof, her whole body aching, but her heart still pumping, determined to live. She watched the hands reach out as their rooftop haven drew ever nearer. Suddenly, beyond the hands, she saw a ghostly figure beckoning. As the raging waters washed them closer, Pandora recognized the woman. It was Nicolette, urging them on. And then, Pandora saw a thin ray of light, a silvery lifeline flowing from Nicolette’s upraised hand, attaching itself to Pandora’s heart to draw them ever closer.

  “Come, come, come!” the wind seemed to moan.

  Their broken roof jolted to a halt while the waters swirled around them. For several moments, they both lay still, hanging on tightly, waiting to be washed away again, but nothing happened.

  Ward gripped Pandora’s arm. “We’re caught firm!” he said excitedly. “We’re saved, darling!”

  For the rest of the night, they held each other, clinging together as if their very lives depended upon their closeness. The rain still beat at them, cold and vicious, but they shared their warmth and protected each other the best way they knew how.

  At dawn, the winds died. The rain stopped. The Gulf waters drew back into their primeval bed. The sun rose—glorious, brilliant, all colors of a fire opal. The storm had passed.

  Ward rose gingerly. Pandora gazed up at him, aching for every bruise and cut on his body.

  “Would you look where we are!” he said.

  Pandora glanced about. The rooftop that had saved them was lodged firmly in the top branches of the three oaks in Laffite’s Grove. She smiled. Nicolette had saved them! Reaching out from beyond her grave below, she had brought them to safe anchor to keep her own love for Jean Liffite alive.

  “Look out there.” Ward’s voice was somber now.

  Pandora gazed out over the island—a scene of total destruction. A huge windrow of wreckage rose like a great rampart in the distance. Trees, houses, furniture, bodies!

  “Oh, Ward!” she cried. “Oh, my God!”

  He came to her and took her in his arms; he could think of no words to soothe her. At least they were alive. They would face whatever came together.

  “Come, darling,” Ward whispered. “Let’s go home.”

  Epilogue

  September 8, 1925

  Galveston Island

  Pandora Gabriel, sat in a wicker rocking chair on the front veranda of the castle, the setting sun turning her bright hair to flame. A few late-blooming oleanders perfumed the air. Five white kittens frolicked about the folds of her lace skirt.

  She was waiting… waiting for him.

  Automobiles rumbled by on Broadway, widened now, the trolley tracks long gone.

  “My, how Galveston’s changed,” Pandora mused aloud, remembering the bygone days when horses pranced up and down the avenue. Now, Pandora Gabriel was one of the few residents who still drove her matched team of white horses, riding behind in her open carriage.

  “Ma’am, you want me to bring you some iced tea while you wait for Mr. Ward?”

  Pandora turned and smiled at old Cassie. “No, thank you. But bring me my box, won’t you?”

  A moment later, Cassie shuffled back out. In her hands she held the antique box that Ward Gabriel had given Pandora for her eighteenth birthday. The sunlight glinted on the bright lotus blossoms she had carefully painted so long ago—the forever flowers, as she always thought of them. “That sure is one fine picture, Miss Pan! I always liked it from the first time you painted it in Paris. Remember?”

  “Ah, but this picture is different, Cass.” She stared down at the two figures, embracing in the grove and said more to herself than to her servant, “This one never changes.”

  Cassie went back inside, leaving her mistress to her box of memories. Pandora rummaged through her treasures, finally locating the clippings about the great storm of twenty-five years ago this very day. She read them through, one by one, then leaned her head back and closed her eyes, thinking.

  “Six thousand killed!” she murmured aloud, recalling that terrible night. “And Ward and I almost among that count. If it hadn’t been for Nicolette…”

  She’d seldom thought of Nicolette and Jean Laffite since the storm. They didn’t come to her in visions anymore. By saving her and Ward their purposes had been fulfilled; the two ghosts could finally rest from their labors. Following the storm, she and Ward had grown too close to allow anyone else to intrude—even her beloved phantoms. Things were better that way.

  “Let the past lay,” Pandora told herself. “Live for now, for tomorrow, not for yesterday!”

  Yesterday was much on her mind this afternoon. “Twenty-five years ago,” she whispered. “It can’t be that long.”

  There were so many things—good and bad—to be remembered about those days and weeks following the hurricane. Their reunion with Meraiah and Miriam had been joyous the morning after that horrible night. But not all had come home to be welcomed by loved ones.

  She and Ward, picking their way through the rubble and the bloating bodies the next day, had found old Daniel more dead than alive.

  She could still hear the poor old man sobbing, “I tried to save her, Madame Boss. Honest, I tried! But there wasn’t nothing I could do. Now your baby girl’s gone.”

  “My babies are fine,” Pandora assured him, supporting Daniel’s weight as Ward and Jacob dug through the pile of debris that the old servant had guarded all night and half the hot, steaming day.

  Finally, near the bottom of the heap, they found a woman’s near-naked body lying crushed and broken.

  “Jeannette!” Daniel wailed. “Oh, poor little Jeannette!”

  Pandora stared at the man, unable to believe her ears, but certain that he spoke the truth. “Nettie… Jeannet
te,” she murmured. Then her tear-filled eyes focused on the sad, old man. “’Gator-Bait?” she whispered, holding out her hand to him.

  He nodded. “Ain’t nobody called me that in many a year, ma’am. I reckon you know the truth now. Me and Nettie, we wanted to tell you all along but she said it wasn’t our place. She said, when the time was right, you’d just naturally know.”

  ’Gator-Bait lived for only a few days after the storm—just long enough to tell Pandora everything he remembered about Nicolette and Jean Laffite, and all about his life with Nettie.

  A few nights after the storm, when Pandora went in to tell him good-night, he said, “Well, I reckon I’ve told it all, Madame Boss. I’m gonna take me a good, long rest now.”

  He never woke up again.

  Pandora fished into the box to bring out two golden earrings. Their matched fire opals caught the flame of the sunset. She still had to look at them to believe it. “Crazy Nettie,” as the island’s citizens had called her, had been wearing the missing earring when her body was found. It still sent a shiver through Pandora to think that she had actually known Jeannette Laffite.

  “My other daughter,” Pandora sighed, thinking back over her relationship with the old woman, Nettie, and wondering why she never guessed until it was too late.

  Searching the box again, her fingers touched a soft curl of hair. She drew it out, pressing it to her heart. Now she knew to whom it had belonged. The missing lock of Jean Laffite’s hair had been found, amazingly enough, after the storm. It had been inside her silver locket where Angelica, who had stolen both, had placed it before the raging waters swept her out of Ward’s protective grasp.