by J. D. Robb
I wanted to tell them the truth. A dozen times I started to tell them, or at least Sam, but I’d listen to the sentence about to come out of my mouth and have second thoughts. “You’ll never guess where I really was all that time you thought I was in a coma.” Or “I know you guys think you hit Sonoma that day on Georgetown Road, but guess what, you really hit me!”
Let’s face it, even Benny wouldn’t believe me. Even if I told Sam everything that happened, things only he and the dog could possibly know, he’d find a way to rationalize it. So would I—who wouldn’t? “Oh, you’re just remembering something I told you while you were sleeping,” he’d say. He’d find an excuse, the way we do with people who’ve seen ghosts or UFOs or religious miracles. Whatever they say, somehow we always find a way to explain it.
Besides, sometimes I think it couldn’t have happened; it must’ve been a dream. People do not come back as dogs. I can’t even prove it anymore, because Benny gave me back the hoarded treasures that were going to be my ace in the hole, the secret I couldn’t have known because no one knew it except him and Sonoma. But I wasn’t fast enough. The day I came home from Hope Springs, Benny piled my coffee mug, mouse pad, and earrings on the bed. “Look, Mommy. I was saving them for you.” After I had a good cry, we had a long snuggle.
“Come up soon,” Sam says, and I say, “I will, five more minutes,” as he and Benny gather their stuff and start for the cabin. Sonoma used to follow Benny everywhere, I happen to know, when she wasn’t following Sam everywhere, but now she sticks with me. She’s my dog. Benny’s feelings weren’t hurt—he took it as a matter of course. Sam, too. The only one who had a problem with her instant devotion was me.
She splashes over and sits next to me, her rump in the water, chin on the arm of my lawn chair. “Hey, babe,” I say, gently squeezing one thick, silky ear. She’s smaller than I thought. Smaller than I felt, rather. She comes to just above my knee, perfect stroking height as she winds gracefully by. She has soft, soulful, light brown eyes. She likes to cross her legs in front when she lies down, very ladylike. We have the same color hair, tawny reddish tan, but hers is straighter. I admire her trim waistline. When I take her to the ball field in the park and let her off the leash (illegally), she chases the low-fl ying barn swallows until she’s so tired her tongue hangs out. I could watch her run forever.
Now she puts her paw on my lap for me to shake, which I do, but it’s never enough. She switches paws, I shake that one, she switches back. It’s almost a tic. “What do you want, honey?” She never answers, but sometimes I think it’s to put her arms around me. Just get closer.
She scared me at first. I was, of course, ecstatic when I heard she hadn’t drowned, but when they brought me home and the first thing she did was leap up beside me on the bed and gaze deeply into my eyes, I was, frankly, weirded out. “Who are you?” I whispered—when we were alone. “Are you me? Nod your head for yes.”
Nothing.
Since then I’ve tried lots of other ways to communicate (“Blink your eyes.” “Lift one paw.” “Wag your tail.” “Bark twice.”), but nothing’s worked. Either I haven’t found the key yet, which seems increasingly unlikely, or Sonoma is simply a dog (“simply”; not “just”). A delightful, handsome, intelligent, affectionate dog, yes, but nothing more, no one hidden or trapped inside trying to get out. Apparently.
So I don’t know what happened to me. Sometimes I imagine all dogs are, from time to time, secretly people, and there’s this global conspiracy to keep it under wraps so those of us who’ve experienced it aren’t carted off to asylums. Other times I think, well, why just dogs? Why not cats, too? Or birds? Squirrels, whales, hedgehogs? Maybe there’s constant species body-swapping going on, but nobody talks about it except in children’s books and science fiction.
Other times, I’m pretty sure I dreamed the whole thing.
One thing is true: Being a dog changed me. I’ve become a pack animal. Family’s everything—Sam and Benny not only complete me; in some bone-deep way they are me. And not just them. The whole concept of family stretches out farther, farther, planets around the sun. It includes all my friends, Delia and her family, Charlie, and Monica, Ronnie Lewis, neighbors, the community, anybody I love, even Mr. Horton—we’re all a pack. With my little, immediate pack, Sam and Benny, I still have a faint but undeniable urge to roll around on the floor, but with the secondary and tertiary members, I mostly just want to have constant goodwill and cooperation. Which, believe it or not, works out well in the real estate business. Ronnie says I’m better than I used to be and, in all modesty, that’s saying something. It turns out that honesty, reliability, transparency, and kindness not only make good retrievers; they make good house sellers, too. News to me. I thought my profession was dog-eat-dog.
“Shall we go in?”
Sonoma backs up in the water, tail wagging. She loves transitions, anything new. I was the same way. I fold my chair, tuck my phone in my pocket, the real estate contract I was reading under my arm. Put on my water sandals. It’s such a pretty day. Maybe we’ll go on a hike this afternoon—Shenandoah National Park is our backyard. “Ready?” Sonoma and I set off across the rocky shallows, and of course I’m extra alert, setting each foot down with care, wary of slipperiness. We reach the shore without mishap.
Sometimes I try to catch her off guard.
“Who saved Monica, Sonoma? Hmm? Who saved her, girl, you or me?”
Her ears twitch at her name and my questioning tone. She looks at me in happy blankness.
We start the climb to the cabin. I think of another trick.
“Hey, Sonoma! How would you like to be spayed? Huh? Do you wanna be spayed?”
I can’t believe my eyes! Her tail sags—her ears flatten.
“No?” My heart skips a beat or two. “You don’t want to be spayed?”
She shakes her head so violently, her ears sound like cards shuffling.
“Okay,” I say, shaky-voiced. “Okay, then. Don’t worry; we won’t.”
Now what? Did that just happen?
“I’m actually having the same dilemma,” I tell her as we proceed up the path. “Not getting spayed—getting pregnant. Sam and I, we’re talking about it. He’s for it, but, you know, trying to sound neutral. What do you think?”
But she’s through communicating. She’s got her nose buried in something stinky on the ferny wood floor. When she finishes smelling it, she pees on it.
So I am left, once again, to imagine what my dog thinks. It’s not as satisfying as knowing for sure, but since she’s the best of me I can never go far wrong—in ethical quandaries, tough decisions, tricky situations. I just ask myself, “What would Sonoma do?”
Lost in Paradise
MARY BLAYNEY
One
SUMMER 2009
ISLA PER DIDA
LESSER ANTILLES
“We should not have come. The curse will never die.” Father Joubay blessed himself as he spoke.
“A curse? What curse?” Why in the world would he say that? Isabelle wondered. It was a gorgeous day. The boat chugged its way through calm water clear to the seabed, filled with fish and sea grass.
The sky ahead was as blue as a sky could be, the island they were headed to as lush as one expected in the Caribbean. The air was warm. The old fort that loomed over the bay was the only thing that kept the shore from looking like a postcard picture of a tropical paradise. The home of the mysterious Sebastian Dushayne. A man who owned an island and lived in luxury. But a man Google had never heard of.
When Isabelle Reynaud turned to question Father Joubay, she saw that he was not looking at their destination, but was mesmerized by something behind them.
Isabelle looked toward the wake of the boat and drew in a sharp breath of shock. The sky on the far horizon was darkening with astonishing speed. Even as she watched, the rapidly building clouds eclipsed the late-afternoon light.
“How can there be a storm from the west? The weather never comes from the west here.” I
sabelle folded her hands in front of her heart. “It’s only a squall.”
The boat lost its smooth momentum. The engine still ran steadily but the increasingly choppy waves made the going rough.
“Squalls pass quickly.” Please God. Isabelle breathed the prayer as the waves around them grew.
“We will outrun it,” the captain called back to them as the small boat sped up noticeably. Lightning lit the storm clouds, and a dozen prongs of light chased after them.
“We cannot outrun this,” Father Joubay said, and Isabelle agreed with him. It was true that neither of them was a weather expert. They were, however, realists.
Isabelle turned from the storm to look toward the land, grabbing on to the strut that supported the canopy over the engine house.
The waves had grown from choppy to malicious. Not only was it a challenge to stand but the waves were so high Isabelle could not see the shoreline or the trees, only the fort rising over the harbor. It was more threat than comfort despite the lights that flickered through the dark.
The rain began, pushed by the wind, so that it fell like needles. Isabelle and Father Joubay moved to the partial shelter of the windowless cabin, bracing themselves against the wooden walls that gave scant protection.
Were there any life jackets? she wondered.
The captain yelled back to them, “Life jackets are in the covered bin.”
Isabelle found only two. The orange kapok was older than she was and bug infested, but better than nothing. “You take it. You and the captain. I can swim.”
“No!” Joubay shouted and pushed the life vest back to her as if it were too hot to handle. “I will make the right choice this time. This is my salvation!” Father Joubay threw the other life jacket to the captain, who ignored it.
A strong wave poured more water on them and they were thrown to the other side of the shelter. Father Joubay fell to the deck and Isabelle slid down to sit beside him.
“Are you hurt?”
“No, no, Isabelle.” He reached for his hat but the water swept it away. “May God help you, child. For me, I welcome death, but I pray, with all my heart, that you survive even if this place is cursed.”
“What curse?” she asked again, pointedly. “Father, you know there is no such thing as a curse.”
“My dear, do you think that only God can work wonders? So can the devil, for that’s what a curse is. The devil’s miracle.”
Isabelle saw no fear in his eyes even as the rain and wind grew stronger, whitecaps crowning the waves that were now taller than the boat.
“Tell me what you mean,” she insisted and did her best to ignore the fear. She would put her faith in God’s wisdom and her own ingenuity.
“You will learn eventually, Isabelle. There is not enough time now.”
She stood up to see if the boat could possibly reach shore before it fell apart, but she could not see to the shore. The waves and the rain defined their world.
The boat rode up high, very high, and before it slammed into the trough of the wave, she saw lights above them, much closer now, but still too far away for the boat to make landfall before the worst of the storm overtook them.
The wooden trawler rose and fell, shuddering and rattling as the boards loosened and water seeped through the seams. Isabelle struggled to her feet, and helped Father Joubay stand as water pooled around their legs.
Another shudder and the roof of the cabin flew off. When the storm broke the boat apart, they could ride out the waves on one of the bigger pieces. The water was warm enough for them to survive for hours.
“Isabelle, listen,” Father Joubay shouted over the storm. He took her hand, pulling her down below the side of the wheelhouse so she could hear him. “When Sebastian Dushayne gave us permission to come to his island for a year of medical and missionary care?”
“Yes?” Hurry, she thought. We don’t have much time.
“There are two things you should know, Isabelle. One is rather odd.”
“Odd?” she prompted, worried that he would not finish before the waves swamped the boat.
“The first is that the island healer will not cooperate with you, and Dushayne insisted that I bring a doctor who could sing.”
Sing? A doctor who could sing? That was absurd. And besides, “I can’t sing and I’m a nurse, not a doctor.”
“You are as good as a doctor, Isabelle, and you have a lovely voice.”
“But that’s only in church. I only know hymns.”
He shook his head sharply as the waves took control of their lives. He shouted, “Sebastian loves music, especially music that is sung. It did not seem too much to ask. And if it was meant to be, I knew a singing doctor would appear, and you did. I do not think that will matter now. Kneel down.”
Father Joubay put his hand on her head and began to pray over her. “God keep you safe, Isabelle. Show Him that your love is true and pure and free.”
Show Him that your love is true. Is that what Father Joubay had said? God knew her heart better than anyone.
Isabelle felt the boat turn into the waves again, but this time instead of climbing over the mountain of water, it wallowed in the troughs.
The screeching wind made any more conversation impossible. His lips moved, but Isabelle could not hear what he said. Prayers surely. They held on to each other and, as the giant wall of water broke over them, she whispered, “God bless you too, Father.”
The storm came with such force that Sebastian Dushayne had to brace his body to stand at the open window and watch the harbor, his narrowed eyes the only concession to the rain that bit into him.
Anger pulsed through him, his rage matching the weather around him. Sebastian knew the boat would be lost the moment that the clouds dimmed the sun and the servants began to light candles.
The curse would not allow those on board the island trawler to reach the shore. Joubay and the doctor would die along with the fool who let money convince him that his boat could beat the curse’s fury.
The storm brought an early twilight, but Sebastian could see the boat as it struggled in the waves with a desperation that he could feel even this far away.
Joubay would pray. Sebastian knew better than to try that. God had no place here. This was the devil’s playground. The sounds of the revelry in the next room proved that. God’s minions were not welcome and lasted only as long as it took to seduce them with life’s pleasures.
The boat disappeared from sight and the words of the curse crawled through Sebastian’s memory as clearly as if it had been yesterday. Joubay, because you love this island, I cast you out. If you dare to return, you will die.
Even if Joubay was coming back with a solution to the curse, it would die with him. Sebastian wished he had never trusted, even for a moment, that there was a chance he could escape this island, his prison. He continued to stare at the roiling harbor. Suddenly, quiet settled around him as though a shield of silence held him between his world and some other place.
Two ephemeral shapes rose from the water, shrouded in the rain, but rising, rising, rising out of sight as a song echoed, sung in a lovely voice more than alto but not quite a soprano. “I will be with you always in light and in love. My light surrounds you with love from above.” The song ended, the cocoon vanished and the wind came back with renewed strength.
Cursing, Sebastian pushed the shutters closed, pressing with all his strength against the east wind that battered them.
He returned to the grand salon where the others partied, all of them unaware that people were dying within sight of this room. Why tell them, he thought. They were tourists, here for entertainment, for the taste of another time as if man had lived better or more fully in 1810.
If he told this group what was happening, they would be shocked and it would ruin the mood.
Sebastian had watched people die for so long he had grown used to it. He would take one of the women to bed and let her help him forget what he had witnessed.
The prettiest in this group, h
e was fairly certain her name was Genetta, reached for the one remaining cream cake and drank the last of the champagne with drunken greed.
No one complained. The group was already bored with the illusion of nineteenth-century life conjured for their entertainment and were well into the carnal pleasures that transcended time and place.
Genetta looked at him with a provocative pout and he nodded. She would be the one. Her gold blond hair was natural; her body was not too muscular, like so many other women these days. But Sebastian already knew what sex with her would be like.
She would be less entertaining than most. Not evil, not at all, but shallow and self-i ndulgent. And not very creative.
With a promise to bring back more champagne, Sebastian left the salon, found his way to the open courtyard, the inner ward of this onetime fortress.
As he crossed the wet stone, the squall was already passing. The last of the rain fell as a soft mist.
Sebastian opened the small door in the giant iron gate facing the sea. He saw the wreckage floating, random pieces of wood, the ship’s wheel, and among the debris a body in black, arms outstretched.
Sebastian Dushayne lived a curse of his own making. He had no doubt that he would spend eternity living it, but the least he could do was send word to the village and order a decent burial.
Two
Isabelle wondered if this was heaven and she was resting on a cloud. Impossible. She was sure heaven would be more than her idea of a perfect bed.
Besides, Isabelle knew she was alive. Her chest rose and fell with each breath as aches and pains marched over every inch of her body.
Where were Father Joubay and the trawler’s captain? Opening her eyes, Isabelle hoped to find them lying beside her, but all she could see was the crown of a massive canopied bed and the soft light of the candles on the table nearby.