The only things that moved as I looked out over the farm were my father’s shirts that I had washed earlier that day and hung out to dry. They were his brand-new uniforms, emblazoned with the initials WPA, the Works Progress Administration, Roosevelt’s answer to the Great Depression, and thankfully to those of us who suffered the dust storms. There was no relief for women, though. We were left to scatter on the wind. My destination was a great-aunt from my mother’s side whom I had never met before, and I was grateful for a place to land, because my father was now free to work.
As I looked out the kitchen window, a gust of wind burst through the open window and into the kitchen, reminding me that I ought to bring in the clothes. Grabbing the empty laundry basket, I went out the kitchen door and down the stairs. The screen door slammed behind me; the wicker basket bounced at my hip. I tossed the basket onto the ground and began to pull the clothes from the line, folding each item tightly, and my mind running over the things I had yet to do.
As I took down a shirt and folded the sleeves together, I heard the sullen creak of the windmill as it came to life and started to spin. Only a moment later a gust of air rushed over me. Wary, always wary now, I looked up, but saw only that perfect blue sky. It was just the wind. No need to run. I lowered my head and resumed folding the clothes. Minutes passed and I was almost finished. Then, another gust and a creak of the windmill. Again, I lifted my eyes.
Crouching low on the horizon, almost hiding from sight, a dark cloud gathered. My eyes quickly scanned along the bulk of it, which spread across the horizon fast and wide as I watched. The cloud curled and billowed furiously until it rose up and dominated the serene blue sky. It was a monster and galloping toward me, growing larger all the while. It was my enemy. It was the dust.
I moved quickly, yanking the clothes down and tossing them into the basket. The windmill spun wildly, screaming a high-pitched wail that droned on and on. I darted a glance back. The cloud had swelled even higher. I ran faster, my eyes now glued to the storm, gauging how much time I had left. Not much. Blackness devoured the sky until only a small circle of blue remained above my head. Why was nature so cruel that she had to deliver a final blow as a farewell?
My feet had just landed on the first stair when I felt the hot wind slam into me and yank my dress tight against my body, shoving me toward the door. I felt the bite of a million needles on my exposed skin and the dry rush of sand as it pelted my face and filled my eyes and nose. Gasping and coughing, I muscled the door open against the wind, struggling mightily. Sand burst inside before I slammed the door closed.
Dirt blasted against the house, surrounding me as it whipped inside from the open window, and sprayed across the counters and covered the vegetables I had been cutting. I slammed the window shut, and then raced around the house, closing windows as fast as I could as dirt pummeled my face. When every window was shut, and the wind howled angrily outside, I felt my way along the walls until I reached the kitchen. I could just barely read the clock. It was a quarter past one in the afternoon and I stood in complete and utter blackness.
It was the sound, though, that forced me to the cellar. In the wind I heard howling dogs and laughing devils, their calls rising and falling in intensity. All alone as I was, the cellar was my only choice. I shut the door behind me and waited on the stairs hour after hour, for the angry howls to cease. Sometimes, I listened with my ear to the door, but all I heard was the buzzing wind, which screamed so much longer and louder than I’d ever heard it before. I confess that right then and there, I fell to my knees on those treads, and began to pray for the safety of my father, certain he was on the road and plunged into this nightmare of nature, and all because of me, because he had to buy my train ticket for the morning.
I reached to twirl the ring around my finger. I was horrified to find it gone. I crawled about on the stairs, feeling in the darkness, but I found nothing. It was lost. I was lost. Hope left me then and I knew that I was well and truly alone.
After what seemed a great amount of time, a thin line of pale light shone from beneath the cellar door, and I went up the stairs and opened the door. Sand was everywhere, covering the wooden floors and piled against the walls beneath the windows. I saw that three windows had shattered and the sand poured in, already reclaiming the farmhouse as its own.
I walked to the front door and opened it, kicking away the sand to step outside. The sky was once again a perfect blue, the sun heavy and golden in the late afternoon. But, piled onto the north side of our house, all the way to the roof, was a dune of sand. It was almost as if nature was making good and sure I’d never want to return.
As I looked around, I saw a dark spot approaching from far in the distance. Slowly it grew larger and larger, and by the time the sun just started to disappear for the night, I recognized the figure as my father.
“Pa!” I yelled, and ran toward him. Gray dust coated every inch of his skin and the whites of his eyes shone bright from beneath the grime. I didn’t care and I hugged him fiercely, almost violently. I had thought I might not ever see him again.
“I’m just fine, Zara,” said my father. “I took shelter at the Emersons’ farm.”
“I thought they left for California.”
“They did, so I didn’t have to ask permission. I broke a window and went upstairs.” He tried to give me a happy, reassuring look. “I even took a nap on their bed.”
The rest of the evening we moved about as if in a dream. The only bright spot—and it was a bright spot—was that I found my mother’s ring in the laundry basket, buried amid the shirts and sand. It must have come off my finger in my panic, but thankfully fell in the safest place it could. Instead of putting it on my finger again, I found a ribbon and hung the ring from my neck. I went to bed, knowing that tomorrow we would walk out, never to return, leaving everything untouched. We wouldn’t even lock the door so that the next poor soul might have a place to hide during a storm.
∗ ∗ ∗
Right after the sun rose in the morning, I put on my simple cotton dress, stockings and my Mary Janes. I brought an overcoat, which my father laughed at. “Imagine a coat in Florida,” he said, as we walked to the train station. More than once, I looked back at the farm, expecting to be filled with sorrow, but I felt nothing. Nothing at all. When we reached the station, he pressed a few crumpled bills into my hand.
My father was never a man for goodbyes. We stood on the platform, the great black train huffing and spitting out steam beside us, barely able look at each other. People milled around us, each one of them thin and tired looking. Much like ourselves I supposed. When he spoke, his voice wavered a bit. “I have the address of your Aunt Cleo. I’ll write to you when I can. The WPA will send you a check every month on my behalf, and if I can spare it, I’ll send you more.” He reached out and touched my cheek. “I hope things get better, Zara.” He cleared his throat before adding, “Zara, just hold on tight and have faith.”
My throat closed and I couldn’t speak, so I took the money without protest and hugged him quickly before turning away.
I climbed the steps on the railcar, and took my seat by the window, scanning the crowd hoping for one last look at him. He stood on the platform, watching me with his ever-present grim smile. From my vantage point on the train, I saw him with new perspective, with the eyes of a stranger, and he was no longer my Pa, but a beaten down man who looked as if he might blow away in the wind.
Chapter Two
The train gave a shrill whistle, huffed to life and belched out a thick cloud of white steam before lurching forward. Slowly, haltingly, it chugged through our small town, gaining speed and certainty until it broke free onto the open plains. As we passed each farm, children spilled from the small houses, chased along beside us until they could no longer keep up and fell away one by one. Faster still we moved, until the homes and farms and the land that I held dear were only a blur, a memory of a hope that I once carried in my heart. If only the train could go backward and deliver me to earl
ier, happier days. But I had to be more practical than to indulge in fantasy.
I looked around and saw in the faces of the passengers an assortment of suffering. I recognized the floral pattern from my dress on no less than three other women and felt a kinship with them. For all of us had a secret. Our dresses were cut from the cloth sacks of government flour, decorated just for the needy so that we might clothe ourselves.
We traveled a dull patchwork of bare earth fields stitched together with fences of barbed wire. Tumbleweeds huddled at the seams. The land was as ravaged as my own heart, my own faith in the world. I closed my eyes. I could take no more. Perhaps a fresh start would do me well. Perhaps the invitation from my aunt to live with her in Florida offered me a new beginning.
Uneasiness settled over me, a feeling that I was hurtling toward a murky future and that it was too late to change course. When night fell, I took solace in the darkness, in the sheet of glass that reflected back only my own likeness. Weary blue eyes, far too old for an eighteen-year-old, stared back at me. Hastily pulled-back hair, strands bleached white from the sun, formed a halo around my face. Smooth skin was the only sign of my youth.
Soon enough I slept. In the morning, the rising sun revealed a very different world than I was familiar with. The washed-out palette of the prairie was gone. Everything had turned from ashen brown into provocative shades of green. Trees were everywhere and vines tumbled from them. Lush grasses carpeted the fields. I marveled at how quickly things changed. The only constant was my uncertainty.
As the day wore on we grew closer and closer to our destination, and I opened the letter from my Great-Aunt Cleo. The words were written hurriedly and in an uneven scrawl that spread erratically across the paper.
∗ ∗ ∗
I will take Zara. She may be some comfort to me now that I am old. I am an old timer, not a penny to spare, even before the hard times came. There’s no running water or electricity. But if you’re in a bad way that doesn’t matter. Please remember to send the payments from your paychecks, cash if you can. I have stopped using banks since mine went under. From the train station, she should follow the road south until she comes to the bridge over the river. It is halfway down, and there is a sign with my name—Delaney.
Make sure she understands that once she crosses the bridge she is not to go to the gate, but come down the path. She must never go to the gate.
—Cleo
∗ ∗ ∗
I tucked the letter into my suitcase. My grandmother’s sister. I tried to remember my grandmother, but I could only recall vague memories of sitting in her lap before she died when I was seven.
Suddenly, our train came close to a great river. The land rose and fell in gentle hills, dotted by large oak trees whose limbs swung low to the ground. Every now and then we passed a copse of swampland, covered in cypress trees, their fists plunged into the dark water as if they hung on for dear life. The conductor came and let me know that we would soon arrive at my destination. I looked out the window again, at the secretive, tumbling foliage that would be my new world. I was surprised to find that I missed the simplicity of the prairie. The flat and broad land of the plains kept no secrets hidden, as I suspected this land did.
Finally, the train slowed down and then stopped, and I looked out the window at the lonely train station. It was more of a covered platform, and completely empty save for one man napping on a bench, a hat covering his eyes. He didn’t even bother to look up at the train, which told me he anticipated no passengers would disembark.
I saw a sign hanging from the wall. “Welcome to Suwannee, Florida, Fertilizer Capital of the World.” I stood and disembarked, and I was the only one to step from the train. A wave of moist heat enveloped me, and even though my coat hung limply in my arms, the heat was such that I could hardly stand to hold the coat any longer.
The small ticket window was shut tight. I hadn’t considered that possibility, and it caused a new worry as I had no real directions other than to follow a road to a bridge. Looking at the man, I saw he wore a police uniform. Though I didn’t want to be rude, with the sun dropping in the sky, I had no choice but to wake him and ask directions. He was stout, middle-aged and his uniform pulled tight across his chest.
It turned out that I didn’t need to wake him after all because as soon as I drew close, he pulled the hat away and squinted with one eye open and one closed. He ran his lazy gaze over me. I distrusted him right away. A man who can’t spare a full glance for a person doesn’t deserve my trust.
“What can I do for you, sugar?” he said in a low, rolling drawl.
“I’m sorry to wake you. I’m here to visit family. I’m hoping you could help me with directions.” I read the return address of the envelope aloud to him. “Do you know where that is?”
His other eye finally popped open. “Why are you headed that way?” Apparently, I said something that interested him and he sat straight up. “Don’t tell me you’re one of them?”
“One of whom?” I said. I didn’t understand his question, but I heard the anger in his tone, and something deeper beyond even that. “Do you question all visitors like this?”
“When they’re headed in that direction I do. That’s how I keep out the unwanted folk who come here for…ill reasons.” He took another look at me, and I felt uncomfortable.
“Ill reasons? I’m coming to live with my Grandmother’s sister. My great-aunt.”
“Your aunt?” He looked at me again. “Who’s your aunt?”
“Cleo Delaney.”
He laughed out loud, a huge guffaw that seemed almost obnoxious. “Thank God,” he said and laughed again. “Why didn’t you say so, sugar?”
I ignored his question and decided to ask for help once more. “If you could help me with some directions, I would appreciate it.”
“I’ll do one better than that.” His meaty fingers nabbed the hat from his chest and then with a flick of his hand he tossed it expertly on his head and tapped it into place. “I’ll escort you myself.” Then, he stood up and hitched his belt higher over his belly. “What did you say your name was again?”
“I didn’t.” I quickly shifted my suitcase and held out a hand. “Zara. Zara Pendleton.”
He took my hand in his, and it was clammy. “Pendleton. Hmm. Now I know exactly who you are. I read a letter to your aunt from your pa a few weeks back.” He scratched his forehead thoughtfully. ”
“Thank you, Sheriff, for offering to give me a ride.”
He led me to his police cruiser and opened the passenger door for me. We travelled north with the windows open. I marveled at the warm weather, and the thick trees all around us. We came to a river, the same large one I had seen from the train, I thought. He said, “Your great-aunt lives just off the river there, down past the bridge. I check in on her now and then and every Sunday I pick her up for church services.”
The river widened a bit, and the course of it drew farther away from the road. A brick fence, perhaps ten feet high, ran along beside the river. Far off in the distance, I could see a strange white spire piercing the sky. But if there was anything else to see, it was hidden behind the trees.
“What is that strange tower?” I asked.
“It’s hard to ignore, isn’t it?” the sheriff said. “That tower, sugar, is living proof that there are plenty of crazies in the world. That is the compound of the Lucians.”
“The what?” I asked
He laughed. “That’s what everybody says. Until they find out more about them. Their leader, a man named Navarre, fashions himself a reincarnated mythic god, and all his followers think he walks on air.”
We were getting close to the bridge now, but he slowed down and I could see his sinister delight in trying to scare me. “They’re heathens. They worship sins of the flesh. They dance beneath the moon. And if he wasn’t the most powerful man in the state, I’d have his ass up in Georgia, or out in the Gulf of Mexico, swimming with the fishes, if you know what I mean.”
I was co
nfused. “How is he so powerful?”
“Dumb luck. He owns thousands of acres of junk land around here. Except, it turns out, it’s not worthless after all because underneath the ground they found deposits of phosphate.”
“Phosphate.” I thought he was about to say gold or silver, and I was surprised to hear the word phosphate.
“You know. Fertilizer. The whole world gets its fertilizer from this little town. And he owns almost all of it.”
We had come to the bridge. He stopped the car, turned and handed me my suitcase. “Here we are.”
“Thank you,” I said, opened the door. His arm shot out and grabbed me. “I will tell you this. Stay away from him. He eats pretty young girls for breakfast, I hear.” Without meaning to, I shook his hand from my arm and climbed from the car.
After I had slammed the door, he leaned across the seat. “Now, Zara,” he yelled after me, “once you cross the bridge, just take the road that doesn’t have the gate. Just to the left. Can’t miss it. You tell your aunt I said hello, and stay out of trouble.” The car peeled away and left me in a small cloud of dust.
∗ ∗ ∗
Those were the events that brought me to where I now stood, with my foot hovering over the first slat of a wooden bridge. Underneath me, a river, dark as coffee, slithered along. Sweat covered me from head to toe. I felt so very Northern at that moment, so out of place in the swampy Florida landscape. Still dressed for a brisk spring day in the plains in my woolen hose, and with my coat still hanging uselessly over my arm.
The bridge was exactly as my aunt described in her letter. Right at the curve in the road, and with a sign that read Delaney, her name and my mother’s maiden name. The bridge was crafted from old railroad ties, and the structure looked ancient as it stretched across the river. Just on the opposite bank the road forked in two directions. On one side, the road stretched on away from the marshy grasses at the bank of the river toward the trees—cypress and pine—which were hidden behind the fence and iron gate. My aunt was oddly clear, as was the sheriff, that I was not to go anywhere near the gate.
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