Chapter 2

Pink and Mauve

There was a faint sound off toward Charleston ... kinda like those Civil Defense sirens that they used to test about once a month. She came awake looking for a school. desk to hide under. Then the shark alarm at the park and she was REALLY awake now. She fumbled with the radio alarm clock.

Said the radio, ‘Tsunami Warning. Evacuate to higher ground.’

A massive trembler at the Mid- Atlantic Ridge normally signifies a wider split. The under water mountain range widens and there is a slight drop in the ocean level as the seawater fills in the hole. There wasn’t a human in sight the last time the ocean floor humped ... it had been 17 or 18 thousand years since a genuine tsunami inundated the North Hemisphere shoreline ... and nobody would have noticed if there had been someone around to notice. The oceans were a lot shallower then ... all that water frozen as ice made for a much farther out shore ... well ... the impossible had finally happened ... a hump instead of a drop.

“Miss Hastings? Miss Hastings!” The local National Guard Commander called. His Jeep was at her gate.

She came to the stoop, “What do you want, Joshua?”

“Evacuate to higher ground!”

“In case you hadn’t noticed ... I am higher ground” ... and she was. Pink and Mauve was a good hundred and twenty feet above the shore.

The worst storm surge had never wetted so much as a stick of her veranda latticework. A force five wind gust of 145mph had blown the railing on the widow flat but that was as close as Pink and Mauve had ever come. These old craft built homes were sturdy. The only home ever damaged was the new construction three houses north ... and it was rebar reenforced concrete. The empty ‘shell’ was still there.

“You’re staying?”

“Aye.”

“On your own head it be then.”

His driver continued down the street, stopping at each house.

It was full on dark when the tsunami struck ... six waves in succession, the third was the tallest ... wiped out the gated community on the southern point entire ... not a board left standing.

But ... ain’t that always the way? ... But ... there is always a but, Murphy said and it was so ... the 251 foot German U-boat came ashore in Miss Hastings’ front yard. The sub’s bow was neatly stuck in her front gate.

There are ... were... 46 U-Boats missing during the war ... no records, no reports ... unexplained.

Well ... one that was supposedly lost off New Jersey was actually lost off Edisto. Why the boat was that far out of its assigned operational area we’ll never know ... but ... it was intact. The Schornel was in the raised position. All hatches were closed. The crew was missing.

No claims ... not by bomber or by ship. Nothing. Another Bermuda Triangle mystery.

“Miss Hastings?” Joshua was at her gate ... again.

“When are you going to get that thing outta my yard?”

“What?” “Where?” “When?” “How?”

“I don’t know. I got up this morning and it was there.”