Page 16 of Hurricane Irene

Team 5 turned west to support them. Luke sent Teams 1 and 2 toward Darden by separate routes, keeping Team 3 moving evacuees.

Team 6 found the crawfish camp at 1447 hours. The cabin had folded into itself, tin roof resting in the trees and the porch gone. Two aluminum traps hung from a limb twenty feet above the water. Irish circled once, searching for movement.

Hoot shouted. Bone fired the air horn. Nothing answered. Then Bogey saw a red fuel can wedged at the mouth of a narrow slough. Fresh rope marks crossed its handle. They followed the slough until both banks closed tight around them.

A quarter mile in, they found an overturned airboat jammed under sweetgum branches. One brother clung to the exposed hull. The other lay on a hummock above the water with a branch pinned across his legs. He had been there since the storm.

Team 5 arrived from the opposite end, engines muted, Jalen’s crew visible through the trees like figures in a broken mirror.

“We brought seven,” Chief called.

“Show-off,” Irish answered. Between the two boats they stabilized the wreck, cut away the branch, and moved the injured man onto a backboard.

The trapped brother had no feeling below one knee and a fever that worried HG. His older brother would not stop talking, describing every hour since the water rose, every failed attempt to free him, every sound in the night.

Will gave him water in measured swallows. Chase found their radio in the wreck, its casing crushed. Benji lifted a crawfish trap from a tree and set it atop the ruined boat.

“Evidence,” he said.

“Of what?” Milo asked.

“That dinner escaped.” Nobody laughed much, but the older brother did, and for a moment his shaking eased.

At 1515 hours, Darden’s house remained unconfirmed.

Team 7 reached the outer side of the barges and found the canal choked with floating drums. Team 4 worked from the inner side with axes and lines. Team 1 approached through a submerged cane field while Team 2 searched along the old parish ditch.

Radios overlapped with bearings, depths, and warnings. The sky dimmed until afternoon resembled evening. Thunder moved closer. Nobody said the forecast had promised this rain would wait.

Nine brought Team 7 alongside the first barge. Its mooring chain had wound through tree trunks and bridge wreckage, cinching the two steel hulls into a gate. Gaspar and Ghost climbed aboard. Ian, Baptiste, and Luc used pike poles to push drums away from the stern. Most were empty. One was not. It rolled heavily, leaking a rainbow thread.

“No sparks,” Nine warned over the radio. From the inland side, Cade answered.

“There goes my entire skill set.” Bodhi told his brother to find another personality.

Magnus and Wade cut branches while Remy hauled a line from the barge to a cypress. Gaspar freed the chain one link at a time. The current pressed steady against the hulls. When the last loop came loose, the nearer barge shifted with a deep iron groan and scraped six feet downstream. A narrow passage opened between steel and branches.

Team 4 went first, their boat barely clearing. Team 7 followed. Behind them, the gap began closing again.

Darden’s property appeared at 1542 hours: a rusted windmill, a drowned tractor, and a white house standing on pilings above a brown current. One shutter banged in a slow, patient rhythm. The front door hung open. A wheelchair floated upside down in the yard, one wheel turning though the wind had dropped.

Every man saw it. No one commented. Bodhi called from the porch while Nine circled the rear. There was no answer. Mud covered the steps. Fresh marks crossed it, two narrow tracks leading from the doorway toward the water, then stopping at a dark stain along the edge of the deck.

“Could be fuel,” Cade said.

“Could be,” Bodhi answered, which was not the same as agreement.

Inside, the house smelled of mud, kerosene, and spoiled food. A clock had stopped at 0418 hours. Family photographs curled on the walls. Remy found a cane near the kitchen. Ghost found a jar of prescription tablets on the floor, cap off, pills turned to paste.

In the back room, the bed was empty and a square of plywood had been dragged over the sill like a ramp.

“She moved herself,” Luc said. Outside, the tracks continued along the side deck to a flat-bottomed boat that was no longer there.

Luke arrived as the teams spread into a line. Team 2 came through the parish ditch. Four boats searched west from Darden’s house, idling beneath a sky almost purple with weather. They found one oar, then a cushion, then nothing.

At 1610 hours, the wind freshened and turned floating debris until every pale object looked like a hand. Twice Cam shouted and twice it was insulation caught in reeds. On the second pass, nobody cursed him.

“Twenty minutes,” Luke said. “Then we mark and return tomorrow.” Thunder rolled over the marsh. Eric looked at the black water.