For a whole day it rained, turning the camp into a giant mud bath. Now the sun had returned, cooking every surface with a crust of dried earth. Each afternoon more MREs appeared, tossed from the back of an Army five-ton, but never any news. The chemical toilets were foul, the waste cans overflowing with trash. Kittridge spent hours watching the front gate; no more refugees were coming in. With each passing day, the place had begun to feel like an island surrounded by a hostile sea.
He’d made an ally of Vera, the Red Cross volunteer who had first approached them in the check-in line. She was younger than Kittridge had first thought, a nursing student at Midwest State. Like all the civilian workers, she seemed utterly drained, the days of strain weighing in her face. She understood his frustration, she said, everyone did. She had hoped to take the buses, too; she was stranded like the rest of them. One day they were coming from Chicago, then next from Kansas City, then from Joliet. Some FEMA screwup. They were supposed to get a bank of satellite phones, too, so people could call their relatives and let them know they were okay. What had happened to that, Vera didn’t know. Even the local cell network was down.
Kittridge had begun to see the same faces: an elegantly dressed woman who kept a cat on a leash, a group of young black men all dressed in the white shirts and black neckties of Jehovah’s Witnesses, a girl in a cheer-leading outfit. A listlessness had settled over the camp; the deflected drama of nondeparture had left everyone in a passive state. There were rumors that the water supply had become contaminated, and now the medical tent was full of people complaining of stomach cramps, muscle aches, fever. A number of people had radios that were still operating, but all they heard was a ringing sound, followed by the now-familiar statement from the Emergency Broadcast System. Do not leave your homes. Shelter in place. Obey all orders of military and law enforcement personnel. Another minute of ringing, and the words would be repeated.
Kittridge had begun to wonder if they were ever getting out of there. And all night long, he watched the fences.
Late afternoon of the fourth day: Kittridge was playing yet another hand of cards with April, Pastor Don, and Mrs. Bellamy. They’d switched from bridge to five-card poker, betting ludicrous sums of money that were purely hypothetical. April, who claimed never to have played before, had already taken Kittridge for close to five thousand dollars. The Wilkeses had disappeared; nobody had seen them since Wednesday. Wherever they’d gone, they’d taken their luggage with them.
“Jesus, it’s roasting in here,” Joe Robinson said. He’d barely been off his cot all day.
“Sit in a hand,” Kittridge suggested. “It’ll take your mind off the heat.”
“Christ,” the man moaned. The sweat was pouring off him. “I can barely move.”
Kittridge, with only a pair of sixes, folded his cards. April, wearing a perfect poker face, raked in another pot.
“I’m bored,” Tim announced.
April was sorting the slips of paper they used for chips into piles. “You can play with me. I’ll show you how to bet.”
“I want to play crazy eights.”
“Trust me,” she told her brother, “this is a lot better.”
Pastor Don was dealing a fresh hand when Vera appeared at the flap of the tent. She quickly met Kittridge’s eye. “Can we talk outside?”
He rose from the cot and stepped into the late-day heat.
“Something’s going on,” Vera said. “FEMA just got word that all civilian transportation east of the Mississippi has been suspended.”
“Are you certain?”
“I overheard them talking about it in the site director’s office. Half the FEMA staff has bugged out already.”
“Who else knows about this?”
“Are you kidding? I’m not even telling you.”
So there it was; they were being abandoned. “Who’s the officer in charge?”
“Major something. I think her name is Porcheki.”
A stroke of luck. “Where is she now?”
“She should be in the shed. There was some colonel, but he’s gone. A lot of them are gone.”
“I’ll talk to her.”
Vera frowned doubtfully. “What can you do?”
“Maybe nothing. But at least it’s worth a try.”
She hurried away; Kittridge returned to the tent. “Where’s Delores?”
Wood lifted his eyes from his cards. “I think she’s working in one of the medical tents. The Red Cross put out a call for volunteers.”
“Somebody go get her.”
When everyone was present, Kittridge explained the situation. Assuming Porcheki would provide fuel for the