![]() The thing was to get through this one, to get the power back on, and then to forget it. As for the rest-well, future floods could take care of themselves. ![]() Or so said Zack Denbrough, who worked for Bangor Hydroelectric. Now, though, the river was receding, and when the new Bangor Hydro dam went in upstream, the river would cease to be a threat. Clutched in what remained of his hands had been a Ford steering wheel. The fish had eaten this unfortunate gentleman's eyes, three of his fingers, his penis, and most of his left foot. One of the flood victims had been found twenty-five miles east, in Bucksport. That was a long time ago, but there were still enough people around who remembered it to scare the rest. God knew it had happened before-the flooding in 1931 had been a disaster which had cost millions of dollars and almost two dozen lives. Yesterday overflow and expensive flood damage had seemed almost inevitable. Right now a gang of men-Zack Denbrough, George's and Bill's father, among them-were removing the sandbags they had thrown up the day before with such panicky haste. The Kenduskeag Stream had crested just below its banks in the Barrens and bare inches below the concrete sides of the Canal which channelled it tightly as it passed through downtown. The Public Works Department had managed to keep Jackson Street open, but Witcham was impassable from the sawhorses all the way to the center of town.īut, everyone agreed, the worst was over. By that time, many people in Derry had begun to make nervous jokes about arks. By noon of the fourth day, big chunks of the street's surface were boating through the intersection of Jackson and Witcham like miniature white-water rafts. The water had first pried fingerholds in the paving and then snatched whole greedy handfuls-all of this by the third day of the rains. Beyond them, the rain had spilled out of gutters clogged with branches and rocks and big sticky piles of autumn leaves. Stencilled across each of the horses was DERRY DEPT. He had made it sitting up in bed, his back propped against a pile of pillows, while their mother played Fur Elise on the piano in the parlor and rain swept restlessly against his bedroom window.Ībout three-quarters of the way down the block as one headed toward the intersection and the dead traffic light, Witcham Street was blocked to motor traffic by smudgepots and four orange sawhorses. In that autumn of 1957, eight months before the real horrors began and twenty-eight years before the final showdown, Stuttering Bill was ten years old.īill had made the boat beside which George now ran. His brother, William, known to most of the kids at Derry Elementary School (and even to the teachers, who would never have used the nickname to his face) as Stuttering Bill, was at home, hacking out the last of a nasty case of influenza. The boy in the yellow slicker was George Denbrough. ![]() It tapped on the yellow hood of the boy's slicker, sounding to his ears like rain on a shed roof. The rain had not stopped, but it was finally slackening. ![]() Most sections of Derry had lost their power then, and it was not back on yet.Ī small boy in a yellow slicker and red galoshes ran cheerfully along beside the newspaper boat. There had been steady rain for a week now, and two days ago the winds had come as well. The three vertical lenses on all sides of the traffic light were dark this afternoon in the fall of 1957, and the houses were all dark, too. The boat bobbed, listed, righted itself again, dived bravely through treacherous whirlpools, and continued on its way down Witcham Street toward the traffic light which marked the intersection of Witcham and Jackson. Different sites may have different approaches and designs for laying out the content, so occasionally you may need to explore further to get to the next chapter.The terror, which would not end for another twenty-eight years-if it ever did end-began, so far as I know or can tell, with a boat made from a sheet of newspaper floating down a gutter swollen with rain. You’ll need a web browser and an active Internet connection in order to read every chapter available on the author’s website. In this post, you’ll find 79 free general, modern fiction, short stories, and spiritual web series.
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