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CHAPTER TEN

Chief Maxwell Harris sat at his desk, worried about the task at hand.  In twenty-four hours Hurricane Maxine would make landfall near the eastern end of Galveston Island. Maxine was a beast.  She was a powerful category five and was only gaining strength and speed. The destruction to Max's little town was going to be complete.  Over three-quarters of the structures in the town would take in at least ten feet of water. The remainder of the town would be subject to very high winds and torrential rain. Max could hardly imagine the damage that would be done to the city of Houston, but that was not his concern.  He needed to focus on what was important - saving the lives of the people in Santa Fe, Texas.

Max was hoping against hope that the report Elizabeth gave on her drive through the neighborhoods wasn’t true. She went from subdivision to subdivision and no one seemed to care one way or the other that a massive hurricane was headed right for them. They were content to keep their heads in the sand and hope the problem would just fix itself. Now that a mandatory evacuation order was in effect, they were required to leave under the letter of the law.  If they remained behind, they would be fined if they required any emergency services.  If such emergency services resulted in loss of life or damage to government property, they would face prosecution.

Max called a meeting of the Police Department, the Volunteer Fire Department, and every city employee on the payroll.  The "Captain" of the Volunteer Fire Department was sulking; he thought he should be running the show.  Max couldn’t care less about the man's insecurity as long as he kept his mouth shut and did what he was told.

     "OK, people, listen up; time is critical here."  The noise level dropped to a dull roar, but many people kept sipping coffee and chatting.  Max was growing impatient.  "Excuse me; may I have your attention?"  A few people turned and looked at him, but many continued to ignore him.

     "HEY! If it’s not too much trouble, can you people shut up and listen?"  You could hear a pin drop.   "Maybe some of you don't know what is going on here, but we have less than twenty-four hours to get the people in this town out of harm's way.  I do not have the time or the patience to tolerate anyone who isn’t focused and determined to do their job! If you have better things to do and don't care about keeping your job, then get the hell out, NOW!"

     "Dude, calm down, man.  In case you forgot, you're not my boss.  Just say what you have to say, and let's do what we have to do.  Sheesh!"  The man rolling his eyes was Deputy Mayor Tom Williams.  Tom was not a fan of the chief of police.  When Max's predecessor retired and Max took over as chief, Tom was very vocal in his objection to Max getting the job.  The deputy mayor thought the chief of police was a lazy smartass who lacked any sign of motivation.  Most of the people in the room, with the exception of Elizabeth, agreed.

     "Tom, I'm only going to say this once because we don’t have the time for me to repeat it.  Check your attitude before I lock you up in a holding cell.  I am your boss.  I'm the boss of every single person inside the city limits, and don't you forget it.  In a state of emergency, sole authority in all matters rests with the highest ranking law enforcement official.  You don't like it, take it up with the governor of the state of Texas! You have anything else to say?"

     The deputy mayor was shocked.  He didn't know that Max had that kind of passion in him.  The chief was staring at Tom.

      "I said, do you have anything else to say?"  Max had his eyes locked on Tom Williams.

     Tom looked around at everyone in the room.  They were deliberately avoiding his gaze.  He looked back at the chief, who was still staring at him.  He was clearly waiting for an answer.

     "No, I don't, please continue," Tom whispered and looked down.

     "Good, now let's get started.  We’ve printed up flyers to pass out to the citizens.  It clearly states the mandatory evacuation order and the consequences for violating it.  I want to make one thing very clear to everyone in this room.  If we receive any 9-1-1 calls while the storm is on top of us, we will not be responding.  I will not put anyone's life in danger by ordering my own officers to drive around in a category five hurricane.  I encourage each and every one of you to pass along this information to the local citizens.  Hopefully that will light a fire under their asses and get them moving.   Also on the flyer are the evacuation routes.  Once they make their way to I-45, all lanes of traffic will be heading north.  For those of you who don't know, that’s called contraflow.  Once they hit Houston, they can go either direction on Loop 610 and head north.  Inform them that once they get to Interstate 10, they might be diverted east or west to an alternate route leading north."

     "Excuse me, Chief?"  Deputy Collins had his hand raised.  He didn’t want to be dressed down like the deputy mayor.

     "Yes, Brad?"

     "We are going to have a hard time convincing people to leave when they don't have any gas."

     "Yes, Brad, you’re exactly right.  We’ve planned for that.   Each of you will be given gas vouchers to pass out.  Each household will get one, and I mean only one voucher.  The voucher is good for ten gallons of gas at the city garage or one of the three largest gas stations in the city.  I'm deputizing everyone in this room.  Every one of you will be given credentials and a police windbreaker.  If you don’t have a firearm, one will be issued to you.  We will maintain order at all four of these locations.  Each site will have a member of the police force in command; any citizen without a voucher will be turned away.  Any citizen trying to obtain more than ten gallons will be stopped.  It is crucial that we maintain order and not let things get out of control.  Does anyone have any questions?"

     "How long are we expected to perform this task?" one of the volunteer fireman asked.

     "All non-law enforcement personnel are expected to remain and perform their duty for the next twelve hours, at which time they are free to evacuate or remain behind in the command post set up at the high school."

     None of the police officers in the room needed to ask how long they would be staying.  They knew they were in it for the long haul.  They had already made arrangements for their families to leave immediately before the roads got too clogged.

     "If there are no more questions, you have your assigned streets and you know what to do."

     The room quickly cleared out.  Elizabeth had been smiling at Max the entire time, clearly impressed with her boss.  She waited for the last person to leave the room and walked over to him.

     "Elizabeth, I don't know how you could be smiling at a time like this."

     "Maxwell, I have never seen you take charge like that.  I knew you had it in you.  I must say I am very impressed.  You know Tom is going to try and get you fired for what you pulled.  Once things get back to normal, people are going to be talking about that all over town."

     "You like that?  The last thing we need is a pissing contest and that asshole trying to take charge and completely screwing things up.  He probably thought I was a pushover."

     "Well, it’s more than that, boss."

     "Really?  Do tell."

     "He is a forty-nine percent owner of one of the gas stations you got giving away free gas."

     Max laughed.  "Well that explains things!  And here I thought he wanted to be the Big Man in Charge!  But it’s simply about money, huh? What a scumbag."

     Elizabeth sat down in the chair across from the chief.  She undid her ponytail and let her long, flowing hair spill down onto her shoulders.  She sighed and slumped back.  The chief was taken aback by her beauty.

     "What?"

     "I've just never seen your hair down.  You always have it pulled back," Max smiled.

     Elizabeth ran her fingers through her hair and pulled it back up into a ponytail.  "How bad is this really going to get?  Are we on our own?"

     "Computer, bring up the latest Emergency Action Message from TX-DOT."

     A detailed overlay of south Texas appeared on the screen across the room.  Elizabeth turned around in her chair and studied the map.   "What am I looking at?"

     "Well, I must have stared at that thing for an hour after the evac order was issued."

     "I was wondering what you were doing while I was carrying out your instructions."

     "I'm hoping that I'm reading this wrong and that they’re working triple time to get the problem fixed."

     "What problem?"

     "Five miles south of the loop, they have the southbound lanes closed and have one lane diverted to the north side.  It’s going to be a bottleneck if they don't get those southbound lanes opened back up."

     "Jesus Christ!"

     "It gets worse.  I-45 between Houston and Dallas has construction in four different spots.  I don't know how they think they are going to get everyone out of here in time.  People south of the loop are going to have a hard time getting out of here."

     "Isn't that an official evacuation route?  I thought they couldn't close down more than one lane at a time."

     "I thought so, too.  Look at the map and see for yourself.  Please tell me I'm wrong."

     Elizabeth walked over to the wall and studied the map closely. "You're right.  This could be a disaster in the making."

     "Computer, pull up the traffic cams I studied earlier today."

     Three separate windows popped up.  Elizabeth studied them first to figure out where the traffic cameras were located and then to figure out the flow of traffic.

     "Son of a bitch!"

     "I know.  They better work fast; in twelve hours a whole bunch of people are going to be parked in their graves if they don't hurry up and figure something out."

     "What do you want me to do now, boss?"

     "You're riding with me.  Let's go."

     Chief Harris and Sergeant Reed climbed into the chief's SUV and headed for the city garage.  Max pulled two pills out of his shirt pocket and swallowed them.  His hip and knee were throbbing.  If they weren't in the middle of a crisis, he would have pulled out the cane and made every effort to not leave his office chair for the rest of the day.  Max thought ahead to the surgery he had planned in a few short weeks and tried not to let the overwhelming feeling of despair wash over him.  The surgery was surely not going to happen anytime soon.  He didn't know how much longer he could endure this pain.  If things got worse, he was ready to start doing heroin, job be damned.  He would rather be a junkie than live like this for the rest of his life.

     "You know if anyone else is doing this free gas thing you’re doing?"  Elizabeth put her hand on the chief's leg.  She knew he was in terrible pain.

     "I hope so.  It’s the only thing that makes sense.  It's the right call.  Most people don't keep half a tank of gas in their car.  You here for Ike?"

     "No, I was in my senior year up north of Dallas in Plano.  My uncle brought his family up to stay with us."

     "How long did it take him to get up there?"

     "Eighteen hours.  He usually makes the drive in six."

     "Sounds about right.  You think people could sit in a car for that long today?  Think about how many cars will run out of gas, get stuck and block traffic."

     "It would be a nightmare.  What do you think most people will do?"

     Max took a deep breath and thought for a second.   "I think most people will just stay home and hope for the best.  They don’t have the money for gas and know they wouldn’t make it far anyway, so why bother?"

     "I hope you’re wrong about that.  Any word on school buses being used to get people out?"

     "I wish it were that easy."

     "What do you mean?"

     "We might be one of the dozen states that still have public schools, but that's not saying much.  More and more schools are closing, leaving the ones that are still open extremely overcrowded.  Then the kids just drop out.  When the schools close, they auction off everything that isn't nailed down to help keep the operating schools running.  There aren't nearly enough school buses to do any kind of good."

     The two officers didn’t say anything else.  The city garage was less than a minute away.  They turned into the front entrance and parked near the back.   They both stayed in the car and watched the team that had set up shop to supervise.  A line had already begun to form outside the main gate.  The team had used orange cones to designate a route to the main gas tanks.  They were in the process of cordoning off an exit route to the back gate so that no one would linger around the tanks and cause a commotion.  Max watched the team and was satisfied that things were moving along smoothly.

     "Elizabeth, I owe you an apology."

     "For what?"

     "In the office, when you let down your hair...”

     "You were staring at me like a horny teenager?"

     Max's face turned beet red.  "Yeah, that.  That was unprofessional, and if it made you uncomfortable I sincerely apologize.  I'm your boss, and the last thing I want is for you to feel uncomfortable around me.  It won't happen again; I'm sorry."