Disaster in Paradise. Amanda Bath

to Gibraltar a decade earlier, shortly after my father died.

      My purse contained my wallet and Canadian credit cards, my digital camera, my iPod and a small address book.

      I left as one does on any morning. I didn’t reach down to pet Ozzie, curled on the bed enjoying his usual morning nap. I didn’t even think to say goodbye to Ozzie.

      Jillian met me in her comfortable silver Buick with its grey leather seats as deep and soft as armchairs, and we commented on recent developments with the creek. Wednesday had been a frightening day for them too.

      John had been one of the work crew attempting to reconnect the waterline above Gerry Rogers’s driveway; John Madill and Val Webber were by tradition the residents who usually volunteered to take care of water system problems. John, Val and Gerry worked on the waterline, watched by Loran, neighbours Harvey Armstrong and John Lerbscher, plus John’s son, daughter-in-law and baby grandson, and a visiting student garden worker, Aspen. The creek flow, dark and thick as chocolate syrup, fluctuated wildly.

      As she drove, Jillian described what John had told her. “The work crew walked along an ice shelf next to the creek to get to and from the waterline. Gerry was on the ice shelf when Loran heard another surge coming and saw the water rise, pushing a pile of tree debris ahead of it. Loran yelled at the top of his lungs for Gerry to run, which he did, but fortunately there was nothing more behind the surge.”

      As they’d stood in the middle of the dark stinking torrent, struggling to reconnect the pipe, Val Webber had turned to Gerry and asked, “Are we safe?” Gerry, without a moment’s hesitation, told him, “No!”

      As we neared the Argenta Flats, two trucks passed us in the opposite direction, emblazoned with BC Hydro and Corix logos. My heart sank. I was fairly sure they were on their way to Johnson’s Landing to install the dreaded smart meters. Many of us had been campaigning against and objecting vigorously to these electronic replacement meters, which broadcast information about our power usage in the form of electromagnetic waves. I’d pinned a notice beside our old analogue meter, refusing permission to replace it, but it would make no difference. I feared I was going to find a smart meter stuck on the side of the house when I returned.

      Our drive was uneventful. We arrived in Kaslo at ten a.m. and went about our errands. House chores, indeed, awaited me—and as I expected, the yard in particular needed urgent attention. Uli Holtkamp from Argenta, one of my closest friends, had decided at the last minute to join me for lunch; I found his phone message on the answering machine, saying he’d be there just after noon. I set the table with a vase of flowers in the centre in anticipation of a delightful visit.

      I extracted the ancient gas-powered lawn mower from the shed and by eleven thirty was struggling to mow the lawn, weeds mostly, shaggy and difficult to cut after all that rain in June. The mower clogged, almost stalled and I had to backtrack and repeat my mow-line. It was tedious and sweaty work.

      Out of the corner of my eye I saw Andy Shadrack, our regional district’s area director for the past eight years, waving at me. He looked uncharacteristically agitated, crossing the lawn towards me almost at a run. I shut off the mower as he approached. Christopher and I appreciated Andy’s conscientiousness in representing and advocating for our diverse and opinionated local population.

      Without any preamble, he broke the news. “There’s been a serious mudslide in Johnson’s Landing.”

      I gaped at him, sweat trickling down my face.

      “Who lives at 2051 Johnson’s Landing Road?”

      I looked at the swath of grass I’d managed to mow and, frowning, swung my gaze back to Andy. “That’s Kurt’s house.”

      Andy’s voice dropped to almost a whisper. “They say it’s gone.”

      I began to shake. Lightheaded, I followed Andy back to his house, three doors up the street from ours. His partner, Gail, sat me down and handed me a cup of water. I sipped and talked aloud. “What an amazing stroke of luck that Kurt’s in Toronto for the hernia surgery. My God, is it just—his house? How could that be possible?” Andy got busy on the phone, but information was hard to come by. I rose to leave and Gail hugged me. Andy signalled he’d let me know when he found out more.

      I hurried back down the street, sweat drying on my body. I rinsed my face in the bathroom. Kurt’s house? The phone rang: on the other end Renata sounded hysterical, close to tears. “I don’t want to say anything unless you have somebody with you.” Somewhere deep inside me, a cold hard lozenge of knowledge sank and anchored. I already knew what she was about to say. I took a deep breath and tried to keep my voice even.

      “It’s okay, Ren. Andy already told me there’s been a slide. What’s happened?”

      She hesitated and then blurted, “Your house is totally gone! It’s just a pile of logs and mud!”

      So Andy was misinformed—it wasn’t Kurt’s house, 2051, but ours, 2075. Ours! Of course! That made more sense. Kurt’s house was above the bank, ours much closer to the creek. Ozzie sprang to mind, cozy on the bed. “And Ozzie? What about Ozzie?”

      Renata had no news of Ozzie. I pulled the office chair over to the phone and cradled my damp head in my hand. Renata had more to tell me. Val Webber and his girls, Diana and Rachel, were buried in their house. The slide had also covered Petra Frehse’s house. Renata described briefly her own miraculous escape, and urged me to stay in Kaslo. I hung up, bewildered. How could a slide down the creek reach Val’s house so far away?

      I could barely take in the details of how Renata had run to safety just before the landslide swept past her, missing the post office cabin by a few metres. Outside the Kaslo house nothing had changed, the sun was shining. Not knowing what else to do, I attacked the wretched lawn again until the mower ran out of gas. Ren’s words hammered in my skull: “Your house is totally gone!” I couldn’t grasp it or believe it. How could it be gone? Where had it gone? Where was Ozzie?

      I went indoors and grabbed a glass of water. Just after noon it occurred to me that I had to tell Christopher. But what would I say? How could such an impossible thing be true, the house gone, the post cabin, only metres away, untouched? Houses don’t just disappear. Was Renata right? Why hadn’t anyone else called?

      I phoned Eugene and spoke to Virginia. Christopher was out shopping, enjoying himself in the big city he loved. If it was true and the house was gone, he had to be told. I found myself speaking very slowly, enunciating every syllable. I told Virginia, “A terrible thing has happened. A landslide has destroyed our house. Make Christopher sit down before you tell him.” She gasped and started asking questions, but I had to cut her off. I didn’t know the answers and I couldn’t talk any longer.

      As I put down the phone, Jillian’s Buick pulled up outside. I ran down the path, still in my sweaty work pants and ragged T-shirt. One look at her face told me she’d heard the news. After she received John’s phone call at her mother’s house, Jillian had driven all over Kaslo looking for me (I was at Andy Shadrack’s at the time). She checked the grocery stores, then, on the spur of the moment, went into the insurance office, interrupting the manager with a customer. “Excuse me, but there’s just been a landslide in Johnson’s Landing. My house is gone. Is it covered by our insurance?” The manager looked at her helplessly. Her reply etched itself into Jillian’s brain: “She said, ‘Now is not the time to talk about it.’ And I knew immediately that we were not covered.”

      We stood together in the narrow band of shade under the eave at the back of the house. John was okay, but like Renata he had had a very close call. He’d given Jillian only sketchy details: the landslide had sideswiped their house; an enormous log went through it like a skewer, from front to back. Their cat, Tumbles, was missing. The glorious garden I had so admired three days before, the guesthouse, garage and vehicles were all gone. The fate of Petra Frehse, Val Webber and his daughters was unknown. I could not yet visualize what had happened. It made no sense that Val’s house could have been touched. Easier to envisage how Petra’s cabin, nestled near the ravine, would be affected.

      Jillian was anxious to be with John,