Beneath The Third Waterfall: A Novel

By Bradford Dillman

Bradford Dillman exposes the flaws and fantasies of the upper sets in this house party novel that takes place during one summer weekend in 1938 at Waterfalls, the beautiful Santa Cruz, California, summer estate of San Francisco high-society millionaires Chester and Lily Moreland. The occasion is the fortieth birthday of their eldest child, Abigail. As the weekend unfolds, characters interact, sometimes gracefully, sometimes grindingly, sometimes painfully. They drink a lot resulting in behavior that brings the birthday party to a shambles. Sex happens in various indiscreet combinations. Family secrets are revealed, causing fights, ending the party, and bringing shame and ruin to the high and mighty.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Daniel & Daniel Publishers
• Release date: Feb 9, 2016
• ISBN: 9781564748034

Book preview

Beneath the Third Waterfall

a novel

Bradford Dillman

2015 Fithian Press

Copyright © 2015 by Bradford Dillman

All rights reserved

Printed in the United States of America

ISBN: 978-1-56474-803-4

The interior design and the cover design of this book are intended for and limited to the publisher’s first print edition of the book and related marketing display purposes. All other use of those designs without the publisher’s permission is prohibited.

Published by Fithian Press

A division of Daniel and Daniel, Publishers, Inc.

Post Office Box 2790

McKinleyville, CA 95519

www.danielpublishing.com

Book design and production: Studio E Books, Santa Barbara

Book cover design: Christopher Dillman

Distributed by SCB Distributors [phone]

library of congress cataloging-in-publication data

Dillman, Bradford, (date) author.

Beneath the third waterfall : a novel / by Bradford Dillman.

pages cm

ISBN [first print edition] 978-1-56474-581-1 (pbk. : alk. paper)

1. Family secrets—Fiction. 2. Domestic fiction. I. Title.

PS3554.I4187B46 2016

813’.54—dc23

2015028998

Contents

I. Earthquake

1. The Earthquake

II. Abigail’s Fortieth Birthday

2. Announcements

3. Friday Morning

4. Arrivals

5. Friday Evening

6. Saturday Morning

7. Saturday Afternoon

8. Dressing for Dinner

9. Home Movies

III. Aftermath

10. Shock

11. The Third Waterfall

12. Oliver’s Farewells

13. Friend of a Lifetime

About the Author

I. Earthquake

San Francisco, 1906

1. The Earthquake

The rain was a slate-gray curtain drawn on blinding light.

Where water had met flame a subdued hiss suggested the abiding presence of venomous vipers. In makeshift shelters, survivors huddled under coats that smelled of sopping wool, and listened. They emerged carefully, like children promised a gift that might be snatched away, to see the fires of hell lay smothered under a blanket of dust and ashes.

Ian Campbell, mistrusting the scene as but an intermission, stood outside his tent, balanced warily on the balls of his feet. But the ground was silent. He shivered from unanticipated cold, reminded that his brown three-piece suit was in tatters, the buttons burst from his vest, a gash in his trousers exposing a knee caked with dried blood, his ripped jacket exposing muddy underwear.

He noticed the cuts on his hands had formed scabs. They were bony hands, as befit a lanky man. A soggy fedora protected his balding head. Though his starched collar was gone, along with his favorite necktie, the plaid, his oxfords had endured inconsequential scuffs a bootblack could remedy quickly.

If Willy was alive.

So why am I complaining? he asked himself. I’m as presentable as any other waterlogged wretch picking through San Francisco wreckage. The armed soldiers who challenged my every move are no longer in evidence. From the look of it, there’s nothing left to loot.

He patted an interior jacket pocket, making sure he hadn’t mislaid the tools of his trade: a small, lined notebook and three pencils, one sharpened. His last piece for the Examiner, delivered yesterday on a fearless journey to the Ferry Building as the City rocked and roared, had been published. The paper would expect an update.

I’m betting the fires didn’t make it across Van Ness ­Avenue, he told himself; it’s our broadest thoroughfare, after all. If I’m right, my report will fix the precise place where the wall of flame expired, identify the buildings that refused to melt, and name the streets that saved the City from extinction.

He observed the Golden Gate Park tent community astir, moles arising from holes in the earth to blink at day, their future bleak as the sky. They queued up at the toilet tent. Emerging from the latrine, Daphne held out a hand. As ever, she was prepared to be pulled wherever he chose, incurious about the destination.

Are you hungry?

She shook her head.

He informed her, We’re going to try to find Van Ness ­Avenue.

She nodded.

We’ll be climbing over a lot of wreckage, so hold tight to my hand, and as we go, mind your step.

Fortunately, her brown leather shoes had proved sturdy. Not so her long cotton dress, torn in several places, and her knee socks had holes. He visualized the chest of drawers where he’d find replacements, but all their possessions lay irretrievable under debris.

Ascending and descending concrete obstacles, choosing footing with care, Ian led his child down what used to be the Panhandle, hoping to recognize the gentle slopes of Van Ness Avenue. Though the exertion was taxing, his heart was quiet, having squandered its ration of adrenalin days ago. Fear was no longer an enemy; rather, an annoying houseguest who continued to overstay his welcome.

There it was. At the foot of the City’s widest boulevard Ian was greeted by a sight so stirring his eyes misted. For the most part, the western perimeter stood intact, buildings that had bravely confronted the invading eastern holocaust. This had been the apocalyptic battleground, the meeting of fire and air, exploding flames that leaped the breadth of the boulevard to lick sentinels staying their rush to the sea. The firestorm’s fury was palpable in a suffocating smell of ash.

Before proceeding, he asked his daughter, You want me to carry you?

Her reply was a lifted hand.

Ian paused, ambushed by a skipped heartbeat, a reappearance of remembered horror. A ghost wind had pulsed with screams of people seeking salvation by leaping out of windows.

Strange, he thought, that the two of us owe our lives to a cat. When Sheba violated an erotic dream he was enjoying by leaping up on the bed, screeching and clawing, I shouted angrily to the girl, Put your damn cat outside! But the creature was berserk. As I grabbed it by the nape, and held it at arm’s length as we descended to the first floor, I learned at last the definition of caterwaul.

And that is how we came to be standing in our pajamas in the open air; standing, that is, until struck down.

A rumbling expanded to a tremor, a tremor to a jolt that unbalanced us, dropping us to hands and knees. I smelled sulfur and, in growing dread, saw why—the earth had opened to disclose a dragon heaving itself awake, its ridged back parting the pavement. It approached at howling speed, its lashing tail carving subterranean passage, its fiery nostrils a bellows that ignited the building next door, splitting it into two imploding pillars of concrete.

I hurled myself atop the girl to shield her from the raining rocks, our screams commingled in terror, unwilling riders saddled to this monster, enraged that it hadn’t expelled us, lunging forward and back, up and down, in jarring convolutions.

I was unconcerned that my weight might be crushing Daphne; I needed both hands to cover my head against the pelting stones. Gradually deafening thunder subsided to drum beats. An eternity passed before I heard the furious dragon tire, gasp by gusting gasp, until at last it pretended to be tamed.

I waited, fearing the monster might be teasing us, that this peace was fraudulent. Satisfied at last, I returned to my knees and hugged a whimpering child to my heart.

Aftershocks, I thought. This isn’t the end. We can’t be caught meeting the next quake in pajamas. It was a gamble, but it paid off: we went back into the building, dressed as quickly as we could, then returned to the street.

In what had once been a street, families had congregated, all in shock, some bleeding, many expressing lamentation in wails of grief.

The cat had gone.

What do I do now? I wondered. Where do we go?

My answer was a distant detonation, an explosion caused by—leaking gas mains?

An amber glow appeared at the downtown horizon, from the vicinity of Market Street, the business district, and Chinatown. That moment marked the beginning of a heated race to the ocean.

Ian articulated a memory. Poor Sheba.

Sheba is dead.

He looked down, but the child did not look up. Her determined stare at pavement shut out all but the next placement of a foot.

Their advance up the western perimeter was accompanied by a curiously majestic silence. A few buildings were gutted skeletons, some were seamed with cracks, yet capricious winds had randomly spared others that stood isolated in formal splendor, like debutantes awaiting invitation to dance.

At the intersection of Sacramento Street, Ian tugged his child to a halt. He was staring at the only block that had capitulated, its resolve melted, its homes consumed by the furnace to create a jagged tomb of rubble. A last stand had been made farther in, at Franklin Street.

He asked himself, Why was this one particular section devastated when virtually all others stood fast? Had there been an architectural flaw of some sort? He released Daphne’s hand to reach for notebook and pencil, for this, he knew, would be his story.

He began scaling obstacles in search of clues, conscious that the girl, weary and bored, had seated herself on a smooth, elevated slab. His pencil was busy, composing terse reminders, when a clatter of disturbed shale alerted him they were no longer alone in the dusty wasteland.

Two people labored forward, a pair so comically incompatible they might have escaped from a circus: a mid-sized man wearing a straw boater and an expensive suit, and a little girl dressed as if for a party, in patent leather shoes. It was their masks that invited laughter. The calico red handkerchiefs covering the nose and mouth suggested disguises worn at a stagecoach robbery.

Oddly, Ian was incensed, asking himself, Are these people mocking a city’s suffering? He seethed throughout the couple’s stumbling advance, until at last the handkerchiefs were pulled down to reveal puffing innocence. Pince-nez spectacles that the man removed from his nose were attached to his lapel by a mysterious spring device. His dark hair was wavy and as thick as his mustache, hinting he wished to be mistaken as older, though Ian judged him to be some five years younger than himself, probably mid-thirties. The exposed face of the man’s daughter revealed her to be younger than Daphne.

The winded stranger inhaled so deeply he shuddered, unbalancing the girl clutching a coattail.

Though his hostility had been unexpressed, the reporter apologized with an observation. This dust was much worse before yesterday’s rain.

Forgive the intrusion, the man wheezed. We have come here looking for…for.…

His shoulders sagged under invisible weight. For something that obviously no longer exists.

With mourning eyes his hand soothed the child’s hair. His vibrant voice cracked. It’s gone, precious.

She glanced up, uncomprehending. Gone?

His stroking was intended to remind her of abiding protection. All of it, dear. Gone.

She jerked her head from side to side. My room?

We’re…we’re standing on it, precious. Your room, Mama’s room, my room.… Gone, all gone.

The enormity of the loss literally staggered the girl. Her face squinched to a prune as she whined, Where’s Little Stella?

The father shook his head.

And Benjy Bear…I want my dolls!

The man removed his boater and used the red handkerchief to wipe cheeks glistening with sweat and tears. We’ll buy others, he said helplessly.

I don’t want others. With two fists she was rubbing away a coursing inundation of grief. Who did this? she demanded.

No one, angel.

I want to know who hurt my babies! Her eyes came to rest on the quiet girl seated nearby. "What’s she doing here, Papa? This is our house!"

Hush, Abby.

"Did you give her permission? This is our front stoop. Nobody can sit here unless we say so!"

The gawky stranger rose slowly, shrugging regret.

Ian had heard enough. Stay where you are, Daphne, he ordered. This corner of hell belongs to all who’ve endured its misery.

The man was already shaking his daughter by the shoulders, voice raised. Abigail! What’s come over you? How dare you speak that way? Shame! You apologize to these people this very instant!

Temper was doused by tears. The child sobbed, I…I’m sorry…I guess. It’s just that.… She turned and buried her face in her father’s vest. Oh Papa, I can’t bear it! I want to die!

The three witnesses stood rooted in tragedy, listening to the muffled hiccoughs of despair.

* * *

How can a person not accept an invitation to receive an apology? Ian Campbell was by no means a religious man, but in Aberdeen his parents had raised him to honor religious values, and forgiveness was one. Though, truth be told, there was little to forgive, considering the age of the child and her emotional state.

At any rate, this explained his late-afternoon presence on a bench in the Marina. Overcast had been