He saw the wave coming toward the shore.
It was enormous, as wide as the eye could see, a foaming line of surf, a white arc spreading as it came toward the beach. It was not a very high wave, but it grew as it came ashore, rising up, rising higher...
The jeep lurched to a halt.
"Why did you stop?" Kenner yelled.
"It's the end of the damn road!" Evans shouted.
The wave was now about fifteen feet high.
With a roar of surf, the wave struck the beach and raced inland toward them.
To Evans, it seemed as if everything was happening in slow motion--the big wave churning white, boiling over the sand, and somehow keeping its crest all the way across the beach, and into the jungle, completely covering the green landscape in white as the water boiled up the slope toward them.
He couldn't take his eyes off it, because it seemed never to lose its power, but just kept coming. Farther down the muddy track the two men were scrambling away from their fallen jeep, and then they were covered in white water and gone from sight.
The wave rushed up the slope another four or five feet, then suddenly slowed, receded, sweeping back. It left behind no trace of the men or their jeep. The jungle trees were ragged, many uprooted.
The wave slid back into the ocean, farther and farther away, exposing the beach far out to sea, before it finally died away, and the ocean was gentle again.
"That's the first," Kenner said. "The next ones will be bigger."
Sarah was holding Morton upright, trying to keep him comfortable. His lips were a terrible blue color and his skin was cold, but he seemed to be alert. He wasn't talking, but he was watching the water.
"Hang on, George," she said.
He nodded. He was mouthing something.
"What is it? What are you saying?"
She read his lips. A weak grin.
Wouldn't miss it if it was the last thing I did.
The next wave came in.
From a distance, it looked exactly like the first, but as it neared the shore they could see that it was noticeably bigger, half again as large as the first, and the roar as it smashed into the beach was like an explosion. A vast sheet of water raced up the hill toward them, coming much higher than before.
They were almost a hundred feet away. The wave had come a good sixty feet up the slope.
"The next one will be bigger," Kenner said.
The sea was quiet for several minutes. Evans turned to Jennifer. "Listen," he said, "do you want me to--"
She wasn't there. For a moment he thought she had fallen out of the jeep. Then he saw she had fallen on the floor, where she lay curled in pain. Her face and shoulder were soaked in blood.
"Jennifer?"
Kenner grabbed Evans's hand, pushed it back gently. He shook his head. "Those guys in the jeep," he said. "She was okay until then." Evans was stunned. He felt dizzy. He looked at her. "Jennifer?"
Her eyes were closed. She was hardly breathing.
"Turn away," Kenner said. "She'll make it or she won't."
The next wave was coming in.
There was nowhere they could go. They had reached the end of the track. They were surrounded by jungle. They just waited, and watched the water rush up in a hissing, terrifying wall toward them. The wave had already broken. This was just surge rushing up the hillside, but it was still a wall of water nine or ten feet high.
Sarah was sure it was going to take them all, but the wave lost energy just a few yards away, thinning and slowing, and then sliding back down to the ocean.
Kenner looked at his watch. "We have a few minutes," he said. "Let's do what we can."
"What do you mean?" Sarah said.
"I mean, climb as high as we can."
"There's another wave?"
"At least."
"Bigger?"
"Yes."
Five minutes passed. They scrambled up the hillside another twenty yards. Kenner was carrying Jennifer's bleeding body. By now she had lost consciousness. Evans and Sarah were helping Morton, who was moving with great difficulty. Finally, Evans picked Morton up and carried him piggyback style.
"Glad you lost some weight," Evans said.
Morton, not speaking, just patted him on the shoulder.
Evans staggered up the hill.
The next wave came in.
When it receded, their jeeps had vanished. The spot where they had been parked was littered with the trunks of uprooted trees. They stared, very tired. They argued: Was that the fourth wave or the fifth? No one could remember. They decided it must have been the fourth.
"What do we do?" Sarah said to Kenner.
"We climb."
Eight minutes later, the next wave came in. It was smaller than the one before. Evans was too tired to do anything but stare at it. Kenner was trying to stop Jennifer's bleeding, but her skin was an ugly pale gray and her lips were blue. Down at the beach, there was no sign of human activity at all. The tents were gone. The generators were gone. There was nothing but piled-up debris, tree branches, pieces of wood, seaweed, foam.
"What's that?" Sarah said.
"What?"
"Someone is shouting."