Something rattled faintly against one steel rib of the hemisphere. It was a shrub, about five feet tall.
Annie began to laugh hysterically. Brady had protected the shrub with loving care. It was tied to the steel rib through grommetted holes in the hemisphere, and covered with its own plastic bag to shield off the wind.
One minute.
The red devil was shouting now, laughing with triumph. He ran his sandy fingers through her hair and blew his gritty breath in her eyes.
She pulled the zipper at the bottom of the polyethylene bag that covered the shrub and yanked the bag off. It was heavy, almost oily plastic, slippery and pliant.
There was no time to decide whether it would be better inside or outside the house. She pulled the bag over her head inside out, so the zipper would close completely. Then she folded the zipper part under once and wedged herself as far as she could go into the space between shrub and hemisphere, holding the oxygen mask in her teeth.
With infinite care, though she was not likely to split the heavy bag, she pulled off her shoes and her heavy, woollen walking socks. She put the shoes back on. Her slacks covered her legs. Only her ankles were bare.
She unraveled one sock and stuffed the yarn in her ears. There was a sudden, remarkable quiet. Then, even through the yarn came the roar of the storm. For it was upon her.
She looked through the milky plastic into a wild, red inferno, spitting at her in furious frustration. Then she bound the other sock over her eyes.
She was in a blind, muffled world now, buffeted against the shrub and the wires and the steel rib, but not painfully, because of her heavy clothing. It was as though suddenly all her senses had been switched to the last pitch before silence.