Hurricane House by Sandy Semerad

to leave Dolphin ahead of the storm.
    “I put your report and pictures in a file called ‘Hurricane Donald,” Ellen wrote in reply. “Please forgive me for arriving late. I caught a ride with a psycho. Lucky for me I had my pepper spray. Otherwise I’m okay. I’ll start cleaning your place tomorrow. Your home is lovely. Thank you for giving me this opportunity. I won’t let you down. Love, Ellen. P.S. Please be safe. I’ll say a prayer. See you soon.”
    After sending the e-mail, Ellen searched online for “hysterical muteness.” Swedish soprano Jenny Lind developed that condition at one time in her career. Another article featured Svengali, a fictional character created by French author George du Maurier in 1894. “An itinerant conductor, the sinister and repulsive Svengali, used his powers of hypnotism to enslave the heroine, a young Irish girl called Trilby,” the article said.
    Trilby’s condition was termed hysterical muteness. “Svengali took Trilby’s tuneless voice and perfected it by transferring his musical genius in exchange for sexual favors,” the article went on to say. “Trilby began to sing like an angel. She became a concert-hall sensation although she was in an amnesic trance.”
    As far as Ellen could tell, this condition didn’t apply to her, but interesting. The article included stuff about real-life charismatic mesmerizers who flourished in the eighteenth century.
    Like Anton Mesmer. His patients joined hands, crooned and swooned. In fact, it was Mesmer who invented the spiritualist séance.
    Along with Mesmer, other charismatic demagogues and politicians—like Conservative Prime minister Benjamin Disraeli—exercised hypnotic powers.
    Even respected physicians like Jean-Martin Charcot were mesmerizers. Charcot gave demonstrations to large audiences, including the famous psychoanalyst Sigmund Freud.
    At 10:00 p.m. Ellen’s eyelids grew heavy from reading. The rain outside pounded the roof in its own hypnotic rhythm.
    Despite her grogginess, she couldn’t sleep with the storm raging and those creepy noises a house makes. Better to keep busy. Ellen rubbed her tired eyes, then typed in, “voice paralysis” and read about Gerhardt’s Law: “Vocal cords are caught between abduction and adduction, so-called cadaver position.” Oh, no, like a corpse?
    Another hour of research led her to a condition called: “Aphonia,” and featured an article about Edgar Cayce, “the Sleeping Prophet.” Cayce recommended osteopathic adjustments and a homemade remedy, which Ellen printed out.
    Hypnosis should be used as a last resort, the article said. “Better to meditate daily upon the use of the voice and helping others. All healing comes from the awareness of creative Godly forces and your ability to stay close to nature.”
    With the storm bearing down, Ellen didn’t think she could stand being any closer to nature than she already was.
     
     
    Chapter Fifteen
     
    Maeva , Dolphin, Florida
         Three hours after the eye of Hurricane Donald struck Dolphin, I steered the truck in the pouring rain toward the Bay Bridge where the water stood two-feet deep. I hated to make this trip, but the claims were pouring in and duty called.
    I clinched my teeth and drove across, slowly. I knew my brakes might stall in the flood, though my chief emotion wasn’t fear but anger over losing Adam and I thought I’d already completed the anger stage. Apparently not.
    I took deep breaths, trying to relax and let go of the rage. Earlier that morning, I had felt calm. As a matter of fact, I was in REM sleep when the phone rang, jarring me awake. It was Jan Benson from Catastrophe Claims Inc. She had the nerve to call and disrupt the lovely dream about Adam.
    I grunted my displeasure as I answered the phone. It took me a moment to understand what Jan was saying, “You’ve been assigned 200 claims. Details in your e-mail.”
    After I hung up from Jan, I tried to recapture the lovemaking dream with Adam. No