Chapter FourLilly witnessed the effect of a Pacific typhoon on Kauai about two months earlier, before the last drowning victim floated up. In late August into September, Typhoon Bing passed over Guam and skirted Saipan. Quite unpredictably, it cut a sharp northeasterly turn, missed Japan and headed toward Alaska where it died out over cooler waters. During its course, the waters of the Pacific, all the way to Ke'e Beach and along the entire group of Hawaiian Islands, had been so churned no one could swim. In addition, the winds had been peculiar.
Lilly had not swum that day. She went into waist high water and was immediately washed down toward the reef's end. That was the closest she came to swimming in Puka Ulua channel, which swimmers were warned to avoid and where the strong undertow s
