The Toyota plunges into Indian Creek

The Toyota plunges into Indian Creek after The Senator takes a disused marsh road in haste to catch the ferry, turning a wrong turn into a catastrophic crash. The accident’s significance lies in its double exposure: an unsafe, unmarked route helps create the danger, but the ensuing struggle reveals who can escape, who is left behind, and how quickly the survivor’s attention shifts toward self-preservation and political ruin.

Causes and setting

The Senator and Kelly Kelleher leave a party at about 7:55 p.m. with roughly twenty-five minutes to reach the 8:20 ferry at Brockden's Landing. They are new acquaintances, and Kelly is not drunk. The Senator, however, has been drinking; earlier, he had wanted to catch an earlier ferry, but they did not leave on time. The clock, the ferry, and the pressure to make it in time form the immediate background to his decision to drive quickly.

The road they take is Old Ferry Road, a badly rutted sandy track that has not been maintained and has not had a sign for years. A new paved Ferry Road had replaced it, and the turn to the old route lies three-quarters of a mile beyond the turn to the new one. The Senator is technically heading in the right direction for Brockden's Landing, but along a route no longer used. Turning onto Old Ferry Road is described as an understandable mistake even without alcohol; its apparent plausibility does not make the road safe.

At about 8:15, the rented Toyota reaches an unmarked hairpin curve and plunges into water neither passenger knew was there. Some thirty feet ahead is a narrow wooden bridge with badly weathered planks. There is no warning sign for the bridge or the dangerous curve before it. The road is therefore not merely a backdrop to the crash: its disuse, absent signage, and hazardous layout are specific conditions in the chain of events.

The water is Indian Creek, though its name seems improbable in the marshy wasteland. It runs northeast, is about twenty feet wide and as deep as eleven feet in places, and empties into an Atlantic tidal pool near Brockden's Landing, roughly two miles away. The creek lies amid black water, rushes, stunted trees, and vines. In darkness, the marsh makes the actual danger difficult to perceive until the car is already leaving the road.

The crash

The Senator drives the Toyota with impatient exuberance, taking turns in skidding slides. At the hairpin, he brakes and turns sharply without signaling; a motorist behind them sounds an angry horn, which he ignores. Kelly has noticed that since they turned onto the old road he has not spoken directly to her. Their easy conversation and immediate rapport give way to his silence and concentration on the wheel.

Just before the plunge, The Senator calls the route a shortcut and insists that they cannot be lost because there is only one direction. The certainty is sharply at odds with the road itself: it has no sign, has fallen out of use, and leads toward an unmarked hazard. The Toyota skids into a guardrail, swings sideways, and tumbles down a short, steep embankment into the creek. Kelly's head strikes the window; the car lands on its passenger side and rapidly sinks in the black water.

The narrative also considers a counterfactual danger without presenting it as something that happened. If the Toyota had not lost control on the curve, it might have hit the railing of the bridge ahead and fallen into the water anyway. That outcome is speculation, but it underscores that the curve and bridge together make the route perilous even beyond the precise sequence of the crash.

Trapped in the sinking car

The collision leaves Kelly disoriented in darkness. Bands of the safety harness hold her across the chest and thighs, her left arm is tangled, and the roof and door have buckled inward. Her right leg is pinned and her kneecap crushed, though she initially feels no pain. The Senator, thrown against her, gasps and struggles to free himself. In the confusion of the overturned car, Kelly cannot tell where the top, the air, or the exit is.

The Senator works himself free from the belts and forces open a door against the weight of the water. Kelly clutches his arm and then his trouser leg and foot as he pushes past her. His crepe-soled canvas shoe comes off in her hand; he leaves the car, while she cries out for him to wait and help her. The difference between their outcomes is immediate and physical: the same opening through which he escapes does not free Kelly from her trapped position.

Afterward, Kelly tries to make survival into a problem she can reason through. She imagines that the submerged car still holds a bubble of air, but understands that water will seep through cracks and holes and rise until it fills the space. She cannot tell how deep the car is, and darkness and the roaring in her ears undermine her ability to orient herself. When the car shifts with the current and overturns completely, she wakes in terror as water rushes over her face and neck. She reaches for the broken steering wheel, using it to locate herself and imagining that it might help her reach the driver's door. Her calculations preserve a foothold in reality, but they cannot remove the water, the wreckage, or her dependence on an exit she cannot see.

Escape and immediate aftermath

The Senator gets out of the doomed car and swims desperately to shore. He vomits the filthy water and is exhausted; although he briefly rises, he cannot bring himself to return to the creek. He flees along the marsh road toward the highway, limping with one shoe on and one off. Black muck covers him, mosquitoes swarm around him, and he fears that a passing motorist may see or recognize him.

At the highway, he waits in the rushes for traffic to clear, then runs to a telephone booth in the parking lot of Post Beer & Wine. His Rolex reads 9:55 p.m. He calls the St. John residence on Derry Road and asks for Ray Annick, initially using the name Gerald Ferguson. When Ray answers, The Senator identifies himself and says there has been an accident and that the girl is dead. Ray tells him not to explain over the phone, asks where he is, and offers to come get him.

The Senator’s account to Ray quickly becomes an attempt to assign blame and anticipate prosecution: he says Kelly was drunk, became emotional, grabbed the wheel, and caused the car to swerve, then fears that they will call it manslaughter and prosecute him. This is his claim in a panicked telephone call, not an independently established account of how the crash occurred. The scene sets his fear of legal jeopardy beside the known conditions of the road, his own drinking and speed, and Kelly’s experience as the passenger left trapped in the car.

Narrative significance

The episode unfolds through a striking split in knowledge. The Senator escapes into the night and reaches a telephone, but Kelly cannot know what he does; from her perspective, the accident seems not yet to have happened, and the car is only turning onto the road. That temporal dislocation holds the crash open between her trapped present and the survivor’s later flight, making the reader’s knowledge of her danger sharply different from her own.

The roadway’s hazards and the Senator’s conduct remain distinct parts of the event rather than interchangeable explanations. The unmaintained road, missing signs, blind curve, and weathered bridge create a dangerous setting; his hurried driving and prior drinking add personal risk. The aftermath then reveals an unequal distribution of consequence: Kelly bears the physical crisis in the submerged car, while The Senator, though injured and terrified, reaches shore and immediately confronts recognition, prosecution, and the possible collapse of his political future. His first account to Ray turns from her condition to the blame and public consequences he fears, giving the plunge its larger force as both a traffic disaster and an exposure of power under pressure.