Forbidden Fire (34 page)

It was then that she heard Ian's voice. And in the first few seconds she couldn't even answer him, she was too busy whispering prayers of gratitude. He was not only alive, he was coming to their rescue.

“See? We're all going to be fine. They'll be with us any minute.”

She hoped so. The scent of gas was still very strong on the air.

And only seconds later she began to smell smoke.

Ian found the emergency equipment in its slot in the wall and seized the ax. Bobby followed him, and he began to hack at the door. The wood gave easily enough, but once he had managed to slice through it, he realized that there was more than a beam blocking him. Tables had overturned, plaster had fallen, and some bricks had come loose. There was a high pile of debris between him and the people he was so desperate to reach.

“We dig through, I guess,” Bobby said.

“Maybe there's help in the street,” Ian murmured. “I'll be right back.”

But there was no help in the street. There was the most curious mixture of panic and absolute detachment going on. People, some ready for work, some half dressed and some almost naked, wandered around aimlessly, almost like sightseers.

And still, the screams were rising. Two of the city's horse drawn fire carts were racing down the ripped-up streets.

The face of San Francisco had changed within seconds. Some buildings still stood; many did not.

And the screams were going on and on.

Someone was shouting orders, a policeman perhaps, trying to gather what folk he could to lift the debris of a roominghouse. He was managing to find some support. It wasn't that the people weren't willing to help, Ian knew. They were still in shock.

The firemen were shouting warnings to evacuate the area. Ian was well aware that he wasn't going to get any help, and he could understand why. The firemen were using everybody they could recruit to rescue the people caught in the tangle of fallen buildings.

Down the block, Ian could see the flicker of flames rising from a downed wooden structure.

He breathed out a silent prayer, then he felt a renewed soaring of hope.

The bay was up. His handsome horse was up and standing, bleeding only slightly from a wound on the fetlock. And despite the panic, the horse hadn't fled. Marissa's mare was nowhere to be seen, but the bay was standing firm and waiting.

“Good old fellow,” he murmured, patting the animal's neck briefly. “Wait for me, I may need you.”

Then he hurried into the emporium. “Bobby, it's you and me. We're going to have to arrange some kind of a pulley and lever system. Let's dig and get to it, eh?”

Bobby looked panicked for a minute. Then he smiled. “Sure, Mr. Tremayne. Let's dig, shall we?”

They started digging. In a while, Ian called out to Marissa again. “We're coming. How's everyone doing?”

Horribly, Marissa thought. Sandy was no longer conscious, and she hadn't heard from the Father in a while. The boy with the injured foot was softly sobbing.

“We're—we're holding out,” Marissa said. But they weren't holding out, not well at all. Her eyes stung terribly. Darrin was coughing every other second. So were the others. Ralph was complaining that he couldn't breathe.

“Almost to you!” Ian called.

Marissa bit her lip. She could see them working. The door was down, and there was more light peeking in. Ian and Bobby were dark silhouettes against that light, silhouettes in constant motion.

And still, the time went slowly. So slowly.

They could hear the shouts in the streets. The warnings to evacuate the area.

And they could hear the screams, too.

“Marissa!” Ian called to her. “We've created something of a tunnel here. I need a boy to volunteer to crawl through first.”

She looked at Darrin. He shook his head, his eyes watery, his breath a wheeze. “I'm not coming out until you come out, Mrs. Tremayne.”

“I'll go,” a lad named Peter told her bravely. His voice only quavered a little.

“Good boy, that's grand,” Marissa told him. She found his hand. His palm was wet in hers as she brought him to the debris in front of the doorway. Once they were there, Ian started shouting instructions to him. He had to keep his weight upon the beam. When he was close enough, Ian would grab him and carry him through.

“You all right with that, young man?” Ian asked.

“Yes, sir, Mr. Tremayne!” Peter promised.

And so they all watched him crawl atop the broken table and plaster chunks and make his way to the beam. He moved slowly, carefully and with a natural agility. It still took him endless minutes to reach Ian.

But then Ian's strong arms grabbed him, and the entire room cheered.

“That's my lad!” cried Father Donohue.

But Marissa knew that they were still in very deep trouble. Father Donohue was trapped. And Sandy could never make such a crawl. She wasn't conscious.

“Billy! Billy Martin. You're next now!” she called out cheerfully. Then she backed away and found Ralph and Teddy.

“We've got to free the Father,” she said. “Maybe with the boys out there, they'll be able to dig a larger opening. But we have to free him while they're trying.”

The two cooks looked at one another. Ian was shouting to her, wanting to know what was going on. She hurried to where he could see her and tried to put the truth of the situation into her voice without alarming the boys.

“We've just got to move a few things to reach Father Donohue, Ian. Darrin will be here. I've got to help Ralph and Teddy.”

She could see him looking at the little boy who had just made it through. “Peter, now you're on the safe side, lad. I need your help. Take up that broken spade there and help Bobby start digging again, eh?”

“Yes, sir, Mr. Tremayne, sir!” Peter promised.

Marissa, hearing him, smiled, but she blinked quickly. She was very close to tears, and she couldn't afford to cry.

She hurried to Father Donohue. At his side, Ralph and Teddy were surveying the huge oak table that trapped the Father along with a tangle of broken chairs. She saw their dilemma. If they shifted the table the wrong way, it could fall upon him and crush his lungs.

“Mrs. Tremayne,” Teddy told her. “You get down there by the Father. When Ralph tells you to, pull. And pull fast. It's the only way we can see to clear him.”

Tiny, the boy with the hurt foot, limped his way over to her. He was a small boy, thus the name, but he had a certain wiry strength about him. “I can help you with Father Donohue's shoulders, ma'am.”

“Tiny, you could be hurt here,” she warned. She wondered if Father Donohue was going to make it. His blue eyes were closed; his fingers rested upon the cross that lay on his chest.

Tiny was no longer caught up in his own fear. He offered Marissa a crooked smile. “He's been Mom and Dad both to me for a lotta years now. Can't see's how I'll have anything much left myself were I to lose him, too.”

Father Donohue's eyes opened. “Ye've a lifetime ahead of you, me lad, and don't ye forget it! Now the two of ye take grave care there, for I've a fondness for me Maker, and I'm certain he's a fondness for me, so if I leave ye this day, it'll be fittin'.”

“Father, enough blarney!” Marissa told him with forced cheer. She looked at Ralph and nodded. Tiny and she each took hold of an arm.

“Yea, though I walk through the valley …” Father Donohue began.

And then there was a screeching sound as the two men shifted the desk. The sheared portion would come flying down in seconds, Marissa knew. She and Tiny pulled and pulled hard, and there was a thunderous crashing just a split second after they freed Father Donohue's legs.

Again, a rousing cheer went up in the basement. But when Ralph tried to help Father Donohue to his feet, the man buckled with a cry.

“'Tis no use. Me leg is definitely broken,” Donohue said.

“We'll get you out,” Marissa insisted. “Bring him some of the sherry, Teddy. I'll check on Sandy.”

Sandy, stretched out on the floor, her head laid upon Ralph's apron, was still unconscious. Her breathing and her pulse were irregular. She needed help, and needed it soon.

“It's going to be all right,” Marissa whispered close to the girl's ear. She knew Sandy couldn't hear her. It didn't matter.

“Mrs. Tremayne,” Teddy told her. “The boys are almost out. We've got to do something about Sandy and the Father.”

“Yes, of course,” she murmured. They were looking at her to know what to do. She glanced toward the doorway. With a number of the boys helping from the other side, the tunnel through the bricks and beams and plaster was widening. She looked quickly at Ralph. “I need two tablecloths. We'll rig stretchers for the Father and Sandy. Between the three of us, we can get them to the opening, and Ian will have to pull them through.”

“There's not enough space—” Ralph began.

“Then they'll have to keep digging,” she said stubbornly.

She hurried to the opening. She could see Ian's silhouette, dark now against the full light of day. What time was it, she wondered? The quake had lasted only seconds, but it seemed that hours had passed. She was tired and thirsty and her throat was growing harsh and dry as the smoke in the basement steadily increased.

“Ian!”

“Yes. Can you come now, Marissa?”

“No, I can't. We're trying to rig stretchers. We've got to have the opening a little larger. Can you keep at it?”

He was silent. Silent so long that she knew they were all risking their lives.

And she didn't want to die. She really, desperately didn't want to die. And she didn't want the tiny life within her to expire without ever having had a chance.

For the first time she realized that a child would be a part of them both. She could have a tiny son with his father's ink-black hair and striking blue eyes, and their baby could even mimic his smile.

And dream his dreams of a better world.

“We'll dig, Marissa,” Ian said, but then she heard him turning to a number of the boys who were already out “There's no reason for you lads to hang around here. You Billy Martin, you're in charge. Take the lads out of here Ask a fireman which way you should be heading. But move quickly now. Stay together, and get away as soon as you can.”

“Yes, sir!” Billy told him, and then Marissa could hear Billy taking charge, lining up the boys from the youngest to the oldest.

And she could hear the sounds of digging again.

“You get out now, Mrs. Tremayne,” Darrin told her. “I can help with Sandy and Father Donohue.”

She shook her head. “No, I've got to see everyone out,” she told him, and she hurried to Sandy's side. “We need to take care getting her on the tabletop, Ralph. We'll have to carry them to the hospital like this, too, so we might as well make sure we've got it right to begin with.” She started to tell them how to roll Sandy, then how to see that she was tied properly on the tabletop. Ralph stared at her curiously.

“I've been around a mine disaster or two, Ralph,” she told him with a rueful smile. “Do trust me, please. I know what I'm doing.”

“I never doubted it,” Ralph told her. “Teddy, grab that tablecloth like Mrs. Tremayne told you.”

Soon they were ready with Sandy. Ralph and Teddy lifted the makeshift stretcher, and Marissa watched nervously as they moved to the tunnel.

“Can you do it, men?” Ian called to them.

“Yes, Mr. Tremayne. Teddy and I and the boy can get her to the opening. We're fine on this end.”

And so they began. Trying to get their burden over their heads was difficult and demanded the men's concentration. Sandy almost started to slip once, and Marissa caught her breath. But the stretcher evened out high above their heads, and then Ian cried out. “We've got her! Get to the Father, and quickly.”

It was just then that the ceiling sprinklers, triggered by the thick smoke in the basement, burst into action. Water spewed down upon them.

Startled, Marissa cried out.

“Marissa!” Ian shouted.

“I'm—I'm all right! Just surprised!” she called back. Drenched, she turned quickly to Ralph and Teddy and the stubborn Darrin. “We've got to get Father out, now!”

Quickly, nervously, their wet fingers slipping over fabric and wood, the four set to work on Father Donohue.

Despite the odds against them, they managed to secure him to a stretcher. Father Donohue groaned with pain as they lifted him.

“Stop!” Marissa said. “His leg, we should have splinted it first—”

“No, ye'll not stop! I'm firm to this stretcher and ye'll get me the hell out so that ye'll get yerself the hell out, excuse me, Lord!” Donohue insisted with thunder in his voice.

Marissa and Darrin smiled at one another, and Teddy and Ralph repeated the procedure with Donohue. She heard a soft moan, and she knew how desperately he was fighting the pain.

“Got him!” Ian called.

“Mrs. Tremayne—” Darrin said.

“After you, my boy, and I mean it!” Marissa insisted. “I'll be right behind you, and then Teddy and Ralph.”

Darrin agreed at last, climbing nimbly. Within seconds, he had crawled up to the tunnel and passed through. “Come on, Mrs. Tremayne!”

“I'm coming!” Marissa called.

But she never got farther than taking the first foothold of her climb.

An aftershock suddenly seized hold of the earth, and she lost her balance and fell to the ground.

There was a ripping sound, and a shard of wood from the beam came loose.

“Marissa!” She heard someone scream her name, and she tried to roll away from the falling missile. She moved quickly, but not quickly enough. She felt a searing pain as the chunk skimmed by the back of her head.

“Marissa!” She heard her name again. It was Ian's voice, she was certain, and yet the sound too quickly faded. She closed her eyes, and fought the void that was opening to welcome her.