The last girl was unable to reach Ting Leo's hand. She fell to her knees, paralyzed by fear as the collapse of a burning building several doors away shook the walls. Ting Leo dropped into the basement, seizing the girl by the back of her dress and shoving her upward, the girl kicking Ting Leo in the face as she squirmed.
Alone, Ting Leo shone the Eveready around the filthy room, searching for something on which to stand. Nothing. Then she shone it through the opening and waved it frantically.
I saw the light waving in the dark, just below the beam. I realized Ting Leo was trying to signal me, and that she herself was trapped.
"These horses cannot hold any longer!" screamed Hunter. "Get her out of there!"
I somehow squeezed through the exterior opening and pulled myself toward Ting Leo. The stench and my exhaustion made me retch. The building creaked and the beam slipped several inches, sending down a mountain of dust.
"Annalisa's going to be trapped," Hunter screamed. Francis grabbed a wooden cane from an abandoned wheelbarrow and flailed at the horses' flanks as Hunter strained against the yoke. Slowly, the horses inched forward and the beam creaked upward.
I grabbed Ting Leo's wrists. She wriggled desperately, her nails digging into my flesh. I tried not to scream or drop her. Digging in the dirt with my toes and knees, I inched backward until she popped through the opening.
We crawled toward the street, Ting Leo in front, unconsciously kicking dirt in my face as we scrambled forward.
"Hurry!" Hunter screamed as the lamppost started to buckle and pull loose from its mooring.
Ting Leo squirmed through the hole in the outside wall, then turned and pulled me clear as one horse stumbled, dragging the other one backward.
Hunter cut the rope and sent the building crashing into the basement, the horses stampeding down Jackson Street.
Hunter lifted me to my feet as the rooftop of the Jade Dragon burst into flames. We rushed the weeping girls down Jackson under the canopy of searing heat.
"Annalisa," Hunter said when we reached Montgomery, struggling to catch his breath. "Take these girls to Miss Cameron at Washington Square. Please."
I was about to argue when I realized the girls would be lost without a guide. "I will if you'll tell me where you're going," I said.
"We're going to do what we have to do. Meet us at Meigg's Wharf. Please."
"You're going to Rolf's house after him and Scarface."
"Scarface killed my father and then he killed my brother. On Rolfs orders."
"And what if they kill you?"
"If I had killed Scarface the first night, on the Barbary Coast, Christian might still be alive. He's not going to kill someone else."
I knew it was useless to argue. I gathered the weeping girls and steered them up the hill toward North Beach.
Before she crossed Broadway, Ting Leo turned to smile back at Hunter. She would later talk about seeing him in the harbor, about the light shining on his face, the light that came from his hands, and about the prophecy she had heard in her village about a man who would come to save them from the dreaded emperor. "Hunner," she said, gazing up at me with a dirty, beatific smile.
I hurried Ting Leo and the others along. Though we had won a small victory, it was not over yet.
In fact, it was about to get worse.
Chapter 60
NOB HILL
APRIL 19, 1906. 12:30 A.M.
Eugene Schmitz leaned on a banquet table in the ballroom of the Fairmont Hotel, examining his map, the air rife with the smell of burning buildings and the thunder of constant dynamiting. He gazed over at Police Chief Donen and Assistant Fire Chief Dougherty. "Any word from the Navy, anyone?"
"Nothing," Donen said. "The telegraph office burned down an hour ago. Unless they're still operating a line out at the Presidio, we're completely cut off from the world."
What Schmitz did have was a stack of disturbing reports. An elderly Italian immigrant, a witness claimed, had been bayoneted for refusing to help soldiers on the fire line, an order he could not understand. Two other reports claimed that soldiers had executed a dozen men in a vacant lot near the Townsend Street Train Station. The Reynolds & Company tobacco firm had been looted so many times by men in uniform, an employee reported, that their entire stock had disappeared.
Schmitz threw the reports into a trashcan, where, unbeknownst to him, an aide would shortly retrieve them.
"Does anyone have an update on the fire situation?" he demanded.
Dougherty finished conferring with a soot-covered firefighter and walked to the map table. Everyone squeezed in around him. He began to point out locations, his slumped shoulders sinking toward collapse. "The fireboats from Mare Island are still pumping enough salt water to keep the fire off the Ferry Building," the old man stated. "That's the only good news. If the front that hit Chinatown jumps Broadway into North Beach, it could burn all the way down Montgomery to the waterfront. It's like the bloody Devil himself is at the wheel. Every time we think we have him cornered, it outflanks us."
Dougherty pointed to Van Ness. "Nightmare number two. If we don't keep the fire from jumping Van Ness, we'll lose Pacific Heights, Golden Gate Park, the Sunset, the Richmond, maybe even the Presidio. The whole Western Addition, the damn thing could burn all the way to the ocean. Won't be a building in the city left standing."
"The whole bloody city," Schmitz croaked. "Thirty-five thousand buildings. Dear God."
A lanky fireman ran into the teeming ballroom, a pair of binoculars dangling from his neck. "Chief Dougherty, Chief Dougherty!"
Everyone turned to listen.
"I've been up on the roof, spottin'. It's a bloody miracle. Colonel Morris, he used so much dynamite on the east side of Van Ness he blew the fire out! Busted windows for a mile but damn if he didn't blow it out! Somehow a couple of Spring Valley water guys hooked up a hydrant near a block or two from Van Ness and the boys doused all the sparks."
A cheer resounded throughout the room.
"That's not all, sir," the firemen said. "The wind shifted. Chinatown is gone, but the fire didn't jump Broadway. It's blowin' toward the Barbary Coast."
Schmitz checked the map. "My God. If we move all the firefighters from Van Ness to the Ferry Building, we can use water from the Navy's pumper boat to hold the fire back until it burns itself out on the Barbary Coast. Save the waterfront. We do that, it's over."
"Whoa, that's invitin' trouble," Dougherty argued. "It's too early to pull those men off Van Ness. If it flares up, won't be anyone to stop it."
"If we lose the waterfront, we lose the lifeblood of the city," Schmitz argued. He stared at the map. "Victory is at hand, gentlemen. Chief Dougherty, I want all your men moved from Van Ness to the Ferry Building, as quickly as they can get there."
"I don't like it," Dougherty argued. "My men haven't eaten or slept in twenty-four hours. You move all those men and equipment, it will be impossible to move them back."
"They'll do what needs to be done, Chief." A triumphant look spread across Schmitz' face. "Bertrand! Find General Funston and tell him to stop the dynamiting immediately. No more dynamite, understand? Then send someone to the Presidio and telegraph Washington. Tell President Roosevelt the city is out of danger."
"A bit premature, Eugene," Donen offered sternly. "Maybe you better look out the window."
"Thank you for your input, Chief Donen. You all have my orders."
Donen walked to the back of the Fairmont ballroom, staring at the mountain of flame advancing on the Barbary Coast. Three feet from the enormous window, he could feel the heat radiating through it.
Earlier that day, he had been as impressed with Schmitz' uncharacteristic decisiveness as had everyone else in the room. Now, Donen was convinced that the grinning buffoon had returned.
"Washington likes to hear good news," Schmitz announced to anyone in earshot. "President Roosevelt is not one for pessimism. He'll think twice about indicting me now."
Dougherty walked away in disgust.
"Mr. Mayor," Chief Donen called. Schmitz raised an eyebrow and moved to the window, apart from the others. Their faces reflected the glowing hues that seemed to dance on the window. "If the fire is winding down like you say," Donen offered, "we're going to have to make a report. The higher the body count, the harder it's going to be to rebuild the damn place. Who the hell is going to invest in a deathtrap?"
"How could we ever count the dead?" Schmitz countered. "You heard what Dougherty said earlier. The fire is well over two-thousand degrees, exactly what it takes to cremate a body."
"Precisely. The papers will report any figure you give them. No way to ever count 'em up proper."
"Thank you, Jessie. Your civic-mindedness never ceases to impress me."
Donen looked across the massive ballroom at the city's business leaders. Many of them were Schmitz-haters a day earlier. Now all of them worked harmoniously, managing tables with handwritten placards denoting their assignments: Restoration of the Water Supply, Relief of the Hungry, Citizens Police, Restoration of Abattoirs. Nineteen committees in all. Schmitz had included all of the city's leaders except Rolf and the Supervisors, a calculated move to distance himself from the threatened coup d'etat. In the midst of a horrific crisis, his instinct for self-preservation had survived intact.
"Your popularity seems to be on the rise, Mr. Mayor," Donen added with a pursed smile.
"Nothing like a little war to boost a man's public image," Schmitz replied.
He turned and addressed the others. "Gentlemen! Despite the difficulty, the city has drawn upon its great resources to steer us through this trying hour. This should harken a new era of cooperation and community that will last a lifetime!"
No one seemed overly moved by the homily, perhaps due to the conflagration, fifty stories high, that framed the grinning Schmitz.
From the roof of his mansion, Adam Rolf watched the stream of civic leaders that continued to arrive at the Fairmont. Above the GRAND OPENING – APRIL 18 sign on the roof, the flames and smoke obscured the sky.
"Kind of ironic, isn't it?" he said to Tommy. "I own that charlatan Schmitz, and here I am at the front door, not even invited to the party."
"Makes you wonder what the world's coming to, boss, the lack of gratitude and all."
"I've been thinking about something, Thomas. That little faggot Pierre, timid as he was, where did he find the blarney stones to hang himself like that? No. Seems to me like Pierre might have been hung contrary to his own free will."
"I don't know who would do something like that," Tommy said, returning Rolf's stare. "Seems real lean on potential." Tommy stood there for a moment and considered strangling Rolf and throwing him off his own roof when they were interrupted.
A bloody, disheveled man appeared behind them.
"Ah, Mr. Scarface," Rolf called. "Since you're alone and missing an ear, shall we assume your encounter with The Brotherhood was only marginally successful?"
"Depends on your way a' thinkin', Mr. Rolf. We killed Feeney and Christian Fallon. And poor Mr. Spreckels. His place up and caught fire with all them valuable papers in it."
"Who does that leave us then?"
"The Fagen brothers and Fallon's youngest kid, the college boy."
"The Stanford graduate and Francis Fagen. Congratulations. You killed the dumb ones and let the two smartest cops in the city walk. The ones most likely to put us behind bars."
"It ain't over yet."
"And my elusive papers, the ones that provide the road map to our mutual gallows?"
"They probably burned up somewheres, most likely Feeney's house."
"Mostly likely," Rolf bristled. "And who put the bullet in Christian Fallon?"
"Yours truly."
Rolf looked back over the city, waving his arms as though conducting the symphony of continuing explosions. "Look at that, will you? Frederic Funston, blowing the city to pieces so he can save it. A bloody genius at work. Every one of those little explosions rings my cash register. Remind me to put him on my Christmas list."
"I can raise a few men and go after the Fallon kid and his pals, Mr. Rolf," Scarface offered.
"Hunter Fallon saw you put the bullet in his brother?"
"Standing maybe ten feet away when I done it."
"And he thinks I put you up to it. That's the danger of educating a cop. They start thinking. No. I think we'll just sit tight and wait for him right here."
Rolf pulled a cigar from his vest pocket, clipped the end and handed it to Scarface, clipped one for Tommy, and a third for himself. "All told, it's been a pretty good day" Rolf said. He looked at Scarface's bloody cheek. "Give or take an ear."
Tommy, growing more wary of Rolf by the minute, watched as they puffed away.
It is doubtful any of them took notice of a solitary man below, dressed in a filthy duster and struggling up California Street.
Lincoln Staley, his features so obscured by dirt it's doubtful anyone would have recognized him, stopped under the vast portico of the Fairmont. He caught his breath as best he could and headed toward the hotel lobby.
A bellhop dipped a silver ladle into a brass tub and offered him a drink. Lincoln sipped slowly, the cool water stinging all the way to his spastic stomach. "Much obliged," he said, and accepted the offer for another. "I apologize for the appearance."
"Hell of a grand opening, isn't it, sir?"
Lincoln nodded politely, fingering the derringer in his pocket. He walked outside on quivering legs, fighting another wave of nausea. He leaned against a pillar, his eyes on the mansion across Mason Street.
Chapter 61
GOLDEN GATE PARK
APRIL 19, 1906. 6:44 A.M.
Kaitlin Staley stirred next to the great tenor, against whom she had cuddled for warmth throughout the night. She forced herself to sit up, jabs of pain from sleeping on the cold, damp ground reawakening the ache of the previous day's treks.
Caruso teetered to a sitting position next to her, stretching for his toes.
They noticed it at the same time. Spread out on the trash-strewn lawn was a sea of human beings. Acres of them, each family huddled together and clinging to the things they prized most. Victors and Gramophones, stacks of musical recordings, tubas, bass fiddles, string guitars, sewing machines, fur coats, favorite suits, straw hats with flowers and bows, felt hats plumed with pheasant and egret feathers, oak chopping blocks, an enamel bathtub filled with a life's effluvia, brass cooking pots and iron sauté pans, prized carving knives, framed photographs of weddings and baptisms, crutches, roller skates, bicycles, scores of dogs and cats of every breed and disposition, leather baby carriages with sleeping pets and infants, wagons overflowing with boxes of precious documents.
"I never see so many sad peoples in my life, Kaitlin." Caruso stared skyward. There was no sun, no moon or stars, not a speck of blue, nothing but rolling patches of smoke above a pale gray haze, with shafts of amber light occasionally slipping through. He had no idea what day it was, if it was sunrise or sunset.
"We're safe here, Enrico," Kaitlin offered.
"They tell me thees every places we are go."
She clutched the arm of the once heroic figure, noticing how much smaller he seemed than on stage. The cool breeze, blowing steadily throughout the night from the Pacific Ocean just a few miles west, suddenly shifted.
The air warmed instantly, the faint roar of the fire two miles away became a mounting crescendo that woke many of those sleeping around them. The cries of frightened children melded into an unnerving symphony.
Kaitlin wrapped her arms about her knees, rocking softly, tortured by the horror her foolishness had caused her father. She muffled a sob and gazed out over the array of pitiful souls. It looked to her as if a giant wave had thundered ashore and left behind its human flotsam.
An old woman, who seemed to be wearing every stitch she owned, begged change for a dollar, as if there was something on which to spend it. She passed a young man clutching at something bundled in shelving paper as other pe
ople, possibly his friends or family, urged him to release it. He handed it over, and a child's hand flopped loose, dangling lifelessly. Kaitlin let her head sag so Caruso would not see her tears. If my father was here, he would know what to do. And she sobbed some more. Caruso spotted a teamster with a one-eyed mare pulling a dump wagon. He grabbed Kaitlin's hand, jerked her to her feet, and ran to flag him down.
"'Ow much to take my friend and me to boats?"
"Three hundred dollars."
"Three hundred dollars? This is, 'ow you say? Robbers?"
"I took a Hansom ride two days ago," Kaitlin argued, "and it cost two dollars for the whole afternoon."
The teamster reached for his buggy whip. "Price of poker goes up closer you get to Judgment Day."
"Wait," Caruso said as he stared at the flames and smoke billowing above him. "We are not wait for whole city to burn up, poof." He counted out three hundred dollars in gold coins into the teamster's hand.
"A wise decision there, paesano. Climb on up."
Caruso took Kaitlin's hand and helped her on. He was halfway on himself when the wagon jerked and nearly spilled him over the back.
In seconds, the carriage was thundering down Fulton Street, taking corners on two wheels.
"I think you're right," Kaitlin said to Caruso. "Maybe San Francisco is a little crazy."
Chapter 62
NOB HILL
APRIL 19, 1906. 9:33 A.M.
In the ballroom of the Fairmont, a bone-weary Eugene Schmitz dozed in a silk upholstered chair, the first rest he had gotten in more than twenty-four hours.
Bertrand grabbed his shoulder and shook until the Mayor jerked awake. "Mayor Schmitz, sir. You better come up to the roof. Now, sir." Schmitz forced his eyes open, struggled to clear his head, and wobbled toward the stairwell with Bertrand, Donen, and a wheezing Dougherty trailing close behind.
On the roof, Schmitz stared at the fire eating its way toward them, up the eastern slope of Nob Hill.
1906: A Novel Page 33
