The Glass Inferno

by Thomas N. Scortia

  Infantino was surprised that there had been so few casualties. In a fire of this size, he would have predicted more. Out of a working crew of well over a hundred, perhaps a dozen had been sent to the, hospital for smoke inhalation, burns, and cuts from falling glass.

  Some of the burns had been bad ones, both from the intense radiant heat and from some of the older turnout coats which had crumbled in the heat.

  But as yet there had been only one fatality-the man with the hot lung.

  Shevelson’s appearance on the scene was helpful but troubling.

  The blueprints were proving useful, though not as much as Shevelson obviously thought they should be.

  It was more helpful to learn, finally, that it was Shevelson who had been feeding information to Quantrell. Whether or not Fuchs would believe it, at least in.his own mind Infantino knew he was free and clear. But Shevelson had impressed him in one area-the Glass House was a minimal building. The equipment in it was designed to serve sixty-six floors and not one more. There was no reserve, no back-up system. If there were any unpleasant surprises now … well, they could really be unpleasant.

  He took one last look at the building, then walked over to the Red Cross canteen truck where Chief Fuchs was having a cup of coffee. He took the cup offered by the girl inside, added cream, and ladled three heaping spoons of sugar into it.

  “Sweet tooth, Infantino,?”

  “You burn up a lot of energy fighting fires.” He studied the chief for a minute and decided to have it out. “Shevelson, the construction foreman for the Glass House, showed up a while ago. He brought along a set of the working prints.”

  “Oh?” Fuchs waited.

  “He’s your leak for inside information, if you were looking for one.

  He’s been talking to Quantrell for weeks.

  Apparently he was canned by Leroux and still carries a grudge.”

  “That so?” Fuchs sipped at his own coffee without looking up.

  “Your friend Barton talked to me about that. He even introduced me to Shevelson while you were upstairs. Interesting fellow. Would have made a good fire captain, though I’m not so sure I’d care. to work with him.”

  There was surprisingly little hostility in his voice and Infantino asked: “Any complaints so far?”

  “About how you’ve been handling things? If I had any You would have heard about them. Pretty standard fire …

  larger than most, but standard.”

  “Seen one fire, you’ve seen them all?”

  A little of the sharpness returned to Fuchs’s ‘voice.

  “I didn’t say that.”

  “I’ve never seen a fire like this one,” Infantino said.

  “And I don’t think you have, either. It spread faster than any fire I’ve ever worked. And it was damned hot.”

  Fuchs nodded. “I’ll give it that,” he said mildly.

  Again, the absence of hostility surprised Infantino. He took another sip of coffee, then suddenly said: “Why the hell are we fighting, Chief?”

  For a long moment Fuchs said nothing; he stood leaning against the truck and gazing up at the building a few hundred feet away. “You’ve got your views, I’ve got mine.

  I didn’t put you in charge of the high-rise problem because I hoped you would agree with me. The only gripe I ever had was because I thought you were airing department business in public.”

  That was as much of an apology as he was going to get, Infantino thought, but it was enough. “I didn’t think I was-but I can see where other people might have.”

  “Yeah,” Fuchs agreed. “You know how some people are-touchy.” He put his cup on the truck window ledge behind him and pulled his collar up closer around his neck. “Speaking of department business, I imagine you have some recommendations.”

  “I do. You probably won’t like some of them.”

  “That’s irrelevant.”

  “It will all be in a formal report.”

  Fuchs nodded. “I expect it to be, Mario. But I’d still like to hear your suggestions now.”

  “We need new equipment.” Fuchs’s face was impassive and Infantino added: “Mostly personnel equipment. High-capacity respirators would allow us to hang in there longer. And we could use lightweight bottles containing oxygen instead of compressed air. More comfortable masks, more reliable reducing valves. And new turnout suits; some of the ones we were using are so old they crumbled from the heat. And the advance hose teams could use aluminized cover suits-the kind they use in fighting oil fires-for close proximity work. Almost all burns were from radiant heat.”

  “Anything else?”

  “I think every man working on a fire floor where the smoke is heavy should have a walky-talky. It’s easy to get separated up there.”

  Fuchs seemed lost in thought and finally Infantino asked, “Any comments?”

  “Not many You’re right about the heat. It was greater than I had expected, though part of it may be because of the nature of the building-poor construction techniques, fire loading far above the norm, that sort of thing.”

  He half smiled. “But you’re not through in listing what you would like to have, are you?”

  “Shape charges? We actually didn’t have to use them tonight but they would be nice to have on hand.”

  “Speak to the department engineers and send me a memo. If they recommend it I’ll look into it.”

  Fuchs started for the building and Infantino shouted, “I’m not through yet!”

  “I don’t know why I thought you would say that,” -Fuchs said dryly.

  “What did you forget this time?”

  “I’d like to recommend the hiring of fire protection engineers, perhaps on a part-time basis, when it comes to the Fire Department checking out major buildings.”

  “Good idea if we can find them; there aren’t many floating around.

  Put that in your memo, too.”

  Fuchs had taken a step back to the building when a voice said, “You gentlemen have anything to say for the tube?”

  . Quantrell approached from the other side of the Red Cross van, trailed by a cameraman, his sixteen-millimeter rig riding high on his equipment pod.

  “Why don’t you go straight to hell, Quantrell,” Infantino said, suddenly acutely tired.

  “I probably will, in due course,” Quantrell said grimly.

  He glanced up at the ice-sheathed building. “Nice little fire; it probably could have been avoided if the developer had been more conscientious. Wouldn’t you gentlemen agree?”

  “Get lost, will you, Quantrell?” Infantino snapped. “The Glass House is no better or worse than half a dozen other buildings in this town. They’re all alike; they all suffer from the same defects.”

  “Care to point out a few of the others? You’d be doing our viewers a public service. Now’s the time to sound the alarm, now while the press is listening and watching.”

  He cocked his head, half smiling. “Well, Division Chief Infantino?”

  “It was a tough fire,” Infantino said slowly. “A dozen of my men are in the hospital-some of them may not leave for months. One is dead.

  I’m not about to play games with you tonight; all I want is for you to get the hell out of here. It was probably a bastard like you that thought up the term ‘body count’ for the enemy dead in Vietnam.

  You cover disasters like they were football games; for you there’s no difference between a man who gets tackled and one who gets killed.

  They’re just numbers on a scoreboard.”

  Quantrell stepped closer to Infantino, the bantering smile gone.

  “Where the hell do you get off calling me names, Infantino? I’ve got my job just like you have yours.

  My job is to get the news out to the voters who just happen to pay your salary. I kick a few asses and I bruise a few feelings and nobody’s ever going to vote me the most popular guy in the class. I don’t deal in press releases and handouts; I get out there to see for myself.

  Buddy, you don’t
know this business-how much information do you think I would get with a sweetness-and-light routine? There isn’t a department in this city that wouldn’t like to brush me off with a couple of drinks and three pages of public relations bullshit. Well, if you don’t like how I quote you, then stop being a gabby dago and keep your mouth shut.”

  “That’s enough,” Fuchs interrupted quietly. “You’ve had your say, Quantrell. Now get the hell out of here or I’ll have you escorted out of the lines.”

  “Go ahead; it’ll make a great story,” Quantrell said sarcastically.

  “If you don’t think I’ll do it try me.”

  Something in Fuchs’s voice made Quantrell back off.

  “Okay, Chief, I’ve got my story anyway.” He jerked his head at the cameraman and they walked away.

  “That goddamned cameraman was picking all of that up,” Infantino said, furious.

  “Don’t worry; they won’t use it.”

  Infantino said, “I don’t give a damn whether they do or not.” But he did; Quantrell had really gotten under his skin.

  Fuchs said, “Stay cool,” chuckled, and started walking back across the plaza, the frigid wind whipping his coat around his waist.

  Infantino remained by the van a moment longer, staring at the Glass House. He was thinking of the men still in the building working at knocking down the last of the fire. Idly he watched the scenic elevator start down the side of the shear wall again; it looked like some slow-moving, phosphorescent waterbug. Then he spotted Quantrell and his cameraman running up the terrazzo steps to the lobby.

  Quantrell must have been counting the loads and realized that Leroux was in this one. They’d catch Leroux as he stepped out of the elevator, still dressed-in evening clothes-a perfect contrast to the pajama-clad, weary and frightened-looking tenants whom Quantrell had probably already photographed in the basement lunchroom.

  Infantino drained the last of his coffee. He could care less about what Leroux and Quantrell would have to say to each other. He’d read about it in the morning paper or watch it on the six-o’clock news tomorrow night.

  The wind began to pick up again; the combination of sleet and snow pelted him like tiny little darts. He shivered, wanting desperately to go home. He thought of bed; and Doris’ warmth beside him.

  Another hour, he thought, perhaps in another hour …

  CHAPTER 44

  David Lencho rubbed his gloved hand against his turnout coat and swore quietly. The burn wasn’t that bad, but it would be several days before it healed properly. The reddened skin hurt and the salved edges of the burn itself were beginning to itch. Probably an allergy to the ointment; he had a history of them as far back as he could remember.

  The fire had only blackened part of the sixteenth floor, that portion of it directly beneath the original site of the fire on seventeen.

  Lencho and Fuchs and some of the other men under Captain Miller’s command were going through the corridor with pulldown hooks and pry bars, pulling away charred paneling and ripping up sections of scorched carpeting, searching for any lingering traces of the fire. When they found any glowing embers, a man with one-inch hose soaked them out of existence.

  Mark Fuchs, just behind Lencho in the corridor, flashed his electric lantern around the hall, making sure they didn’t stumble over any debris. The men before them had pulled down partitions, chopped through studding, and stripped off wallpaper looking for the last remnants of the fire. Fuchs occasionally spoke into his walky-talky, giving a progress report to Captain Miller on the landing.

  The air stank of fire, Lencho thought. The particular acrid quality of burned wood and cloth and seared metal.

  The hall itself, except for the beam from Fuchs’s lantern, was completely dark. Occasionally they passed an office with a battered door hanging on a hinge or leaning against a wall. He could see the night through the office windows, a framed portrait in deep blacks and purples with flakes of snow whirling past the glass. He rubbed again at his blistered hand.

  “You pick up more burns than any rookie I know,” Fuchs said. It was a flat statement, not a jibe; Lencho caught the irritation behind it.

  “It could happen to anybody,” he protested.

  “I know, but it always seems to happen to you.”

  They moved cautiously down the corridor, constantly searching for smoldering sparks and embers. The previous cleanup crew had done a good job, Lencho thought; the floor seemed almost completely clean, except for an occasional glow that had rekindled after the other team had been through.

  The corridor dead-ended and Fuchs said, “That wall marks the utility core; we’ve covered the whole floor.” He thumbed his walky-talky, then hesitated a moment. “Did you check that mop closet?”

  He pointed at the last door on the corridor.

  “Probably a utility room,” Lencho said. “I’ll take care of it.”

  Fuchs spoke into the -walky-talky. “Captain Miller?

  Mark Fuchs-it looks like sixteen is completely cl-” Lencho reached the door and turned the knob. He screamed suddenly in agony. The metal knob was incredibly hot. He pulled his hand back; part of the glove and the skin from the palm of his hand lay crisping on the knob. But the twist Lencho had given the knob was enough. The door swung open. There was an explosion.

  The utility room was directly under the two heavy fire loadings on the floor above.

  It hadn’t caught fire but the heat from above had driven the oxygen off. Stored waxes and solvents had burst their containers, then vaporized in the oxygenless, superheated air. The door was remarkably tight. Very little air from the corridor had seeped into the intensely fuel-rich atmosphere. Nor had the room been cooled appreciably by the hosing of the corridor outside.

  For a Moment there was no sound but that of tile falling from the overhead ceiling, then the muffled sound of debris falling into the utility core itself where the explosion had ripped out the rear wall of the storage room. A quiet hissing followed and’then abruptly … a second, louder explosion.

  The corridor immediately filled with steam.

  CHAPTER 45

  Thank God, Leroux thought, it was the last load. The two men who had assisted in handling the evacuees had gone down the time before, leaving him, Thelma, Quinn, Jenny, and a scattering of the kitchen help-enough to actually overcrowd the small, scenic elevator.

  Suddenly one of the woman diners turned to Quinn. “I thought Harvey was in here,” she said, panic in her voice.

  “He was with me until just a few minutes ago!” Leroux remembered both of them-a woman in her fifties who had been having dinner along with her teenage son.”The boy had made a pig Of himself on the free wine and it suddenly occurred to Leroux where he was. He motioned to Quinn. and they stepped back in the foyer for a moment.

  “He’s probably in the john,” Leroux said in a low voice. “Too much Wine; he won’t be ready to leave for a few minutes yet.”

  She bit her lip. “Mr. Leroux-when he comes back, there’s no way we can squeeze him into the elevator.

  We’re overloaded as it is.”

  Leroux swore to himself. “All right, I’ll stay behind and wait for him.”

  Quinn shook her head. “I don’t think that would be practical.

  Neither your wife nor Jenny will leave without you. For all three of you to stay behind is ridiculous. I’ll wait for the boy.”

  “I can’t let you do that, Quinn.”

  “Why not?” She looked irritated. “Because I’m a woman? That’s ridiculous. We both know we’re in -no danger up here, even if the others don’t. If we were we would certainly have known . by now.

  Don’t be foolish; go on down and I’ll join you in another ten minutes.”

  She laughed shortly. “I’ll get some soda from the kitchen; the boy will need something to settle his stomach.”

  “All right, Quinn; you’re the boss.” He stepped back inside the elevator cage, and told the woman that her son would come down with Quinn in the next load, then he
pressed the button for the doors to close before she could object. A moment later he felt the descent begin.

  He started to relax.”He had made up his mind what to say to the reporters-which was nothing at all-and now he was anxious to get it over with.

  “You can see the whole city below,” Thelma said quietly to Jenny.

  They were all standing by the glass side of the cage. “With the snow falling, it looks like a jeweled fairyland.”

  “It’s beautiful,” Jenny agreed.

  Leroux put his hand gently on his wife’s shoulder.

  There would be investigations later that would be hard for him to take. He would need Thelma then more than he ever had. Suddenly he felt a sense of shame. He had kept her out of so much of his life. It hadn’t been fair to her-or to him.

  They were almost halfway down now; he could make out the ground below through the swirling snow. A few moments more and they would be in the lobby. And the ordeal would begin.

  At that point a muffled explosion rocked the cage.

  Someone grabbed at Leroux for support to keep from being thrown to the floor. Dimly he saw below them a flash of flame, reflected from the falling snow. The exterior bulbs that outlined the cage in a faint aura of light went out abruptly. There followed a ripping sound as the elevator plunged for an instant … then came to a sudden halt. The mechanical emergency brakes screeched against the side rails.

  The inside of the cage became a screaming bedlam.

  Several people had fallen to the floor; they now struggled to their feet. Next to Leroux Jenny moaned, “Oh, my God, what’s happened?”

  Leroux, stunned, shook his head. It was obvious what had happened.

  Somehow an explosion had ripped away part of the shear wall of the utility core, twisting and bending the guide rails below them. When the electricity failed, the cage had dropped several feet. The emergency brakes activated by a too fast descent, had automatically stopped their fall.