The Glass Inferno

by Thomas N. Scortia

  And it’s not the sort of thing a man can keep from his wife.”

  “I could never tolerate that,” Jenny said stiffly.

  “Any more than you can tolerate Craig’s present mistress-his work?”

  Somebody had started praying in the darkness of the cage above them.

  Jenny felt her mind start to wander back to the reality of their situation and forced herself to return to the conversation. One thing was true-there, was something about Thelma that invited confidences.

  “All right-it’s true that we’re not doing very well. That’s easy enough to guess.”

  Thelma placed her hand lightly on Jenny’s shoulder.

  “It’s not what you expected of marriage, is.it? But then, most women are raised with romantically outrageous ideas of what marriage should be like. At least my generation was. We were never taught that men are human and have weaknesses just as women do. Perhaps more of them.”

  Thelma was probably just as frightened as she was, Jenny thought; talking probably eased her fears as well.

  The idea suddenly lent her a sense of equality. “I don’t know if you would call it a weakness to lead two lives -his professional one and his home life. I’m not invited to participate in the one and there’s very little of the other left to me.”

  “That sounds like a damaged ego,” Thelma accused.

  “The sudden realization that you are not the center of his whole life. Men need to be dedicated to something. I learned long ago that there was only a part of Wyn’s life in which I could play a role. The rest was forever closed to me.”

  “That’s inhuman.”

  “No, it’s very human. Why ‘should Craig devote his every waking moment to you? He’s a person in his own right.”

  “I’m a person in my own right,” Jenny protested fiercely.

  There was a babble of shouting above them and then’ the sound of a sudden, hard slap. “Get control of yourself,” Leroux suddenly said in a loud voice, his tone icy.

  “There’s not a damned thing you can do.

  “Build a world that centers around you,” Thelma said quietly.

  “There are a thousand things that can go into that world. Only save a part of it to overlap with his.

  He can’t think of you all the time and you must grant him the privilege of neglecting you (occasionally.”

  “Doesn’t he love me?”

  Thelma was silent for a moment, then said “Only you can answer that.

  But first I would consider carefully exactly what you mean by love.”

  Jenny was about to reply when there was another distant, muffled explosion. Something heavy clattered to the roof of the elevator and the cage shuddered and slid downward a few inches.

  “That was an explosion!” the big man shouted. “Where the hell was it!”

  “Further up,” Leroux said in a strained voice. “I don’t know where.”

  “Look!”somebody shouted.

  Through the glass side of the cage, Jenny saw two thick snakes coil past and drop into the night, slamming back against the elevator itself.

  “The cables!” a man yelled. “Two of the damned cables have been cut!”

  Life was suddenly frighteningly real to Jenny again.

  Please God, she thought, don’t let us fall. Please.

  CHAPTER 57

  Quinn Reynolds pushed a lock of hair out of her eyes and realized that her hairdo had collapsed. Her formerly neat dress was wrinkled and stained in a dozen places.

  Not that anybody had noticed or that she herself cared -there were far more important things to worry about.

  Smoke had started to seep into the restaurant and several tenants who had straggled up from the lower floors reported, as had Douglas, that the machinery floor below the Observation Deck was ablaze. She couldn’t imagine how they had managed to get past the machinery-room landing which was open to the flames but they had.

  Probably held their breath and ran, with all the risks that that entailed. One of the older men was badly burned on his right arm and two of the women were coughing badly.

  The kitchen first-aid kit had been of some help in treating the burn but useless when it came to smoke inhalation.

  There were now almost fifty people in the restaurant, the majority of them tenants who had come up from the floors below. Several of them had minor burns and a few had inhaled too much smoke. The one that worried her the most was the little girl. Her father had brought her up shortly after the explosion on the machinery floor.

  She was having a great deal of trouble breathing and was only half conscious at the time. Quinn had done what she could for her and then the interior decorator …

  Douglas … had taken over. At one point, Quinn saw that he was giving the girl artificial respiration, using the old method.

  Odd, Quinn thought, she had known Douglas from the numerous times he had had lunch in the room but had never figured him as one who could take over in an emergency. But that seemed to be exactly what he was doing. He was working with the girl now, looking up only to give brief orders to the olive-skinned boy who hovered nearby. She watched as Jesus went into the kitchen with boxes of candles and began to replace the ones that had burned down at the various tables. He would glance at Douglas occasionally, his face a study of conflicting emotions, and Quinn wondered what their relationship might be. She had known other relationships of that sort and inevitably it was the boy who held the whip hand. This seemed to be much more even-handed.

  There was nothing she could do elsewhere in the room at the moment.

  Quinn walked over to Douglas and knelt beside him. “How is she?”

  “She’s taken in a lot of smoke,” Douglas said, worried.

  “I was afraid she had stopped breathing there for a moment.”

  “Is there anything I can do?”

  “No-Jesus will help you with the other diners if you need him.

  Just tell him what you want to do.” He sniffed the air. “It’s getting pretty stuffy in here; we may have to break out a window for ventilation.” He looked back down at the girl and shook, his head: “We’ve got to get her out of here.”

  The father standing nearby asked, “Are you sure there’s no way down?”

  Quinn shook her head. “All of the elevators are out and it’s impossible to go back down the way the others have come up.”

  Douglas returned to ministering to the girl. She was coughing more weakly now. He . felt her pulse and bit his lip.

  “Just too much wine, Quinn.” She turned. Harlee Claiborne, who had been taking care of the youth in the men’s room, had now returned.

  He said with a wan smile, “He’ll live, though right now I don’t think he wants to.

  In any event, he’ll think twice before he touches wine again.

  Where are his parents?”

  “They went down in the last elevator load,” Quinn said.

  “The one that’s stuck?” He frowned. “I.think it would be better if we didn’t tell him that just yet. Is there anything that can be done about it?”

  “Not while the fires are burning; the people in the cage will just have to wait it out. The brakes held, thank God, though somebody here said the cables would hold it anyway. Actually, I’m afraid we’re in more serious trouble than they are.”

  “It looks like it,” Claiborne said. A shadow crossed his face.

  “I wish I knew what happened to Lisolette. I have a hunch that she went below to try and help some of her friends get out.”

  “Maybe she succeeded,” Quinn said, trying to cheer him up. “She’s probably down in the lobby now, worrying about you.”

  “I certainly hope she’s down there, though not necessarily worrying about me.” He hesitated, then added wistfully: “The world would be a much drabber place without her-at least for me.”

  “Quinn,” Douglas asked suddenly, “are you sure there’s nobody here with any medical knowledge?”

  “I’ve already checked-I’m afraid not.�
� -He motioned her closer and she knelt down on the floor. “We’re going to lose her, you know,” Douglas said, his voice shaking. “We have to get her down.”

  “There’s no way,” Quinn said sadly.

  Douglas looked back down at the girl. “No, I don’t suppose there is,” he muttered. Suddenly he raised his head and said: “Listen!”

  Quinn strained her ears and over the mumble of conversation in the room heard a beating sound. The sound wavered in intensity as if it were approaching and receding from the building, or as if the sound itself was being carried away by the gusts of wind.

  “Helicopter?” Quinn asked. “What would it be doing out there?”

  Douglas stood up, said, “Jesus, take care of the girl,” then grabbed Quinn by the arm and half pulled her across the restaurant, weaving through the scattered tables until they were at the glass expanse of the outer wall. It took her a few seconds before she made out the running lights of the small helicopter.

  It had a plastic bubble passenger compartment, the sort that could carry just two people, and as it hovered outside the windows she could see the stenciled news logo of K.Y.S-TV on its side. Inside the bubble, she thought she could see a man with heavy camera equipment on his shoulder but she couldn’t be sure.

  “How do we get to the roof?” Douglas demanded.

  “There’s a service ladder in the kitchen.”

  “Let’s go.

  Quinn led the way and Douglas followed her. He grabbed a white tablecloth from one of the tables as he went, scattering the dishes and silverware over the floor.

  The ladder was a permanent steel one bolted to the rear wall of the kitchen. Above it, in the ceiling, was a small trapdoor.

  “It will be cold and windy outside,” Quinn warned.

  “Chances are the roof will be covered with ice, as well.”

  “We don’t have any choice,” Douglas said hurriedly.

  He climbed swiftly up the ladder and pulled back the latching bolts on the trapdoor. The last one gave him some difficulty and he pounded on it with his fist. Then he shoved the door back flat on the roof.

  Quinn had followed him up the ladder and was suddenly chilled by the blast of cold air and snow that roared through the opening.

  “Don’t try to follow me!” Douglas shouted. He pushed through the opening. Quinn ignored his warning to the extent that she could peer out through the trapdoor opening, the wind icy against her face and hair. The roof of the Promenade Room was white with a thin sheet of glistening ice and over that a mantle of snow. To the left she could make out the penthouse and the small gardens that surrounded it, the snow-covered conifers in their redwood planters oddly cheerful, a reminder of the coming holidays. To the far right was the black mass of the shed that housed the elevator motors; the rest of the roof was pocked with a scattering of ventilator shafts.

  Douglas had crawled to one of the ventilator tubes and held on to it while he stood up. Once on his feet, he braced himself against the shaft, unfurled the white tablecloth, and began to wave it back and forth. Quinn could hear the flop, flop of the ‘copter blades but for a moment she couldn’t locate it. She looked up just as it passed directly overhead. The plastic bubble threw back a dun red reflection-the reflection of the fire two floors below, she realized with sudden fear.

  The helicopter was now poised over the roof, swaying back and forth as it was buffeted by the heavy winds.

  Douglas redoubled his signaling. Finally the helicopter settled on the roof, its backwash blowing away the snow from the ice covering beneath. Slipping and skidding on the ice, Douglas ran toward it. As he got close, the bubble swung open and Douglas began to shout, the wind carrying away his words before Quinn could hear them.

  But even-though she couldn’t hear what Douglas was saying, it was obvious he was getting angry. Suddenly he reached inside and began to struggle with the cameraman, apparently trying to pull him out of the bubble. Quinn could see -that he was belted in and for the moment it looked like he was succeeding in pushing Douglas away.

  Then the camera and equipment pod-on the man’s shoulder came loose and Douglas suddenly grabbed it and jumped back. The cameraman immediately unbelted and leaped out of the bubble. Douglas held him off for an instant, then heaved the camera equipment toward the edge of the roof. It landed on the ledge and hung there ‘for a second while the cameraman raced for it. Then the wind caught the equipment pod and it tilted and slid over the edge just as the cameraman was about to grab it.

  In the meantime, Douglas, in a frenzy, had pulled out several cases of camera equipment and jettisoned them over the side of the building.

  Quinn held her breath. The cameraman had turned and lunged at Douglas.

  The big man grabbed the cameraman’s arms and pinned them behind his back while he talked rapidly for a moment. The cameraman finally nodded. Douglas let him go and he climbed back into the passenger bubble. Douglas turned, hunched himself against the wind, and beat his way back to the trapdoor.

  “Goddamned idiot!” he yelled at Quinn. “Thinks more of his camera equipment than of a dying child! Well, there’s nothing to argue about now. But you’ll have to help me.”

  “They’re leaving!” Quinn cried. The helicopter had begun to rise.

  “They’re just getting closer,” Douglas explained. “Let’s get the girl.” They hurried through the kitchen back into the dining room.

  “Jesus, give me a hand with the girl.”

  Quinn watched while he picked the girl up in his arms and Jesus, with surprising tenderness, wrapped a heavy tablecloth around her.

  “She don’t look good, Mr. Douglas.” She was having trouble breathing and moaned once in Douglas’ arms. They half ran back to the kitchen and the trapdoor ladder. Douglas hurriedly climbed it, then turned and leaned down through the opening. Jesus had followed him halfway up the ladder. Quinn held him from below, her arms wrapped around the boy’s legs to keep, him from falling, while he handed the girl up to Douglas.

  Then another set of hands reached past Douglas to help him.

  Douglas disappeared and Quinn followed Jesus through the trapdoor opening up onto the roof, wincing as the cold wind bit through her dress.

  The helicopter was only a few feet away. The cameraman was bundling the girl into the rear section that had once been occupied by his precious equipment. “I won’t be coming back!” he shouted. “It’s too dangerous; the copter’s too light in this wind.”

  Douglas nodded. “Just get her to a doctor as soon as you can!”

  “Come on, come on!” the pilot shouted. “This damned wind’s going to blow us right off the roof!” The cameraman climbed in and closed the bubble. The ‘copter rose, bobbled in the wind for a moment, and then soared off into the night.

  “They won’t be coming back?” Quinn shouted to Douglas.

  He shook his head. “No, Quinn, it would be too dangerous. But at least we got one off.”

  Jesus suddenly slapped her on the back, grinning.

  “What’re you worried about, lady. We’re gonna be okay!” He jerked a thumb at Douglas. “He’ll take care of it!”

  Quinn’s teeth began to chatter and they ran for the trapdoor then.

  She desperately wanted to believe Jesus.

  My God, how she wanted to believe him.

  CHAPTER 58

  Harry Jernigan closed the ambulance door and stepped back, watching quietly while the white vehicle with the huge red crosses on its.

  sides disappeared into the confusion of other emergency vans filling the street. Its red light started to flash and the wail of its siren filled the still night air. Then he walked back across the street to where Lisolette was standing with the three children.

  They were bundled up in blankets while Lisolette looked lost in an oversized man’s overcoat.

  “I think they’ll make it,” Jernigan assured her. “I talked to the driver and he said they’d had far worse tonight that were doing okay.”

  “I pray to God that th
ey’ll be all right,” Lisolette said softly.

  She wrapped an arm around Martin who had started to cry.

  “Well, let’s not stand around out here,” Jernigan said.

  “Donaldson got hold of an emergency generator and there’s light and heat down in the lunchroom now. One of the firemen told me the Red Cross has set up a field kitchen down there for the men. We might talk them into giving us a cup of coffee. Want to try?”

  Lisolette couldn’t help smiling. “I guess I’m brave enough for that.” She shepherded the two smallest children in front of her while Jernigan took Linda’s hand and they started across the plaza.

  The lunchroom was surprisingly quiet; half a dozen firemen gulping mugs of steaming coffee and a few tenants huddled in the corner. “You sit here,” Jernigan said, pointing to a table by the wall. “I’ll get us some coffee and cocoa for the kids.” He hurried off. Lisolette found a handkerchief and blew Martin’s nose.

  “I didn’t cry,” Chris said proudly. “Only babies cry.”

  He looked at Martin accusingly.

  “Martin is younger than you, Chris,” Lisolette said.

  “But you are a brave boy and I’m very proud of you.”

  “Boys,” Linda said, disgusted. “All they can talk about is how brave they are. Both of them cried. I saw them.”

  “I did not!” Chris protested, paradoxically near tears.

  “You were all very brave,” Lisolette said in a tone of voice that settled the matter.

  Jernigan returned with the top of a paper box holding two cups of coffee and three cups of cocoa. He gave the children the cocoa and then offered Lisolette a cup of coffee. “You’ll have to take it black; they’re out of cream and sugar.”

  He sipped at his coffee for a minute in silence, then said: “I suppose we should consider getting the children to bed. I can get someone to drive you to a hotel. Or maybe you’ve got relations in town or friends. Want me to try them?”

  “Harry.” She hesitated. “I have no relations in town and I guess I’m not the type to make many friends. I have no one close to me, I haven’t had for years.” She looked up at him. “Please don’t feel sorry for me; that’s not why I said that.”