The Lorimer Legacy (27 page)

The orchestra began to play, but Margaret did not hear it. The curtain rose, and the huge stage was illuminated with gaslight as the light faded in the giant chandelier which hung over the auditorium: Margaret did not notice. She paid no attention when the girls from the cigarette factory poured on to the stage – not even when Alexa, almost unrecognizable in her dark wig, began to sing. Within seconds the customary miracle had occurred, as though Alexa had gathered the whole audience into the palm of her hand, allowing no one even to breathe until she should turn away with a flick of her castanets. Margaret had succumbed to this strange power at every other performance she had attended, but tonight her own circle of enchantment protected her. Pressed back into the shadow of the box, she thought what she should do.

The decision was not a difficult one to reach. Whether or not David was Frank's father, it was almost certain that he would be escorting Miss Halloran to the ball later in the evening. So Margaret herself must stay away. She longed to meet David again, but she could not face a public encounter. It could be alarming, she told herself, for a respectable citizen to find himself suddenly confronted by someone who would be able to reveal that he
had come to America as a fugitive from justice. Even as she formulated this excuse, she knew how weak it was. A man who had built up a successful new life from nothing was not likely to be troubled about the remote past. The truth was that she dared not risk seeing in his eyes at an unexpected meeting either the polite stare of non-recognition or the flash of remembered anger.

She wanted them to be friends again. If she were to be honest, the confusion of her feelings told her that she wanted him to be more than a friend – but to start with it would be enough if David would smile at her, either forgetting or forgiving their old quarrel. And to expect this in the middle of a social gathering, without warning, and without any opportunity on her part to apologize, would not be realistic. Margaret made up her mind. She would write him a letter, warning him that they were likely to meet, telling him something about her life since their last meeting, and admitting the mistake she had made at that time. She would write the letter at once, this evening, and send it round as soon as she had checked with Alexa the next morning that it should indeed be addressed to Mr Davidson.

On the stage, Alexa had begun to sing the Seguidilla, while Caruso, as Don José, attempted in vain to resist her enticements. The three tiers of her flounced skirts swung to the swaying of her hips. The movement, lithe and sensual, would have been grossly improper in private life. On stage it was in character, but the effect on the audience was almost as intense as the acted reaction of Don José. Recognizing that the first act would soon be ending, Margaret scribbled a quick note to Alexa to be delivered after the performance was over. She made her apologies to the manager, and returned to the apartment.

The letter took her a long time to write. A good many drafts were crumpled and discarded before she could feel
satisfied. By that time, the hour was so late that the opera must be over. The ball would be in full swing – although Alexa, needing time to change from a dark-skinned gypsy to a pale princess, would probably be one of the last to arrive. Too late, as she undressed and went to bed, Margaret realized that she had deserted her duty. Thinking only of her own affairs, she had quite forgotten that this was just the kind of occasion on which Alexa should have been chaperoned. It was true that Alexa was perfectly capable of looking after herself, as she had been doing in Europe for several years. But it was also true that one reason why Margaret had made the journey was to provide respectability of the kind expected in good society, if not in theatrical circles. Her failure tonight horrified her. But the mischief was done now. It could only be hoped that Miss Halloran had taken the young singer under her protection for the evening.

Margaret tried to sleep, but anxiety kept her awake. As the hours passed, she asked herself whether Alexa should be home by now. How long could a ball of this kind be expected to extend? Who would escort her home, and could the carriage be relied upon to come by the shortest route? Every time she heard the hooves of a tired horse clattering on the cobblestones of the avenue she strained her ears for the sound of a door opening, but was always disappointed. She was still awake, and increasingly worried, at thirteen minutes past five in the morning.

Theoretical instructions for action in case of emergency are reassuring and easy to follow – until the emergency actually occurs. Robert had been given detailed advice by his friend Brad Davidson on what to do if there should be an earthquake. It was not, he was warned, a remote possibility, for small tremors were felt in the city quite frequently. The first step, if he was indoors at the time, was to dash for the shelter of a doorframe and stand underneath it, so that when the roof came down he would have some protection against being crushed. The next necessity was to get out into the open as soon as possible. It had all seemed perfectly clear at the time; but at a quarter past five on the morning of 18 April it was distinctly less easy to behave in the prescribed manner.

The suddenness of the shock, waking him from sleep, paralysed Robert. While everything around him trembled, he felt himself unable to move. He clutched the sides of his shaking bed, as though by holding tightly he could keep it still. There was noise all around him – the sudden loud noises of smashing windows and falling chimneys, with a deeper undercurrent as though the earth were grinding its teeth. Even the air seemed heavy with vibration, pressing down on top of him as he lay with his eyes wide open, waiting for the ceiling to fall.

There was a brief pause in the shaking, followed by an odd flying feeling, as though a giant hand had lifted the whole apartment block off the ground before allowing it to drop again. His room, which had been indirectly illuminated at nights by the light of a street lamp outside, was abruptly darkened. The floor lurched sideways and
tipped him out of bed. He half rolled, half scrambled towards the door. The room was swaying slightly, so that for a moment he had the feeling that he might tip the whole building over, like a see-saw, if he took one step too many past whatever centre of gravity it still possessed. He stood very still in the darkness, waiting to see what was going to happen. The moment of fear was over, but it still seemed necessary to be cautious.

The quaking of the earth had already come to an end. Gradually the building also ceased to quiver. Robert heard his mother calling him. He crossed to her bedroom door and tried without success to open it.

‘Mother, are you hurt?' he shouted.

‘No; but the door's jammed. Are you all right, Robert?'

‘Yes,' said Robert. ‘Stand away!' He turned his shoulder towards the door and charged at it. The hinges splintered away from the frame and he and the door tumbled together on the bedroom floor. His mother helped him to pick himself up and gave him a quick hug before patting him up and down as though to assure herself that he was unhurt.

Now that he had taken some action, Robert felt more in control of the situation.

‘We must get out into the street straightaway,' he said. ‘I'll go and make sure that Alexa's all right.'

‘Wait a minute.' His mother was looking out of the window. ‘It's foggy outside,' she said. ‘Wet fog, and it looks cold. The tremor seems to be over for the moment. We will go out, certainly, but only when we've put on our warmest clothes. Get dressed as fast as you can.'

On the way back to his room, Robert knocked on Alexa's door, but there was no answer. He looked inside. By now his eyes had adapted themselves to the dim light. He could see that a wooden beam had fallen across the
foot of her bed, but there was nothing to suggest that she had been lying in it at the time.

‘Alexa's not here,' he called.

‘I know. Hurry up.'

He struggled into his clothes and was then sent back, grumbling, to brush his hair. His mother, meanwhile, had dressed herself and was packing some of Alexa's clothes into a bag. ‘A ball dress is hardly the ideal wear for a day on the streets,' she explained. ‘Right. Down we go.'

There were elevators in the Marie Antoinette building, but they were jammed in the distorted shaft. Robert took the bag from his mother and they joined the other residents of the apartments who were already jostling their way down the stairs.

Outside, on the wide avenue, groups of people were standing in a dazed silence, as though even the sound of speech might be enough to start the ground cracking again. Robert felt as uncertain as everyone else about what should be done next. But his mother, after a moment of the same hesitation, spoke decisively.

‘Stay here, Robert. Don't get lost.'

‘Where are you going?'

‘To see if anyone needs medical help. I won't go far away.'

‘Can't I come too?'

His mother looked doubtful. ‘I'd prefer you to stay here in case Alexa comes to look for us. But if you'd rather not be left alone –'

Indignantly Robert repudiated any suggestion that he was frightened of being on his own. He was genuinely anxious to make himself useful – but from his mother's worried expression he realized that he could help best by staying. After she had left he looked round for somewhere
to sit down. The buildings along the avenue were dangerously out of true, so that there was no temptation to linger on the sidewalk beneath them. But the avenue was unusually wide. Cautiously he skirted the humps and deep cracks which had appeared in its surface and found a fallen chimney stack to act as a seat. There was no traffic about, so that even in the foggy darkness his position seemed safe enough. The frightening experience which had turned into an exciting adventure changed quality yet again and become merely dull.

After an hour his vigil was interrupted by flurries of activity. Several of the families who had come out on to the streets decided that it might be safe to return indoors and prepare breakfast. In the block next to Robert's the chimneys, although not fallen, had cracked, and the lighting of the first stove was enough to set the building on fire. All the men in the street, including Robert, rushed to beat out the flames, and no great damage was done. But the incident revealed that, like the chimney flues, the water pipes were also cracked. When, an hour later, a second foolish cook lit her stove and accidentally ignited a broken gas main, it was clear to everyone on the avenue that amateur fire-fighting efforts would be useless. The electrical fire alarm system had ceased to operate, so runners were sent to the nearest fire station, and Robert found a second way of making himself useful. With another boy he agreed to run along the avenue for a few blocks shouting instructions that no fires should be lit inside or near any building.

Glancing up a side street as he was on his way back again, he saw a crowd jostling around a baker's shop. The front of the shop had collapsed, spilling the contents out into the road. Robert hesitated, his mouth watering. He had been brought up never to steal. But he was very hungry, and he could not exactly see where his next meal
was likely to come from if he did not find it for himself. His problem was solved when he saw a long loaf of bread just about to be trodden underfoot by a group of people who were pressing towards the inside of the store. In a quick movement which he had learned on the rugby field he scooped it up. That was salvage, not theft, he told himself as he broke off a chunk and began to gnaw it.

His mother arrived back soon after he had returned to his place. Her face was pale and her clothes were splashed with blood. She shook her head at his offer of bread.

‘I'm not hungry, thank you.'

‘Are a lot of people hurt?' Robert asked.

‘There have been some very unpleasant accidents,' she said, and he could tell from her expression that she did not want to go into details. ‘In this area, though, there are a good many large houses with only a few people living in them, so the actual number of casualties isn't too large. It's different, I hear, in the Mission Street area: whole tenements crowded with people have collapsed. And there's a bad fire in Chinatown. Robert, if we can make our way to the Davidsons' house, would you be willing to stay with Brad while I see whether any kind of emergency medical service is going to be organized? I imagine every doctor in the city will be needed.'

Before Robert had time to answer, Brad himself arrived, swerving on a bicycle between the groups of people in the avenue.

‘Alexa sent me,' he panted. ‘She's at the St Francis Hotel with my folks. Half the city's there. They're serving out meals as though it was a soup kitchen. She told me to show you the way.'

Robert and his mother hurried to the hotel. The fog lifted as they went, and the sky lightened. Throughout the city, the first atmosphere of shock seemed to have been replaced by one of picnic. Already families were
building stoves on the streets out of fallen chimneys or cobblestones. Robert began to feel excited again – but it seemed that his mother had thought of something to slow her footsteps.

‘Brad,' she asked. ‘Was it your father who was at the opera with Frank and your aunt last night?'

‘That's right,' agreed Brad. ‘He came back from the mine late yesterday, and Aunt Halloran had him into his stiff shirt before he had time to know what hit him.'

‘He'll be at the hotel now, will he?'

‘Don't rightly reckon so. He made sure we were all safe and comfortable there, and then he went off to see what needed to be done. Sounds as though this ‘quake was worse than usual. There'll be an emergency committee, he said, to get things organized. Here we are.'

Alexa came running out to greet them as they arrived. Robert noticed that she and Margaret did not embrace at once, as usually happened when they had been separated for a little while. Instead, they looked at each other with the same expression on each face. It was an expression which Robert found interesting, because he recognized it as one by which he was occasionally trapped himself -the look of a person who has done something of which he ought to be ashamed but who is hoping that nobody else knows about it.