New York - The Novel

back a little way so that he could see. A crowd of workers were standing on the roof, and people from the adjoining New York University building, which was a little higher, had let down ladders so they could escape. Had the girls from the ninth floor got up there? It was impossible to know.
    He went back to the statue of Garibaldi.
    “Where’s Anna?” Angelo was wide-eyed.
    “She’ll come.”
    “Where is she?”
    “Maybe she’s coming down in the elevator, though some of the girls are going by the roof. She’ll find us if we wait here.”
    “Is it dangerous?”
    “No.” Salvatore tried to smile. “Look at all the fire wagons and the firemen, and all the people coming out.”
    Angelo nodded. But he looked frightened all the same.
    Then Salvatore saw her.
    Anna was standing by one of the ninth-floor windows. Girls were appearing at the other windows on that floor too. They seemed indistinct, and then he realized that there must be smoke in the room behind them. One of the girls opened a window, and some smoke came out. There wasa faint flickering of light in the cavernous space behind them. The flames must have reached that floor.
    Why were the girls by the windows? Couldn’t they get out? It must be getting hot in there. Very hot.
    The girl stepped out onto the window ledge. Above the ninth floor, a heavy cornice ran round the building, jutting out a foot or two. The girl looked up at it. Perhaps she was wondering if she could get up there and work her way round to safety. Perhaps she didn’t know that the fire was already on the tenth floor above. But the floors of the building were twelve feet high; there was no way she could get up there anyway.
    Other windows were opening now, and other girls edging out onto the ledges. A young man stepped out, too. They were looking down; the street was a hundred feet below. You could see the flames behind them now. Obviously they couldn’t stand the heat inside any more.
    The firemen saw them and trained one of the hoses up there. The arc of water shot skyward, but by the time it got to a hundred feet high, it broke into a sprinkle. They started to run a fire wagon ladder up the side of the building, but that was no good—it couldn’t reach within thirty feet. The ladder rested there, tempting but useless. They were opening nets now, above the sidewalk. The people on the ledges were looking down at them. Would the nets hold if they jumped? It was an awfully long way down. The firemen didn’t seem to be telling them to jump. They hesitated.
    Then Salvatore saw that Anna was looking toward them. She could see the statue of Garibaldi from up there, for sure, and she must be trying to find him and Angelo. With the water from the hoses and the smoke from the floor below, though, it mightn’t be so easy to make them out. He waved. Beside him, little Angelo waved too. But Anna didn’t wave back.
    “Are we waving at Anna?” Angelo asked. “Can you see her?”
    Salvatore didn’t answer. One of the girls had jumped. The young man jumped after her. Then Anna jumped.
    Angelo didn’t see.
    “Wait here,” Salvatore cried, and ran toward the building.
    The nets were useless, of course. The firemen had only put them there as a last resort. By the time Salvatore got there, the fire chief was already telling his men to take them down again.
    The young man who jumped had gone straight through the net. Annaand the other girls who’d followed her had hardly been slowed at all before they hit the sidewalk. Amazingly, Anna’s face was quite preserved, though the back of her head was entirely crushed. He didn’t need the fireman to tell him she was dead.
    “That’s my sister,” he told the fireman, and gave him his name. “I have to take my little brother home, then I’ll be back.” He was amazed how composed he was.
    He got back to the statue.
    “Did Anna jump?” Angelo asked.
    “Yes. She’s all right, but she’s hurt her leg, so they may take her to the hospital. She told me to take you home, and tell Mama. Then we’ll all go to see her later.”
    “I want to see her now.”
    “No, she told us to go straight home.”
    “Are you sure she’s all right?”
    “She’s fine.”

    On May 23, 1911, no less a person than the President of the United States was in the City of New York for an important ceremony. On the site of the old fortress-like reservoir, the big library on Fifth Avenue was finally opening for business.
    The collection, based on the