Five Past Midnight - James Thayer [133]
"Who are those men in the white uniforms?" Cray asked as he led Katrin across shattered glass.
"They call themselves the TeNo. Everybody else calls them the Rescue Squad."
The TeNo workers wore black berets and black belts that cinched in the white tunic. The white pants were loose and made of rough drill material, and stained from earlier rescues. Black cuff titles identifying the unit were on the left sleeves.
TeNo men entered the home next to the burning unit. The fireman at the hydrant cursed, then spun the nozzle off the spigot. Bombs had disrupted the mains, so there was no water to be had. He dragged the hose back to the pumper to attach it to the outlet. The truck's tank carried four thousand liters of water. It would not last long. The fireman checked the pressure gauges, then pushed back the hose-bed tarp to reach for more hose.
When Cray stopped to watch, and resisted Katrin's trying to pull him along by the arm, she said, "Honest to God, you are a child. Stopping to gaze at a fire."
He replied, "I rarely see one I didn't start."
The muffled roar of a collapsing ceiling came from the burning building, then the squeal of timbers wrenched down by the weight of debris. Two TeNo men ran out of the neighboring building, chased by a swirling smoke cloud. They yelled at their supervisor—the only TeNo worker wearing a black greatcoat—and one of them pointed with agitation back toward the building. Fire in the neighboring building was drawing near. When a fireman turned the handle on the nozzle, a stream of water from the pumper arced into the building, to little effect.
Katrin flinched when the cry of a man came from the neighboring building, a ragged wail, choked off by pain. She breathed, "My God, someone's still in there."
A TeNo worker climbed into the truck, then emerged a few seconds later carrying a three-meter pry bar, so heavy that he could not jump to the ground with it, but had to lay it on the bed, climb down, then retrieve it. Other TeNo men pulled gas masks from a wooden compartment under the toolbox. They removed their berets to secure the masks to their faces. Glancing anxiously at the next building, where fire was gaining despite the stream of water, the Rescue Squad reentered the building.
Another cry came from within, a strangled shriek. Jack Cray edged closer to the building, as far the first pumper truck.
"What are you doing?" Katrin asked, still at his elbow.
"Someone's in that building, and the fire is moving into it."
"That's why the Rescue Squad is here." She gripped his arm more tightly.
"Someone's going to be parboiled." Cray moved nearer to the buildings, stepping over a fire hose.
"This is none of our business, Jack." She was startled she had used his first name.
But he drew closer to the fire, to stand next to the TeNo leader. A double row of silver buttons was on the leader's greatcoat. He wore a black beret. He glanced at Cray, then stepped toward the door of the house where the man was trapped inside. He was met by a Rescue Squad member holding the pry bar as he emerged from the house. The man pulled off his gas mask.
Katrin hung back when Cray walked toward them, as if he were suddenly part of the Rescue Squad.
The TeNo man was saying, "When I jam the pry bar into the fallen wall and jack it up, it just sags around it. The stuff is too soft. Every time I pry, more weight goes onto the man's arm."
The troop leader asked, "Would a pulley and chain work?"
"Nothing solid overhead to hang it on, and you've still got the problem of the crumbling plaster around his arm." The TeNo man looked over his shoulder into the building. Timbers creaked and groaned. "He doesn't have long, Lieutenant. I can already feel the fire when I'm in there, right through the wall."
The lieutenant ordered, "Get the saw."
"Will you do the sawing this time, sir?" the pry bar man asked. "I've had it with the saw."
Another TeNo worker passed the saw to the lieutenant. It was a carpenter's tool, with crosscut teeth.
The lieutenant slipped a