Fortune Is a Woman - Elizabeth Adler [60]
“Morning, Dad,” she called cheerily, pulling his chair out from the table and pouring his tea. “Your porridge’ll be ready in a few minutes. How about a nice rasher or two this morning and maybe some scrambled eggs?”
He shook his grizzled head, sinking into the chair with a loud sigh. “Porridge will do,” he said.
He stared silently at his plate and Annie sighed exasperatedly. How many times had she argued that he had two other sons, that he had grandchildren, that he had a business and money in the bank. That Josh was innocent. But to no avail. “When you have a lad who’s done what our Josh has done, that’s something God will never forgive. And nor will I,” he had told her. And that was all he had ever said on the subject to this day.
But this morning was different. Frank pushed the newspaper to one side the way he always did, only this time something took his eye.
MASSIVE QUAKE DEMOLISHES SAN FRANCISCO, the headline blared, THOUSANDS FEARED DEAD IN RAGING INFERNO.
“I’ll bet there’s a few houses I helped build gone down in that,” he commented, stirring strawberry jam into the steaming bowl of porridge.
“What’s that then, Dad?” she asked, astonished he had passed a comment on something other than his food or the house.
“This ’ere earthquake,” he said, pushing away the porridge untouched and spooning sugar into his tea instead.
Annie was kneeling on the hearthrug toasting bread over the glowing coals on a long brass fork. Two slices lay ready on the flannel-wrapped hot brick, and her cheeks were pink from the heat. She glanced over her shoulder exasperatedly. “What earthquake, Dad?”
“The earthquake in San Francisco, like it says here in t’paper. Read it for yourself.”
“San Francisco? An earthquake?” Dropping the toasting fork she ran to the table and grabbed the newspaper, scanning the story rapidly. Her eyes grew round with horror, her face turned pale, and she clutched her hand to her heart. “Oh Dad,” she whispered, “it can’t be true.”
“It’ll be true enough,” he replied, sipping his tea. “There was allus a rumbling going on under that city even when I was there.”
“You don’t understand.” She sank into her chair, covering her face with her apron so he would not see her tears. She thought of Josh in San Francisco, maybe dead, maybe buried under a shattered building or burned in the inferno. What could she do? Oh, what could she do? Her beloved, beautiful, innocent Josh …
After a while she dried her tears and picked up the newspaper again. Her father was still sitting quietly over his cup of tea, his breakfast lay untouched and he was puffing on his old pipe, filling the room with smoke the way he did every morning. She wanted to scream at him to stop it, that his son might be lying maimed under a ton of rubble or burned to ashes. Instead she read the story again.
It said news reports were still sketchy because all communications had been cut by the massive quake. The state of California had already sent help and the major American cities were dispatching food, blankets, clothing, and money to aid the survivors. The fire chief had been killed in the first tremor when the firehouse collapsed around him, and the water mains had fractured so there was no water to fight the blaze. The whole city was alight, nothing could save it. The brand-new eight-million-dollar City Hall had crumbled to dust, the fantastic Palace Hotel, the world’s largest, was reduced to ashes and Nob Hill’s mansions were even now being devoured by the flames.
The famous opera star, Enrico Caruso, escaped with his company on a specially commissioned train before the fires took hold. He said the city was “a hell of a place,” and swore he would never come back. After the first shock the citizens had run into the streets, wondering what to do. When things quieted down, most of them decided to cook themselves some breakfast, and with the many broken gas mains the city soon had a dozen fires burning. There was no proper fire-alarm