When We Caught Fire

by Anna Godbersen

  Although his hair had gone prematurely gray with dust—though his shirt was creased, stained with sweat, and hanging loosely from his lean, strong arms—his face still had the capacity to change her heart’s rhythm. His eyes flashed, and the dimples appeared in his smudged cheeks.

  “You have to,” he said, producing the brass relic they’d taken from Freddy’s white jacket and giving a little flourish. “I’m the one who has the key.”

  It was some kind of miracle, Fiona knew, that he could still, after everything they’d seen, make her laugh with a silly gesture. “I’m coming with you,” she said.

  He inclined his head—as though he knew better than to argue with her—and they pushed back the imposing front door.

  Inside, the air was dense and dry and the walls gave off an awful heat.

  “Emmeline!” they howled as they hurried up the stairs. “Emmeline!”

  As they ascended, the smoke that hung in the halls became thicker. On the second floor, a bedroom door opened easily, but they could hardly see for the haze. Anders ripped the coverlet back from the bed, and draped it over Fiona. As they came back onto the landing, a seam opened in the wallpaper. In seconds, the hole widened, sending flames upward toward the ceiling, leaving black streaks against the white-and-gold-flocked pattern.

  “You have to go back now,” Anders said.

  “No.” Fiona shook her head. She wasn’t certain if her reluctance was leaving Anders in danger, the possibility of Anders caring more for Emmeline’s safety than her own, or the sense of responsibility to her old friend that, even now, had a strong pull. These had all become hopelessly melded together.

  “Yes,” he said. “You must.”

  Ribbons of flame had reached the ceiling, so that the plaster blistered and cracked. Every breath seemed to scorch her from the inside, to lodge sparks within her chest and the pit of her belly. Even so, Fiona shook her head. The tears came fast and hot now—they sprang up with the smoke, but also at the suggestion of their parting.

  “It will be easier for two to come down than three,” he said. “And anyway, I couldn’t stand myself if you got hurt.”

  “But—”

  “Yesterday, I didn’t think my life was worth very much. I would have given it away for any price. Not anymore. It all seems bigger now, and sweeter. When I look in your eyes, I see my own goodness. Do you understand? I know what it’s all for.”

  The skin of her cheeks was damp, and she couldn’t bear to leave him. The roof would cave in soon, she thought, the walls would catch and come crashing down around them. When that happened, she would rather be with him. He lifted the corner of the bedspread, and used it to wipe the mixture of ash and tears from her cheeks. His hands traveled along her neck, his fingers pushed through her hair, taking hold of the base of her skull and bringing her mouth to his. His lips were moist and tender, and their sensation stoked the old longing. He kissed her, and kissed her again, as though she could take away his thirst.

  “I don’t think you know how beautiful you are.”

  “That can’t matter very much now—”

  “But it does. It matters now more than ever.”

  “I can’t,” she murmured. “Can’t leave.”

  “You have to go,” he said. “Because I love you—go now.”

  “I love you,” she whispered.

  He kissed her once more, with exquisite force. “Now go, get safe. If you’re safe and waiting for me, I’ll have a reason to make it out of here alive.”

  He stepped up, his hand slipping from her shoulder, to her forearm, to her fingertips. In a moment, he was two steps higher. His grip opened and released hers. At the third-story landing, he paused to look back. The corridor was so dim with combustion that she could only make out his general outline. But his eyes still shone blue and bright. When she saw them, she thought that she could not stand it; she would have to follow.

  But the staircase to the third floor was burning by then, and she had no choice but to retreat, down the stairs and into the bleak morning.

  Thirty-Four

  Let me be redeemed.

  —Diary of Emmeline Carter Tree, October 9, 1871

  The world had gone violet and bronze. It was breaking apart in a million tiny pieces that swirled, like fairy dust. Or stardust. Yes, stardust—she liked that better. Soon the city and everything else would disappear in a burst of sublime light, and Emmeline would be no more. Her thinking, and her vision, were not entirely reliable—she knew that much—and so when she saw Anders opening the door, very smoothly, as though he himself had designed the key, she thought it must be her eyes playing tricks. Either that, or she was already dead.

  “What are you doing in there?” he said as his mouth cracked open. She had forgotten that smile.

  She sat up very quickly and was seized by a coughing fit. Then she knew she was still alive. She had to be—the pain was too sharp for her to be otherwise. It was as though burning bristles had lodged themselves in her lungs. As though she were on fire on the inside.

  “Are you here to tell me that you hate me?”

  He shook his head. “Come on, the roof is on fire.”

  “I’m sorry, Anders, I should have come this morning.”

  He made a funny gesture at her wedding dress. “You had someplace else to be.”

  “Oh!” She smoothed her hands over the bodice. “But that was a terrible mistake.”

  He nodded, averted his eyes. “Come with me,” he said, extending his hand for her to take. “It’s dangerous here.”

  She allowed him to draw her out onto the landing. A little side table stood beside the door, topped with blue linen and a lacquer vase full of white roses—he threw the flowers away, and doused the cloth with their water.

  “Here,” he said. “Put that on your face.”

  She did as told. But even with her mouth covered, she could not help asking the thing she had wondered all these hours. “But if I had come, would it have been me?”

  He thought a moment and said, “I did love you, Emmeline.” His eyes darted over her face, as though he wanted to make sure she was all right. “You were my first love. But—”

  “I understand,” she whispered through the cloth. She did not want to hear what came after but. During the long night she had had many hours to contemplate what she had done and the consequences, but it still crushed her, now, to find herself at the final end of that beautiful idea. Her head jerked, as though she were swallowing a bitter pill. “It was a lovely time, wasn’t it?”

  “Yes.” He lifted her hand and, holding her gaze, brushed his lips over the top of her hand. “But please, we can’t talk about that now.”

  Anders had her hand in a firm grip, and pulled her down the stairs. The long white train trailed behind, catching against the hot walls, and by the time they reached the third-floor landing, it had been infected with flames that had to be stomped out. They tried to continue, but the flight between the third and second floor was a riot of yellow licking light.

  “The servants’ stairs,” she said, and they hurried toward the back of the house.

  But they had only gone a little way before their inability to see or breathe told them definitively that there would be no escape that way. They came back, through the linked parlors that would have been hers to have little private afternoons with Ada and Daisy and their kind, toward the front. The middle stairwell was now a tower of flame, the wallpaper peeling off and whirling, making little boats of fire that coasted up and down on the current.

  “Close the door,” Anders said. “All the doors.”

  Once they had sealed the exits to the room, she gestured toward the window. “It’s the only way. Maybe we’ll be lucky.”

  But Anders hung back, assailed by an attack of coughing. “We’re too far from the ground.”

  “Don’t be afraid,” she said. She hurried toward the big front windows, where shouting could be heard down below. The voice sounded familiar, and before she knew to think otherwise,
she was heartened by the realization that it was Fiona. “I’m always lucky.”

  Down below, Fiona had commandeered a crew of Terrace Row men, and they had picked up a large wooden cart—the kind used to transport produce from one side of town to the other, with a large square frame covered in canvas—and placed it in the rose garden beside the front stoop.

  “Closer!” Fiona was shouting to them. “As close to the building as you can.”

  “Anders!” Emmeline exclaimed. “We’re going to be all right—”

  But when she turned, she saw that the ceiling was no longer a ceiling. It trembled and swelled and finally a beam cloaked entirely in fire fell through the white plaster. Anders looked up in time to see it, but not in time to move. The beam struck his back and knocked him to the floor. Emmeline screamed and rushed to kick the wooden torch away so she could roll the rug over him, crushing the flames that grew from the back of his shirt.

  “Anders?” she wailed. Her heart was pounding so loudly that she could no longer hear the encroaching fire.

  “Go,” he said, scrambling to his feet. His irises were like the lake when it froze in winter, glinting with cool, spectral light. He pushed her, so that she reeled toward the window. “We have to go now.”

  “But—”

  His hands were guiding her. Her feet had gained a foothold on the sill.

  “Go,” Anders urged her.

  When she opened the window, the cool air rushed in and the unbearable heat surged, expanded, pushed outward. She did not have time to wonder if she was afraid to jump because the force of that hot gust sent her flying. Her skirt ballooned, and her heart surged up, and a moment later she bounced on the wagon’s stretched canvas, slid down the side, and found herself in her father’s arms.

  “I’m sorry, Emmeline,” he said, kissing her forehead. “So, so sorry for all I’ve put you through.”

  She knew it was bad, then, what had happened in the world while she was locked up. Her father was never discomposed, but his face was stony with shock now. Across the avenue, the people who would have been her neighbors stood among their fine furniture, their heads tilted back, their mouths hung open. They, too, were stunned by what they were witnessing, and when Emmeline revolved slowly she saw that all their grand houses were crowned with flames. Then she heard the scream.

  The window that Emmeline had fallen from was like the mouth of a mythical beast, breathing fire in a long, furious red-and-orange tongue.

  “Stop her!” someone yelled.

  Emmeline heard that anguished scream again, and turned to see Fiona and one of the men who had carried the cart, trying to hold her back from running into the burning building. Emmeline threw her arms around Fiona’s waist, and held tight as she marched her down the stairs, through the iron gate, into the middle of Michigan Avenue. All the while Fiona struggled and screamed, her eyes huge but unseeing. At last her body went slack, and the two girls collapsed into a pile against the pavement.

  The sobs had begun. Emmeline felt them shuddering through Fiona’s shoulders, and knew what they meant. Anders was gone. He had been there, with his mischievous smile and strong hands, urging her to seek safety, but now he was no more. It didn’t seem possible, and Emmeline tried very hard to keep the realization at bay.

  Later, there would be time for her own tears. Now she held steady and let Fiona shake and weep in her arms. Let Fiona’s grief be hers, too. Let it be a storm that could wash over them, wash away the sooty stain of all they had done, wash them clean.

  Afterword

  The news from Chicago is that construction has already begun in the burned district, and that the banks are doing business as usual. This is incredible, especially when one remembers that a week ago the city’s courthouse, all her major banks, and the bulk of her lumberyards were destroyed in the calamity of the fire. But they say there is employment for all who are willing to work.

  —New York Times, October 16, 1871

  The rain was falling again. Fiona touched the window glass in the salon of the hotel Mr. Carter owned by the stockyards and gazed out at the big drops. She knew that these showers from above were necessary and good—the rain had begun Tuesday morning, and put out what was left of the fire, although its power was already much diminished by then. On the North Side, the blaze had reached the edge of town by Monday night, and there was nothing left to burn, and on the South Side it met with the line of buildings General Sheridan had exploded so that the mountain of flame, starved of fuel, was reduced to piles of cinder. And the rain had dampened the ground, which held its terrible heat for days and days after. Yet the rain made her angry. This rain had come too late for her, too late for Anders.

  The rain was also the reason that she had been persuaded to leave her vigil at Terrace Row, and even now, she regretted it and wished she had stayed there until what remained of that terrible house was cleared and she could see for herself that he had not survived its fiery collapse. Wished she had found some tiny relic of Anders, wished she had done him the honor of staying until she was soaked with the rain that came too late, and caught her death of cold, just like everyone said she would, and could thus disintegrate into the atmosphere as he had.

  Emmeline had been at her side the whole time, and when the men who worked—at first to make sure the hot embers did not catch and spread fire again, and then to clear the rubble—started urging them to leave, she had spoken for both girls and said they would stay until the house at No. 5 Terrace Row was cleared. On Wednesday morning, General Sheridan marched his troops up Michigan Avenue to take control of the city, and Gabriel, Anders’s cousin, finally prevailed upon them to get some rest.

  “He would not want you to destroy yourselves,” Gabriel had said. His face was as young-looking as before, his body as frail, but he seemed ten years older now. Overnight, he had become capable of giving wise advice and issuing commands. Like so many others, he worked tirelessly to clear the debris and make ready for a new city to rise over the old one.

  Emmeline squeezed Fiona’s hand. “He’s right,” she had said. “We can come back tomorrow.”

  Fiona’s heart screamed no, but her body followed obediently as Emmeline led her to the carriage that Mr. Carter had sent with orders to wait until the girls were ready to leave. They had washed and slept and changed clothes and returned to the last place they had seen Anders. But by then what remained of Terrace Row had been razed, and Fiona began weeping uncontrollably once again, and was forced to finally admit what she’d known since they dragged her back from the burning house. Anders was not coming out again.

  In the days that followed, neither said his name. Fiona could feel Emmeline’s worried gaze on her, but she did not want to look back. Fiona was having difficulty speaking at all, and she did not want to have to talk about Anders. If they spoke about him, it would be in the past tense, and she wanted to hold the feeling of him alive in her heart as long as she could. She did not want to risk breaking the spell of his living presence. But when Emmeline said there was work to do, Fiona nodded and asked where they ought to start. Children had been separated from their parents when they fled to the Sands, the prairie, and Lincoln Park, and they required looking after until they could be reunited. Thousands were in need of food, clothing, and shelter, and they were both glad to be busy for many days with the relief effort.

  It was a cold comfort that they were well taken care of, while so many others suffered—once the fire had begun to spread, Mr. Carter had ordered Malcolm to bury his many deeds and claims, as well as much of his fortune, deep in the sand and clay beneath the Dearborn property. He led the city in funding new construction, hiring the men who had been left homeless by the disaster, hosting charity balls in barns and construction sites and anywhere he could convince those with money to gather for a good cause. But Emmeline did not seem interested in such events, and Fiona was glad that they did not have to attend to her social status as they had before. She was glad of her friend’s company in the quiet evenings, even if neit
her was ready to discuss the breach that had seemed sure to destroy their friendship, or the secret that was now their shared burden.

  In those days, many people said that despite the terror they felt while the fire consumed the city from one end to the other, it was the most spectacular sight they ever hoped to see. That the fire’s ghastly light, its otherworldly colors, its singular weather, its whoosh and boom, might almost be described as beautiful. Almost—for how could something that left 100,000 without homes, and robbed three hundred of their lives, be beautiful? Three hundred was the official number given by the commissioner’s report some months after the ground ceased smoking, although it must have been many more. For how many men and women were consumed in their sleep, buried in rubble, became ash and floated over the lake, dispersed finally into the upper air? Who could count them all?

  And then there were those who, on Tuesday, when they saw what had once been the whole world leveled, their houses swept away, their businesses gone, their families broken, took the opportunity to begin again. It is impossible to know how many looked at that grim morning and decided to simply walk away, but there must have been many.

  Other lives became legendary, for their fortunes were made or destroyed overnight. Millionaires who became paupers, and the other way around. One such was a girl named Georgie Kelly, who came walking down Michigan Avenue on that strange unending day, saw where the fire was headed, and offered a twenty-dollar bill for the deed to the Michigan Avenue Hotel. The proprietor laughed, for he could see that the fire was already ravaging the building two doors north, and he was only trying to salvage some of the fine pieces from the front parlor, and agreed to the deal. After the transaction, she told him he would have to leave what was in the hotel, for it belonged to her now. The next day, everyone knew that the fire line was marked at the Michigan Avenue Hotel—later known as the George—and Miss Kelly was afterward known as a woman of property in Chicago, not to be crossed.