Sue Grafton - L is for Lawless

I turned and eased the door shut behind me, then crept over to the nearest window and lifted myself gingerly to my feet. Below was one of those vast meeting rooms meant for banquets and large assemblages. An endless pattern of fleur-de-lis proceeded across the carpeting, steel blue on a ground of gray. A series of sliding doors could be drawn across the space at the midway point, effectively dividing the one room into two. Eight evenly spaced chandeliers hung like clusters of icicles, throwing out a flat light. Around the periphery, up near the ceiling where I was, the continuous rim of mirrored-glass windows concealed the space where I hid. I peered back across my shoulder. Through the gloom now, I could see the looming apparatus for a lighting system that must have been called into play on special occasions, floods and spots with various colored gels.

By the light coming through the windows, I hunkered down and opened my bag, taking out my wallet. I removed my driver's license, PI license, and other identification, including cash and credit cards, all of which I stuffed in the pockets of my blazer in haste. I snagged Ray's car keys, my birth control pills, the key picks, and my Swiss Army knife, cursing the fact that women's suit jackets aren't constructed with an interior breast pocket. I plucked out my toothbrush and tucked it in with the other items. My blazer pockets were bulging, but I couldn't help myself. In a pinch, I'm willing to suffer tatty underpants, but not unbrushed teeth.

I became aware that the floor beneath me was vibrating ever so slightly. In California, I'd assume that a 2.2 magnitude temblor was lapping through the earth like an ocean wave. I whipped my head around toward the door. I set my bag aside, sank to a hunkering position, and duck-walked across the narrow passage. I felt the perimeter of the door, fingers searching for the latch bolt on my side. On the far side of the wall, someone was making shaky progress, just as I had, along the catwalk. I found the latch and, ever so silently, pushed the bolt through the eye.

I still had my hand on the bolt when the door gave a vicious rattle. Someone on the far side was testing the latch. A spurt of fear traveled through me, triggering tears that leapt into my eyes. I pressed my hand against my mouth to suppress a gasp. The door was chattering against the lock so hard I thought it would give way, leaving me exposed to view. Silence. Then the floor began to shake again as Gilbert moved away. I glanced to my left, following his progress as he continued down the catwalk. I prayed there wasn't another wooden doorway farther down the line.

He must have reached a dead end because a few minutes later, I felt the floor vibrate with his weight as he passed me again, this time heading toward the ladder leading down to the corridor.

I waited until I thought I was safe. It felt like an eternity but was probably close to fifteen minutes. Then I reached out carefully and pushed the bolt back. I bent my head to listen, hearing nothing. When I opened the door, the fire alarm went off.

My opening of the door and the clanging were so closely connected, I thought Gilbert had booby-trapped the door somehow. The overhead sprinklers came on in a torrent of internal rain. The distant scent of smoke assailed me, as unmistakable as the lingering trail of perfume when a woman passes. I moved back to the windows overlooking the banquet room. There was no sign of flames, no billowing black smoke. The room looked empty, bright and blank. Someone began to make an announcement on the public address system, giving instructions or advice about what hotel guests were supposed to do. All I could hear was the muffled urgency of the proclamation. The exact location of the fire was anybody's guess.

The lights went out, plunging me into total darkness. I felt my way over to the wooden door, crawling through unencumbered by worldly possessions. I was being stripped down to the essentials, feeling light and free and, at the same time, anxious. My handbag was a talisman, as comforting as a security blanket. Its bulk and heft were familiar, its contents assurance that certain totem items were always within reach. The bag had served as both pillow and weapon. It felt odd to be shed of it, but I knew it had to be. Blindly, I measured the width of the catwalk, sensing the cavernous abyss on my left where my hand plunged suddenly into nothingness.

The entire area was pitch black, but I could hear an ominous pop and crackling noise. A blistering wind blew, sending a shower of sparks in my direction. I could smell hot, dry wood, undercut by the acrid odor of petroleum-based products changing chemical states. I inched my way forward. Ahead, I could now discern a soft reddish glow defining the wall where the corridor curved left. A long finger of smoke curled around the corner toward me. If the fire caught me on the catwalk, it would probably sweep right past, but the rising cloud of toxic fumes would snuff me out as effectively as the flames.

While the water from the sprinkler system hissed steadily, it seemed to have no effect on the fire that I could see. The play of tawny light on the walls began to expand and dance, pushing fine ash and black smoke ahead of it, gobbling up all the available oxygen. The metal catwalk was slippery, the chain railing swinging wildly as I propelled myself onward. The public address system came to life again. The same announcement was repeated, a garbled blend of consonants. I reached the top of the ladder. I was afraid to turn my back on the encroaching fire, but I had no choice. With my right foot, I felt for the first rung, gauging the distance as I moved down from rung to rung. I began descending with care, my hands sliding on the wet metal side rail. Hanging lengths of chain turned gold in the light, sparks flying up, winking out like intermittent fireflies on a hot summer night. By now, the fire was providing sufficient illumination to see the air turn gray as smoke accumulated.

I reached the bottom of the ladder and moved to my left. The fire was heating the air to an uncomfortable degree. I could hear a snapping sound, glass shattering, the merry rustle of destruction as the flames roared toward me. Despite the liberal use of concrete, the hotel had sufficient combustible material to feed the swiftly spreading blaze. I heard the dull boom of thunder as something behind me gave way and collapsed. This entire portion of the hotel had apparently been engulfed. I spotted a door on my left. I tried the knob, which was cool to the touch. I turned it and pushed through, spilling abruptly into a second-floor hall.

Here the air was much cooler. The rain birds in the ceiling showered the deserted corridor with irregular sprays. I was getting used to the dark, which now seemed less dense, a chalky gloom instead of the impenetrable black of the inner corridor. The carpet was saturated, slapping wetly beneath my feet as I stumbled down the darkened hallway. Afraid to trust my eyes, I held my arms out stiffly, waving my hands in front of me like a game of blindman's buff. The fire alarm continued its monotonous clanging, a secondary horn bleating gutturally. In a submarine movie, we'd be diving by now. I felt my way across another door frame. Again, the knob seemed cool to the touch, suggesting that, for the time being, the fire wasn't raging on the other side. I turned the knob, pushing the door open in front of me. I found myself on the fire stairs, which I knew intimately by now. I went down through the blackness, reassured by the familiarity of the stairwell. The air was cold and smelled clean.

When I reached the main floor, the emergency generators kicked in and briefly lights flickered back to life. The corridor was deserted, doors closed. Here, there was no sign of movement, no hint of smoke, the sprinkler system muffled. Every public room I passed was empty of guests. I found a fire door marked Emergency Exit with a big flexible bar across the center, the surface posted with warnings. As I pushed through the door, yet another siren began to howl behind me. I walked rapidly, without a backward glance, until I reached the side lot where Ray's rental car was parked.