somebody else ahead of his own. He was Numero Uno, he thought.
This time he came first, this time his life was the most important.
He clutched his empty brief case and started to walk into the vault, glancing up briefly at the dead camera overhead. A wild elation filled him. “Thou Seest Me Nail” he shouted in triumph.
It felt remarkably good.
CHAPTER 31
Within minutes after Jernigan got the warning call from Garfunkel, the sky lobby started to fill with people. Some of the tenants were dressed for the street, others were in pajamas and slippers with an overcoat hastily thrown over their shoulders. A few were hysterical and Jernigan sensed panic in the air. Faint wisps of smoke were already seeping into the lobby from the elevator shafts. He wondered if the fire below was worse than Garfunkel admitted.
He debated for a moment trying to convince residents to return to their apartments and follow the instructions printed on the door plaques. He decided that if he tried, he would have the makings of a riot. It would be the smartest thing to do, but the people in the lobby weren’t exactly in the mood for wisdom.
Rosette had arrived. She was watching a television show on a set in the maids’ quarters when the movie had been interrupted by the news flash of the fire. She was still in uniform and Jernigan thanked God for small favors. He immediately put her in charge of herding the tenants into the residential express elevator, the only elevator he could safely trust to travel through the fire zone without stopping.
He tried to quiet the tenants. “The Fire Department’s already here,” he said in a voice loud enough to be heard over the crying and the babble. “The fire’s confined to the seventeenth floor; we’ll get a little smoke up here but that should be all.” That would be more than enough, he thought, and wondered if the fire actually was being confined.
“They never tell us anything!” one woman shrilled. “We were supposed to have fire drills and indoctrination sessions but nobody ever told me anything!”
An older tenant turned to Jernigan. “See here, young man, does management have any evacuation plans at all? If so, what are they?”
Jernigan flinched inside. Harriman had planned coffee chats with The tenants, but he had postponed them because of the upcoming holiday season. The tenants couldn’t seem to find the time and neither could management.
“This is it, sir, just waiting in line for the express elevator down.”
“Didn’t they even give the families of employees directions on how to get out?”
“Sir, I don’t live here.”
The old man laughed shortly. “You’re a smarter man than I was.”
You had to look at it from their viewpoint, Jernigan thought.
There was the lack of communication between the tenants and management and there was also the sense of isolation on the part of the tenants themselves.
You had all the privacy you wanted in a high rise; it was worse than the’standard apartment house where you seldom knew the people on the other floors unless your kitchen sink overflowed and then you suddenly had the couple downstairs banging on your front door. Here, you didn’t even meet people in the hallways. It was more like a hotel: the usually deserted corridors and an occasional chance meeting by the elevators.
Now they were more-than just alone; they were frightened as well.
“They’ll pay!” a woman added. “The whole apartment will have to be cleaned; I know what smoke damage can amount to!”
See my lawyer first thing Monday. . - It’s all right, Martha, just a little smoke, we’ll be okay . .
“… Whatever happens, hang on to Daddy’s coat, don’t get separated
…”
“. . - Seen your name on the mail slot, you live right next door.
.
.”
“. - - Al, I’m scared as hell . .
One of the down elevators opened and a couple came Put with a toy poodle on a leash. Jernigan stared for a moment in fascination, wondering how they had taken the dog in and out of the building with none of the security guards aware of the animal. Lisolette Mueller had her pet cat, Schiller, but that was an open secret; everybody knew it but nobody really objected.
Jernigan helped Rosette form the tenants into lines in front of the residential express to the main lobby; the only stops the elevator was capable of making were the two lobbies and the basement garage. It made no stops at all in the commercial section of the building.
Suddenly Jernigan spotted a beefy salesman type and his chubby wife buzzing one of the elevators in the commercial bank.
He moved in quickly.
“I’m sorry, sir, you’ll have to wait for the residential express; the commercial elevators are too risky to take down.”
The salesman gave him the fish eye. “I don’t get it.
“What do you mean, they’re too risky?”
Jernigan had been alerted to the risks once in friendly conversation with a fireman and patiently explained it. “If an elevator is capable of making stops in the fire zone and if the call button on that floor is fused because of the heat there’s a good chance the elevator will be called to that floor whether you want it to or not. Once the doors open, you might never get out alive.”
“I don’t know what you’re talking about, son,” the man said. “All I know is Maggie and me aren’t going to stay here and broil.”
“the fire is fourteen floors below us,” Jernigan said calmly.
“Look, it’s too risky; the elevator might go right to the fire floor.”
The lobby was overflowing now. It was going to take time to evacuate the residents and it was going to be increasingly difficult to keep them away from the commercial bank. What none of them realized was that there was a faint blue to the air even now from the smoke. It would get worse, and probably quickly. More people and he would start to lose control….
“I’m buzzing for the elevator, son. I pay my rent; you can’t stop me.” He was red in the face, trying to work up his anger.
Probably because he was scared to death, Jernigan thought. A number of tenants in the crowd had pushed over and would obviously stampede into the elevator the moment its door opened. He could tell by the looks on their faces that they hadn’t understood what he had tried to explain to the salesman either.
He raised his voice. “Rosette, make it women and children first, overload it if you have to.” There was a safety factor built in that could handle the overloading, particularly with women and children. But even though it wouldn’t stop at the fire floor, it was still traveling through the fire zone and the sooner the women and children got out, the better.
He turned back to the salesman, his voice hard. “I’ll try once more, mister. There’s no call button for the residential express’elevator on the seventeenth floor-it won’t stop there, it will go right through the fire zone down to the lobby. You take one of the commercial elevators and the chances are it will stop there, even if you didn’t press the button for the floor. And once the doors open, you’ll cook.”
“Don’t try to bullshit me, mister. When the elevator comes, I’m going.” A few of the tenants behind Jernigan pushed forward in anticipation.
The commercial elevator arrived and the doors slid silently open.
Jernigan saw what the salesman did not: The paint on the doors had been slightly scorched. It had probably stopped briefly at the fire floor, the doors opened and closed, and it had then resumed its upward journey.
