Without breaking her hypnotic connection with the approaching inferno, she stooped to pick up the hat, inches from the tide. Although she’d always avoided contact with his personal effects, now she felt a compulsion to run her gloved finger along the blue band.
Praying that this wasn’t the ship carrying the doctor’s family, she watched the fire, fueled by a strong southerly wind, devour more of the massive, wooden steamboat. Smoke billowed around the paddle wheel, bringing into and out of view the vessel’s name, Gen! Slocum, painted in a large, Old English font. Cora could make out passengers clinging to the remaining railings, and others plunging into the water to escape the devastation. The thought of saltwater eating away at burned flesh was terrifying.
Behind her, frantic shouting signaled that rescue efforts were under way. She turned toward the commotion.
The entire Riverside staff, carrying blankets or medical supplies, appeared to be in motion on the lawn in front of the main hospital building. Nearby, three mechanics were dragging a hose from the physical plant toward the seawall.
“They’re almost here!” O’Toole shouted and leaped from the wall, hitting the sand with a thud. He ripped off his shirt and waded into the shallows. Around him, a volley of people, including Linnaeus and several nurses—but not Dr. Gettler—landed on the beach. He must still be in the hospital, overseeing preparations for an influx of patients, she decided, wondering if that meant he didn’t believe his family was aboard. Then again, with so many people depending on him, Cora knew he wouldn’t shirk his leadership role for even the most sacred of personal reasons.
Those on the strand began stripping down to their undergarments. Cora caught sight of Linnaeus’s lean, muscular torso, even finer than she’d imagined. Trying to concentrate, she told herself all that mattered now was his ability to swim.
A thunderous sound invaded her hood and assaulted her ears as waves of scorching heat blasted her skin.
Hysterical screams rose above the hissing and crackling. As she turned to face the steamboat, almost upon her, black spots filled her vision, like she’d just stared into the sun. Scrambling backward until the seawall halted her retreat, she shielded her eyes and took in the chaos. The people jumping for their lives from the decks, landing on others already thrashing in the churning water, were women and children. As were those clinging to the vestiges of railings.
Twenty feet offshore, the bow ground to a halt with an ear-splitting groan, and the spray from the fire brigade disappeared into a wall of flames.
O’Toole, Linnaeus, and the others in the shallows hurled themselves into deeper water and grabbed the nearest victims. Lulu McGibbons, the switchboard operator, ran past Cora and dove in, followed by nurse Pauline Puetz.
The recently married head nurse, Kate White, barreled past, single-handedly carrying a construction ladder. She extended it beyond the shoal, and victims grabbed ahold.
Dr. Gettler dropped to the sand, wrenched open his black physician’s kit, and began treating a teenage boy disastrously burned.
The doctor wasn’t searching for his family; could it mean her premonition had been wrong? Cora willed it to be.
Heat rolled off the ship like a blacksmith’s forge, cooking the shallows. She yearned to throw off her cloak and dive in to join the rescue effort.
Three at a time now, O’Toole pulled children to shore. Linnaeus handed a toddler to a nurse who couldn’t swim and sprinted back into the river, thick with screaming, flailing, shocked parishioners.
Still, the inferno raged on, feasting on more of those unable or unwilling to jump. Smoke from their burning flesh merged with the billowing black cloud.
At the bow railing, the orange predator was advancing on a cluster of children.
Cora shouted to the fire brigade to redirect their hose, and the spray disappeared into those flames.
Desperate to help, she rocked on her heels. If the doctor saw her pulling someone to shore, he’d be furious.
Hating her body for the vessel of death it had become, she raked her gloved fingertips down her forearms, wishing she could root out the microbes within her. “God, how can this be Your will?!” she shouted.
Again, no answer.
The screams of the young rose above the din: “Hilf mir! Hilf mir!” Help me! Help me!
Cora recognized the German phrase. All her remaining hope that this steamboat hadn’t been the one chartered by St. Mark’s evaporated. Her legs buckled, and she fell back against the concrete wall, its sharp ledge digging into her spine.
Dr. Gettler moved on to another writhing, burned body as Cora wondered if he knew. She scanned the survivors on the beach for his loved ones, even though she wouldn’t be able to recognize them; so many were charred, and she’d never met his family.
She couldn’t just stand there, watching babies, small children, and desperate mothers drown. I’ve been kept alive for a reason, and this might be it, she thought. The water: it would wash away any pests she expelled. Energy buzzed through her limbs; yet, so conditioned to shun human touch, she remained paralyzed in place.
Every minute she wasted, another person would perish.
Her muscles burned with a will of their own, and she caved to their desire.
Simultaneously, she yanked off her cloak and kicked off her shoes. The fire spewed scorching air onto her skin, only partially covered by her thin cotton shift, and she realized she’d just removed the barrier that kept her germs from spreading. She wobbled on the sand.
Passengers were dying by the second, whereas any she helped—even if she infected them in the process—would at least have a chance of surviving.
Filling her lungs with acrid air, she charged into the shallows; a wave knocked a hymnal against her shin. She froze.
The shrill scream of a young girl, calling Mutti, jarred Cora into action. She waded into the river until its drag became too great and dove forward. The heat scalded her skin, yet she
