Hurst - Robin Crumby (bookreader TXT) 📗

the way to see for herself. If it wasn’t her imagination, there was a thin veil of smoke beginning to form, drifting along the corridor, just under the ceiling. She banged harder on the door. In the room above, they heard footsteps and something heavy falling over.

Mila unfastened the latch on the sash window and tried to heave it open but noticed security bolts held it locked in place. Their only option was to smash the glass. Meanwhile, Adele beat out a rhythm at the door. She said the smoke in the hallway was hanging heavier from the ceiling, slowly filling all skylights, apertures and recesses moving towards them down the corridor. The smell of burning wood and plastic reached them for the first time. Someone was ringing the bell again, more insistent, this time more distant. Had the rest of the hotel residents forgotten all about them?

Riley picked up a plastic chair and tested its weight. “Stand back, I’m going to break the glass.” She had a practice swing and then threw the chair with all her might towards the window.

One of the chair legs folded inwards, coming off second best in the collision against the frame of the original sash window. It bounced back harmlessly without making any impact on the glass itself. She tried again, this time with Mila’s help. Instead of throwing it, they used the chair leg as a battering ram. With the first attempt, the glass cracked diagonally, but did not break. Their second effort shattered the glass into a dozen pieces and the lower half of the pane broke on to the thick pile of the carpet and flowerbed outside. They knocked out the remaining pieces and laid a blanket over the frame to cover the remaining shards. They lifted Adele through the empty window, still groggy from sleep, passing her with some difficulty to Riley standing on the other side. With the extra weight of her load Riley's feet sank deep into the earth, as the pointed thorns of a rose bush scratched at her arms.

In the cool night air, it was strangely quiet on this far side of the building. The light was eerily bright and strangely incongruous. An orange glow lit up the sky that reminded Riley of the fifth of November, fireworks night. She half expected to find a towering bonfire, explosions in a million colours and shimmering sparkles raining down above their heads.

She grabbed Adele’s hand and together they raced round to the other side of the building to find a hive of activity. Smoke was pouring from two of the upper windows on the second floor, curling into the night sky. Fire had broken through the roof in one section further down. Twenty women passed bucketload after bucketload of water hand over hand down a human chain. Each bucket was sent slopping towards the French doors that led towards the lobby area and staircase to the upper floors.

With a shudder, Riley remembered Zed. He was likely still in the infirmary on the second floor. In his weakened state, he couldn’t possibly get out on his own. As she hurried inside heading towards the staircase, Sister Georgina held her hand up to stop her. “It’s too dangerous. No one’s allowed up there.”

The sister was right. From Riley’s brief stint as the volunteer fire marshal at the physiotherapy centre for veterans, rule one was to get everyone out safely and wait for the fire brigade. The only problem was no one was coming to help. Either she went in herself or Zed would die. She made up her mind. She had to reach him. It was up to Riley.

“Try and stop me,” she said, pushing past. The sister lunged for Riley’s sleeve but it was too late. Riley took the stairs two at a time. She passed a gaggle of women coming back down, their buckets empty, ready to be refilled from the ornamental ponds.

On the first-floor landing, the line of women bent right towards the crackle and roar of the fire. She could hear raised voices shouting instructions, a note of panic as they fought to regain control. Riley shielded her face against the stifling heat. She could see flames not twenty metres away down the corridor in one of the bedrooms on the first floor. The infirmary was on the next floor up. The stairs were deserted and dark. She knew she had to be quick. The flames had already broken through between floors.

She was halfway up the next staircase when she stopped dead, overcome by a powerful sense of déjà vu. Instinct told her what she needed to do. Diving into one of the bathrooms she grabbed a bath towel, soaked it in a bowl of grey water left out for washing hands. Wrapping the towel around her head and shoulders, she poured the rest of the bowl over her, soaking her clothes to give her some protection against the heat.

Slowing her pace, she tested her weight on each of the steps, unsure of what lay ahead. There was a heavy fire door that gave access towards the infirmary. Inside, it was suspiciously quiet. There was no sign of flames, but thick smoke hung heavy from the ceiling all the way down to waist height. There was an impenetrable wall of heat and cloying fumes. She could feel the smoke catch in her throat, as she struggled to breathe. The cool towel wrapped around her head was already steaming. She hesitated, painfully aware of the danger if she continued.

Riley remembered her fire marshal training and got down on her hands and knees, staying low, just underneath the layer of smoke where the heat was less intense. She crawled along the carpet, clutching the damp towel to her mouth. The air was acrid and burned her throat. She started coughing, gulping air greedily and feeling the panic begin to rise in her throat. She felt nauseous and retched on the carpet.

Focus, Riley, she told herself, you have to do this. She continued onwards, feeling for the doorways to her left. The first door was locked, the second was the nurse’s station but the room was empty. Perhaps the nurse had taken Zed with her. She had to be sure.

Putting her weight against what she assumed was Zed’s door she levered it open with some difficulty. It felt as if she was fighting against an invisible force, pressure sealed against the smoke and heat. Zed was beginning to stir, oblivious to the drama that was unfolding all around him. As the door began to close behind her, it felt like all the air was being sucked from the room, as if a vacuum had been broken. She noticed the top window was ajar. The fire sucked greedily at this fresh source of oxygen. In the corridor, she heard a funnelling of air as the flames leapt, rejuvenated. She didn’t have much time.

She shook Zed by the shoulders, whispering his name softly. His eyes flickered open, groggy and disoriented, then closed again. She tried again, shouting this time, an edge of panic creeping into her voice, “Zed, wake up, wake up.”

He stirred, his eyes wide, blinking at her, still vacant and far away. The nurse must have given him something for the pain. She slapped him hard across the face, shaking him by the shoulders. She raised her hand to strike him again but his free hand grabbed her wrist before she made contact.

“Okay, Riley. I’m awake.”

“There’s no time to explain. We need to go right now.”

He got gingerly to his feet, his legs weak and unbalanced. She supported his large frame, manoeuvring him towards the closed door. At first the door appeared locked, vacuum sealed by the difference in air pressure, but she hauled it open with all her might. As she did so the roar of flames grew suddenly louder and from the far end of the corridor came a surge of heat.

Riley pushed Zed down to the ground and collapsed on top of him. An explosion of heat and flame enveloped them and swept past them into the infirmary, blasting the door half off its hinges. Riley could taste soot and burning hair in her mouth and nose.

She pulled Zed on to his hands and knees and they started crawling side by side towards the stairwell. The smoke was cloying and darker now, only a few inches from the carpet. It was hopeless. She couldn’t see anything, tears rolling down her cheeks. The heat behind them was intense. Zed’s whole body convulsed with coughing but she encouraged him onwards, grabbing his good arm and half hauling him a few more inches towards safety.

The fire door stood resolute at the end of the corridor. A small rectangle of light just visible through the smoke. The whole space was now completely dark. It was only by feeling her way along the wall and counting the doorways that she realised they must be within touching distance.

Her breathing was coming in short rasps. Zed had collapsed beside her, unable to go further. It seemed to be growing hotter by the second. The carpet fibres were sticky to the touch from the heat below. The whole corridor had become a furnace. Unless they got moving again, it would soon become their tomb.

She thrust her hand out one last time and touched the flat painted surface of the fire door, its paint felt like it was beginning to blister. Her fingers found the edge of the door and she managed to prise it open, forcing it outwards. The rush of cooler air was delicious and intoxicating.

Riley stood and fell outwards on to the landing, reaching back to pull Zed through. They both lay there for a few seconds with their chests heaving, panting hard, trying to get their breath back before a darkness enveloped Riley.

She was dimly aware of voices on the stairs. Hands helping them back up. She was barely conscious as they supported her down the stairs. Her head rolled against a supporting shoulder as they half dragged her down towards ground-floor level. She was carried through a conservatory filled with pot plants and acres of glass and finally outside to be lowered gently on to the grass. It felt deliriously cool and moist on the back of her bare arms, soothing the burning sensation on exposed flesh at her wrists and knees through ripped jeans.

One of the last things Riley remembered was Adele hugging her tightly around her neck. She lay there staring up into the night sky, watching clouds drifting lazily over their heads. She was a spent force, every last ounce of strength gone. The flames from two upper windows bathed the trees and grass all around her in light, casting a warming orange glow.

As she drifted in and out of consciousness, the upstairs windows began to resemble demonic eyes flaring wildly. The flames licked the outside of the building, making the iron gutters and fixings glow and spark. Alongside her, Zed’s body lay motionless, as one of the women pumped his chest with the palm of her hand, trying to resuscitate him. Riley grasped his hand, squeezing it hard and then passed out.

Chapter Thirty-seven

As dawn broke at the Chewton Glen hotel, the fire had burned itself out. The southern end of the main building was a scarred, smoking wreck, blackened timbers exposed to the pale light of the new day. Laid out on the lawn were a dozen bodies covered in blankets and sheets or whatever they could find to hide their faces. Most of the victims had been overcome by smoke, as they waited to be rescued, trapped in upstairs rooms by the rampaging flames.

Riley sat consoling Stella, her face blackened, hair singed in places. Judging by people’s reaction to Riley’s appearance, she concluded she must look as awful as she felt. Stella had her head in her hands, sobbing. So many of her friends were gone, their lives extinguished. It seemed so wrong