The smoke filling the girls’schoolroom was growing thicker and more acrid by the second. Screams and shouts mingled with the crackling of burning wood and splintering rafters. Sybil coughed, struggling to see through eyes that had gone watery and blurred. It had all happened so swiftly, the fire tearing through the old structure in what had to be mere minutes.
She held her arm over her face, doing her best to breathe into her sleeve. She had three girls with her now, and with the way the fire was raging, she knew that if they didn’t soon get the children out of the doomed orphanage and into the fresh air on the streets, they would all become trapped within.
But she couldn’t leave until she was sure she wasn’t leaving anyone behind.
“Children!” she cried out, for some of the youngest she and Verity had discovered were hiding, terrified of the cacophony. Thinking that they would be safe if they just stayed where they were and shut their eyes tightly. The very thought was horrifying.
“Children, if you are hiding, you must come out!” she called again, punctuating her cry with another cough.
“I found two more,” Verity announced, herding a pair of young lads toward her, their faces coated in tears and soot.
“The fire is spreading,” called Mr. Gritton, who had been teaching the boys when the flames had begun in the kitchen, rapidly expanding throughout the building, licking up rafters and along floorboards, burning up curtains and rugs and everything in its path. “We can’t afford to wait any longer. Wehave to get out of the building before the roof collapses on us or the fire takes us.”
Mr. Gritton had been aiding Sybil and Verity in directing the children downstairs to the door where Mrs. Stevens waited, guiding them all outdoors. She knew he was right. Sybil wrapped her arms around the girls and began guiding them toward Mr. Gritton at the head of the stairs.
“Come, girls,” she told them, coughing every few words, her voice hoarse. “We must get out of here as quickly as possible, but we mustn’t rush. Don’t trip on your hems or fall.”
Sweat dripped down her face into her eyes, making them sting even more than the smoke already had. But she managed to get all three girls to Mr. Gritton. She turned to find Verity joining them, the two lads at her skirts.
Verity was wild-eyed, her expression fraught with worry. “I haven’t found Emma.”
Worry seized Sybil. Little Emma was a sweet child, and she was Verity’s favorite. Emma was often found not far from Verity, always at her elbow when she played piano for the children.
“Perhaps she has already gone out,” Sybil suggested, mind whirling with possibilities as the smoke poured up the staircase around them.
Verity shook her head. “One of the girls told me that Emma ran to their sleeping quarters on the next floor. She was fetching a necklace that belonged to her mother, which she’d sewn into a coverlet on her bed. I have to go to her.”
Her heart dropped. “Verity, you can’t. It’s far too dangerous. We need to get everyone out of here now.”
“We haven’t time,” Mr. Gritton urged. “We need to go at once.”
A loud groaning and crash sounded below.
“You see?”
The children began crying anew.
“Go with Mr. Gritton and the children,” Verity told her. “I’ll go alone to find Emma.”
“You cannot do that, Verity.” She reached for her sister-in-law’s arm, but Verity pulled away. “Verity, the flames are worse on that side of the building. You’ll die if you go up there.”
But Verity wouldn’t be dissuaded. “I need to at least try to find her. I can’t leave her there.”
“My lady,” Mr. Gritton began, but Verity had already whirled away and was racing back into the thicker smoke.
She was heading for the staircase leading to the upper floor where the children slept.
“Verity!” Sybil cried out again.
But her sister-in-law had disappeared into the smoke.
“There’s no help for her,” Mr. Gritton said, coughing. “We’ve done everything we could. We have to go before it’s too late.”
The children cried harder.
Another loud creak sounded, followed by a series of bangs. Sybil didn’t know if it was her imagination, but the very building itself seemed to shift and sway around them. Fear laced through her.
Mr. Gritton was right.
