No. I can’t think about any of that. My concern right now is for Kat’s safety and only that. I only need to get through today. Just today. I look away from the direction of the neighborhoods near Russian Hill and urge Kat to quicken her steps if she can.
She and I have taken long walks before. I know she can manage a two-mile walk, but Kat tires after the first mile. It is no ordinary stroll we are on; everything about it is wrong. A man fleeing with his own family of much older children offers to carry her, and I don’t even ask Kat if it is all right. I just let him scoop her up and we continue our trek away from the fires and toward the sand hills surrounding the park.
I’ve been to Golden Gate Park several times. It is beautiful and immense, bigger than Central Park in New York. But as its eastern entrance comes into view, the park’s serene beauty is at once eclipsed by its new purpose as instant refugee camp. And it did not escape damage from the quake, either.
The pillars of the stone gate have toppled from their foundations as if they were made of piecrust. As we move farther onto the grounds, I see that the stately canteen near the children’s playground is roofless and its walls have caved in.
And there are so many people. Those dressed in the finest of clothes are wandering onto the same grass as the poorest of souls. The emergency hospital at the pavilion isn’t the only entity using the park as a haven from the hell east of us. Someone asks auniformed man why we aren’t being sent to the military compound at the Presidio and he is told that the Presidio is already filling up with other evacuees and injured who are fleeing the fires. We are told to keep moving toward the bowling greens beyond the carousel and children’s playground. On our way here, I had imagined we might be taking shelter in the Conservatory of Flowers, provided it is still standing, and it is. But I look to the beautiful greenhouse and I see that no one is opening its doors. And there are too many of us anyway. The man who carried Kat lowers her to the ground as we arrive at the vast lawns.
There is no shelter of any kind. Nothing but trees and grass and flowers. People who arrived before us are sitting or lying on the grass while army soldiers erect a few tents. Kat and I walk among the people on the green, looking for Belinda and the baby.
But I can’t find her.
I look down at Kat, whom I’ve never seen cry before, and two tears are sliding down her cheeks. I drop her travel case to the ground and kneel down.
“We will find Belinda and the baby. They are here. Somewhere they are here. We will find them. All right?”
Several seconds tick by before she nods.
It has been many hours since we’ve eaten or had anything to drink, so I lead us to a long table of refreshments that have been set up by the military. Soldiers have appropriated food and water from restaurants and grocery stores undamaged by the quake. We wait for a long while in a queue of hungry people, watched over by armed guards who tell us that order will be strictly maintained. There is to be no pushing or shoving or angry words. But everyone is too tired and numb to demand that the queue move faster. When we finally have something to eat, I take Kat to anempty spot on the grass and we eat hard-boiled eggs, dry biscuits, and an apple each. I don’t have my lapel watch and I’ve no concept of what time it is. I just know that when we are done eating, Kat and I both fall asleep on the one blanket a Red Cross nurse gave us.
When I awake sometime later, there are more refugees all around us, and only a few more tents. Most people are sitting or lying on the grass, just like Kat and me, including many of the wounded. I want to continue the search for Belinda and the baby, but Kat is still asleep beside me.
As I wait for her to awaken I listen for snatches of news about the fires from newcomers arriving in the park with bags and baby prams and garden carts loaded with whatever they could grab out of their houses. I learn that the separate fires are joining each other now and have already devoured the downtown blocks closest to the ferry building. Firemen have tried to pump in water from the bay but the blaze has already moved inland a mile. I want so very much to find Belinda and find a carriage going south so I can get her home to San Rafaela and then Kat and I can be on our way to Arizona, but everyone is saying the roads south of downtown are all on fire or that flames block the way to the southern roads.
When at last Kat awakes, I tell her we shall resume our search for Belinda and the baby. I try to make light of our task, calling it a treasure hunt of sorts, but there is no fooling Kat. Searching for Belinda and the baby requires us to look at everyone, and some of the people arriving at the park are hurt or burned or have been separated from loved ones of their own. There is no panic as we make our way through the throngs of people, but the mood is somber.
I return to the entrance to see if there is anyone in charge there who can tell me where the patients from the Mechanics’ Pavilion are. I don’t find such a person, but I do see a billboard that is at least twenty feet high and that hours earlier had been advertising a brand of beer. It has now been peppered as far as an arm can reach with slips of paper, business cards, and notices asking for information on people or sharing information.
I stop to read the messages. One notice says,Sylvia and Malcolm Berger are safe. Call for them at Number 120, 28th Ave.Another reads,Have you seen our daughter, Eliza Jane Cole? She is eight years old. Dark brown hair, freckles. Red dress. Leave message please!There are hundreds of little notices on the board, some just tiny scraps of newsprint. The largest sign reads,Death notices can be left here.
I set down the travel case, reach inside, and pull out the documents from Martin’s desk, wondering which one I can sacrifice a portion of to leave a note. And then I see Da’s word book lying atop the strongbox and Kat’s clothes. I need the documents. Until I know what has become of Martin, I need them. I take out Da’s book and flip to the page where he stopped a few days before his fall with the wordintrepid. I hesitate and then tear off the bottom half of the opposite page, which he would have filled had he lived longer. I ask an older woman writing a note of her own if I might borrow her pencil when she is finished.
I write,Belinda Bigelow: Kat and I are here on the bowling green. We are looking for you. Leave a note if you can.I tack my message at what should be eye level for Belinda, and then Kat and I head to the food tent to stand for an hour to get bread, cheese, bologna, and canned milk. Then we make our way back to the grass to find a new spot to rest, as our original patch has long since been taken by other refugees. I pull Kat to me as we sit down and tell her wewill try again tomorrow. Tomorrow we will find Belinda and the baby.
When I say the wordtomorrow, I realize we are staying the night in this park, on the grass under the stars, with thousands of other people who likewise have nowhere else to sleep tonight. Some people have made makeshift tents out of blankets and rugs, but Kat and I have only the one blanket between us, and I’m glad that as the sun sets the night is not cool, nor is it particularly dark, as the horizon to the east is glowing orange like daybreak.
As we settle in for the night and just as the last light of day leaves us, National Guardsmen walk through the park to announce that a curfew has been set in the park and in the city. No one is to be out and about after sundown or before sunup. No one is allowed to return to areas where the fires have raged nor where the fires are headed. The mayor has declared that any looters will be shot on sight. No candles of any kind are allowed anywhere and no cooking fires inside any structure, as that very thing was the cause of one of the fires now burning out of control. No liquor is to be sold to anyone for any reason. We are also told army tents will arrive early tomorrow morning, but that tonight we must make do with whatever we can. We are not to worry about the fires approaching the park while we sleep. The army has positioned troops outside the park to watch for them.
The guardsmen move on to repeat their announcements over and over to the hundreds upon hundreds of us spread out on the park’s lawns.
The last of the sun’s warmth is leaving as they walk away. As I wrap Kat in our one blanket and pull her close to me, a Chinese woman who is bedding down next to us with her husband andtwo sons offers me a quilt. She says something in her language and points to Kat and then to me. I think she is telling me she doesn’t want me to be without a blanket, either. I look over at her family and I see that the quilt is extra. I won’t be depriving her of warmth. I don’t know how to thank her. But she smiles at me as I take the blanket.
Minutes later the ground begins to rumble and tremble, and everyone in the park seems to hold their breath for a moment. But the quaking is only another aftershock that lasts just seconds.
“Are you warm enough, love?” I say to Kat, whispering it into her hair when the park is calm again. I have made the travel case my pillow. Kat is resting her head on my bosom.
She doesn’t answer me.
“You were a very brave girl today.” And she was. In so many ways.
We are quiet for a few minutes.
“What has happened today hasn’t changed anything, love,” I say. “I’m still taking you to your mama. It just might take us a few days or so. But I will. I promise. We’ll find Belinda and get her and the baby home, and then I’ll take you to her. You have my word. All right?”
She grants me the slightest nod against my chest.
Several more seconds pass and then she slowly raises her head, not to look at me but to look outward, toward the sickly orange sky to the east.
