“Oy,” says Jack as he takes off running across the stage. “What are you doing?”
“Twaits told me to get it down,” he says. “The candles are still lit.”
“Stop!”
Roy doesn’t stop, and Jack watches the chandelier begin to list.
“Didn’t Perry tell you?” Jack shouts, but he doesn’t have time to explain.The harder Roy tugs on the rope, the wider the chandelier swings.
Jack is terrified the flames will come too close to the backdrops and set them alight. “I’ll climb up there. I bet I can reach it. Just stop what you’re doing!” He makes for the ladder and is up in the carpenter’s gallery when he sees that, in fact, Roy has not stopped pulling at the rope. Instead, he’s been joined by Perry, who is putting his whole body into making the rope move.
Jack climbs out onto the nearest rafter, shimmying over the heads of the two carpenters. Splinters of wood slice into the meat of his hands. When he is as close to the chandelier as he can get, he takes a deep breath and tries to blow the candles out, but the chandelier is too far away for the flames to even flicker. So, he licks the pads of his thumb and forefinger and stretches his hand into the air, as far as it will go. The chandelier is just out of his reach, but the way the thing is spinning, it’s like a pendulum; Jack just has to be patient and eventually it will arrive in his hand.
He wants to try to get Roy’s and Perry’s attention, wants to tell them that he has the situation under control, but the second act is underway. Perry begins to jostle the rope, a different kind of movement that Jack immediately realizes is no good. “Stop!” he yells down to him, not caring who hears him, but it is too late—the chandelier has tipped sideways and Jack watches in horror as it kisses the edge of the nearest backdrop.
What happens next is all sound and light. Jack inches backward, along the rafter and away from the flame, as fast as he can. By the time he has made it back to the carpenter’s gallery, Perry is up there, waving at the backdrop and shouting instructions at Jack. “Help me cut this down!”
Perry has a knife, but Jack has none, and he watches as the carpenter saws at one rope and then another. The fire licks its way to the top of the backdrop and threatens to touch the ceiling, which is nothing but timber and sap.
“Do something, kid!” says Perry, a tangle of ropes in his hands, but Jack can’t move, can’t think of a single thing to do. He barely knows how to make himself useful when everything is going right.
Below him, onstage, Robertson looks up into the flyspace, his eyes widening into orbs. The man’s bottom lip trembles, as if he is trying to make words but can’t force them past his lips. Finally, he pulls his eyes away from Jack and Perry and the flames that rage behind them, turns to the audience, and flaps his arms. “The house,” he yells, finding his voice at last. “The house is on fire!”
SALLY
At first, no one knowswhat to make of the actor’s announcement. A fire in the house? From where she sits, Sally can see no evidence of a blaze. She turns to Margaret, whose face doesn’t betray even the mildest concern. “Is he serious?” Sally asks.
“Certainly not,” says Margaret before she turns around in her seat to get Archie’s attention. He and Tom Marshall have recently gone to get a drink, and now they stand idly talking in the box’s entryway, having never returned to their seats. Archie doesn’t even look up when Margaret calls for him by name.
Sally isn’t familiar with the pantomime. Perhaps there is indeed a fire in the second act, but something about the way the actor has stuttered his lines doesn’t feel scripted. Below, the people in the pit have stopped talking, which never happens, and in the boxes across from them, Sally watches as a few people get to their feet and move into the corridors. The governor leans forward in his chair, studying the stage, and Sally notes that the boy who has been sitting between him and his wife is gone.
The actor who is playing the old servant tries to reassure the audience. “Don’t be alarmed!” He looks offstage, into the wings, where even the audience can hear a commotion. “There’s nothing to worry about!” Some of the people in the boxes return to their seats, and the pit grows loud with murmurs. The actor who plays Raymond stands rooted to the spot where he delivered his last line, and in the dim light of the theater, Sally can see a fine dusting of gold land on his hair and shoulders. He holds out a hand, as if he is catching falling snow, and seems confused by what he finds there.
“I think we should leave,” says Sally, standing to go. Outside their box, on the other side of the curtain, she can hear footsteps and imagines the corridor is growing crowded. She touches Margaret’s shoulder. “Something’s wrong.”
Sally picks up her jacket, but her reticule is missing. As she bends tolook for it under her seat, she hears Tom Marshall soothe the other ladies in the box. There is a girl from Fredericksburg, wearing a magnificent garnet brooch, and two sisters whom he must know from Fairfax, and he tells all of them to remain where they are. “Let’s let this confusion die down a bit first.”
“Miss Campbell,” says Mr. Scott, and Sally turns to find the disagreeable man holding her reticule in his hand. “It must have been kicked under my chair.”
She takes the small bag and thanks him. In the box next to them, a woman screams. The man playing the old servant, who has so recently issued them reassurances, darts toward the rear of the stage and begins to tear down set pieces, for no apparent reason. “What’s happening?” she asks Mr. Scott, although he clearly knows as little as she does.
Across the theater, the boxes opposite them have begun to empty. The governor and his wife are gone. Archie puts down his drink so he can use both hands to pull aside the curtain and direct their party into the corridor. But the narrow hallway is already packed with people, and there is nowhere to go.
In the pit, people have begun to move toward the exit in large numbers, but from above, it is easy to see the obstacle in their path. The double doors that lead to the lobby are shut tight, and as more people push and shove to get out of the pit, it becomes impossible for those closest to the doors to open them. Cries of “Move back!” come from the front of the crowd, but nobody is listening.
The actor who is playing Raymond leaps from the stage to the pit floor and yells up at the women in the second- and third-floor boxes. “Jump into my arms—I can lead you to the stage door!” For a brief second, he makes eye contact with Sally, and she tries to read his face. Is he really so panicked that he thinks jumping a distance of thirty or more feet is preferable to taking the stairs?
Margaret must be thinking the same thing. “Is he in his right mind? We’d kill ourselves jumping that far.”
“Margaret, look,” says Sally, pointing at the stage. The backdrop has begun to glow, as if lit from behind. She can see the silhouettes of two men and then a third run across the stage. Below, the actor continues to hold out his arms to the women in the box seats, but when no one makes a moveto jump, he bats his hands at them and takes off in the opposite direction of the crowd.
Sally thinks she smells smoke, and her heart races. “We have to go,” she says as she threads her arm through Margaret’s and makes for the corridor. Mr. Scott stands between them and the exit, but when he realizes they are behind him, he moves aside and gestures for them to go first.
There is nothing to do but nudge their way into the crowd of people pushing down the dark corridor and toward the stairs. “Archie!” calls Margaret, reaching out a hand for her husband. “Come, now.” He obliges, despite the fact that several women remain in the box.
“Pardon us, if you don’t mind,” says Sally to the people who shove past their box. No one makes eye contact with her, and none of the men will pause long enough to let her into the corridor. “So much for chivalry,” she says aloud to anyone who will hear her.
Finally, a petite woman with a beaver muff stops long enough for Sally to drag Margaret and Archie into the fray. Sally goes to thank her, but before she can get so much as a word out, she feels a crush of people behind her, and the woman disappears from view.
