Noble House

The wreckage began to settle again. He waited, his heart pounding. Now he could see just a little better. Above him was a twisted mass of steel beams, and pipes half imbedded in broken jagged concrete, pots and pans and broken furniture. The floor he was lying on was equally broken. His tomb was small, barely enough space to stand. Reaching up above with his good arm he could not touch the makeshift ceiling. On his knees now he reached again, then stood, feeling his way, the tiny space claustrophobic. "Don't panic," he said out loud. Groping and bumping into outcrops he circumnavigated the space he was in. "About six feet by five feet," he said out loud, the sound of his voice encouraging. "Don't be afraid to talk out loud," Spurgeon Roach had said.
Again the light glinting off the oven attracted him. If I'm near that, I'm still in the kitchen. Now where was the oven in relation to anything else? He sat down and tried to reconstruct the apartment in his mind. The oven had been set into a wall opposite the big cutting table, opposite the window, near the door, and the big refrigerator was beside the door and across the w—
Shit, if I'm in the kitchen there's food and beer and I can last out the week easy! Jesus, if I could only get some light. Was there a flash? Matches? Matches and a candle? Hey, wait a minute, sure, there was a flash on the wall near the refrigerator! She said they were always blowing fuses and sometimes the power failed and . . . and sure, there were matches in the kitchen drawer, lots of them, when she lit the gas. Gas.
Bartlett stopped and sniffed the air. His nose was bruised and stuffed and he tried to clear it. Again he sniffed. No smell of gas. Good, good he thought, reassured. Getting his bearings from the oven he groped around, inch by inch. He found nothing. After another half an hour his fingers touched some cans of food, then some beer. Soon he had four cans. They were still chilled. Opening one, he felt oh so much better, sipping it, conserving it—knowing that he might have to wait days, finding it eerie down there in the dark, the building creaking, not knowing exactly where he was, rubble falling from time to time, sirens from time to time, water dripping, strange chilling sounds everywhere. Abruptly a nearby tie-beam shrieked, tormented by the thousands of tons above. It settled an inch. Bartlett held his breath. Movement stopped. He sipped his beer again.
Now do I wait or try to get out? he asked himself uneasily. Remember how old Spurgeon'd always duck that one. "It depends, man. It depends," he'd always say.
More creaking above. Panic began to well but he shoved it back. "Let's recap," he said aloud to reassure himself. "I got provisions now for two, three days easy. I'm in good shape an' I can last three, four days easy but you, you bastard," he said to the wreckage above, "what're you going to do?"
The tomb did not answer him.
Another spine-chilling screech. Then a faint voice, far overhead and to the right. He lay back and cupped his hands around his mouth. "Helllp!" he shouted carefully and listened. The voices were still there. "Helllp!"
He waited but now there was a vast emptiness. He waited. Nothing. His disappointment began to engulf him. "Stop it and wait!" The minutes dragged heavily. There was more water dripping, much more than before. Must be raining again, he thought. Jesus! I'll bet there was a landslide. Sure, don't you remember the cracks in the roads? Goddamn son of a bitching landslide! Wonder who all else got caught? Jesus what a goddamn mess!
He tore off a strip of his shirt and tied a knot in it. Now he could tell, the days. One knot for each day. His watch had read 10:16 when his head had first cleared, now it was 11:58.
Again all his attention zeroed. Faint voices, but nearer now. Chinese voices. "Helllp!"
The voices stopped. Then, "Where you arrrr, heya?" came back faintly.
"Down here! Can you hear meeeeee?" Silence, then more faintly, "Where youuuuarrrrre?" Bartlett cursed and picked up the empty beer can and began to bang it against a girder. Again he stopped and listened. Nothing. He sat back. "Maybe they've gone for help." His fingers reached out and touched another can of beer. He dominated his overpowering urge to break it open. "Don't panic and be patient. Help's near. The best I can do's wait an—" At that moment the whole earth twisted and rose up under the strain with an ear-dulling cacophony of noise, the protective girders above grinding out of safety, rubble avalanching down. Protecting his head with his arms, he cowered back, covering himself as best he could. The shrieking movement seemed to go on for an eternity. Then it ceased. More or less. His heart was thumping heavily now, his chest tight and dust bile in his mouth. He spat it out and sought a beer can. They had vanished. And all the other cans. He cursed, then, cautiously, raised his head and almost banged it against the shifted ceiling of the tomb. Now he could touch the ceiling and the walls without moving. Easily. Then he heard the hissing sound. His stomach twisted. His hand reached out and he felt the slight draft. Now he could smell the gas.
"You'd better get the hell out of here, old buddy," he muttered, aghast.
Getting his bearings as best he could, he eased out of the space. Now that he was on the move, in action, he felt better.
The dark was oppressive and it was very hard to make progress upward. There was no straight line. Sometimes he had to make a diversion and go down again, left then right, up a little, down again under the remains of a bathtub, over a body or part of a body, moans and one time voices far away. "Whereareyouuuu?" he shouted and waited then crawled on, inch by inch, being patient, not panicking. After a while he came into a space where he could stand. But he did not stand, just lay there for a moment, panting, exhausted. There was more light here. When his breathing had slowed he looked at his watch. He gathered his strength and continued but again his upward path was blocked. Another way but still blocked. He slid under a broken pier and, once through, began to squirm onward. Another impasse. With difficulty he retreated and tried another way. And another, never enough space to stand, his bearings lost now, not knowing if he was going deeper into the wreckage. Then he stopped to rest and lay in the wet of his tomb, his chest pounding, head pounding, fingers bleeding, shins bleeding, elbows bleeding.
"No sweat, old buddy," he said out loud. "You rest, then you start again . . ."
MONDAY
86
12:45 A.M. :
Gurkha soldiers with flashlights were patiently picking their way over this part of the dangerous, sloping, broken surface calling out, "Anyone there?" then listening. Beyond and all around, up and down the slope, soldiers, police, firemen and distraught people were doing the same.
It was very dark, the arcs set up below not touching this area halfway up the wreckage.
"Anyone there?" a soldier called, listened again, then moved on a few feet. Over to the left of the line one of them stumbled and fell into a crevice. This soldier was very tired but he laughed to himself and lay there a moment, then called down into the earth, "Anyone there?" He began to get up then froze, listening. Once more he lay down and shouted into the wreckage, "Can you hear me?" and listened intently.
"Yesss! . . ." came back faintly, very faintly.
Excitedly the soldier scrambled up. "Sergeant! Sergeant Sah!"
Fifty yards away, on the edge of the wreckage, Gornt was with the young lieutenant who had been directing rescue operations in this section. They were listening to a news broadcast on a small transistor: "… slips all over the Colony. And now here is another report direct from Kotewall Road." There was a short silence then the well-known voice came on and the young man smiled to himself. "Good evening. This is Venus Poon reporting live on the single worst disaster to hit the Colony." There was a wonderful throb to her voice, and, remembering the brave, harrowing way she had described the Aberdeen fire disaster that she also had been involved in, his excitement quickened. "Rose Court on Kotewall Road is no more. The great twelve-story tower of light that all Hong Kong could see as a landmark has vanished into an awesome pyre of rubble. My home is no more. Tonight, the finger of the Almighty struck down the tower and those who lived there, amongst them my devoted gan sun who raised me from birth. . . ."