Strange Luck
by Cheryl McGowan


He didn’t realize he was wandering. If someone had stopped him and said, “Hey, Pal, how come you’re dressed like that?” he would not have known what to think, what to say. He would have looked down at himself and continued walking. Perhaps later he would have tried to puzzle it out, but at this point he was not capable of speaking or rationalizing. Those higher thought processes had been temporarily short-circuited. Fortunately, or unfortunately as the case may be, no one observed his movements. A kind-hearted soul might have approached him, asked him what had happened to send him spinning through the worst part of town in the middle of the night. Yet, there were few kind-hearted people there to begin with and, what few there were, were not lingering outside. So he kept walking, lost in every sense of the word.

***

“You haven’t seen him since then?”

“No. Not since about two hours ago.”

Mike Stoker and Marco Lopez surveyed the scene once again. The smoldering remains of the Biltmore Hotel lay before them. The Biltmore was almost 75 years old on this warm, September evening. Or it had been. Now, one of the city’s oldest structures lay devastated by a fire that had killed ten residents and injured 43.

In its youth the hotel had hosted some of LA’s most prominent glitterati. Cocktails had poured freely, even during the Prohibition years. Outside its walls, the world seemed gray and without joy. Inside, however, the party never stopped. Even when the neighborhood changed and the hotel’s residents became increasingly destitute and besotted, its aging facade still evoked memories of its jubilant heyday.

But on this night, the party finally ended.

Stoker and Lopez were not mulling over the history of the ruins before them; they were trying to locate a wayward firefighter.

He had first turned up missing an hour before the blaze had been declared under control. A fire scene can be chaotic. So much equipment pulling up; so many firefighters needing to be directed. So much can happen during a big fire. People become trapped, water pressure drops, men collapse from heat exhaustion, walls collapse on top of them. An older structure will burn more slowly than a newer one. So much heavy wood. It will also burn far hotter, taking the air around it and splurging on itself. Brick walls enclosing an aged building will buckle and fall long before the tell-tale outward bowing is evident. Last anyone had seen of the firefighter, he was standing below a back-end fire escape.

“Bring the engine through the alley!” he had shouted above the roaring bedlam, peering upwards to see several people collapsed on the fire escape, flames spiking out of windows below them. “Get the engine now!” he commanded. “We’ll bring a ladder across and pick up these people!” With that, Engineer Mike Stoker had left the area. When he returned with Engine 51 and several other firefighters not more than five minutes later, the brick wall facing the alley had disintegrated, taking the fire escape with it. Several people they had come to rescue had perished. Some were still alive.

And their Captain was nowhere to be found.

***

Eric Lowry was a twit. He was also a loser. Not very bright and not at all handsome, Lowry lived for the excitement of the moment--even if he had to create that excitement for himself. On this evening, with the sounds of fire engines and ambulances echoing off the apartment buildings and storefronts that made up the bulk of his neighborhood, Eric faced a personal dark night of the soul. The frightened man before him held up his car keys in one hand, his wallet in the other.

“Take them!” the man gasped, obviously terrified by Lowry’s threatening demeanor and by the .22 pistol pointed straight at his heart.

Lowry was loving this. It was his first armed hold-up, and his quandary concerned whether to kill the man or merely wound him.

“C’mon, Lowry! Hurry up!”

This from Frank Verducci, Lowry’s best friend since fourth grade. They had gone all they up to eighth grade together and then, in true best-friend fashion, dropped out together, as well. Of the two, Verducci was the better looking, although that was not saying very much. Frank also a little bit more intelligent; he actually could get from one end of a thought to the other without losing track of the ideas in between. Tonight, however, he had made the mistake of letting Lowry’s constant complaining get to him. “I just wanna car!” his accomplice had whined. “I just wanna get out of here, go the country, man!”

Lowry was smiling, now. He stood there, moving the gun up slightly, down slightly, considering which part of this man should take a bullet. Maybe the head. After all, guy had seen his face! Maybe the leg. He’d spend the rest of his life thanking Lowry for not killing him.

Lowry thrilled to think that someone would remember him years into the future. His alcoholic parents, who had deposited him on various friends’ and relatives’ doorsteps for the first 16 years of his life, certainly never gave him much thought. Overburdened social workers occasionally tried to prevent Lowry’s almost inevitable slide into lawlessness, but they could not during their weekly visits undo years of neglect. The final outcome of such an upbringing stood on this filthy sidewalk, seething with rage that knew no direction. Lowry could not have traced the path from his childhood to this moment. He was not bright enough to see the connection between his parents and the frightened man standing before him. All Lowry wanted was to shoot something.

“Lowry! Grab the shit and let’s get out of here!” Verducci implored.

Finally, Lowry approached his victim and took from him the keys and wallet. Without taking his eyes off the man’s face, he pushed the gun into his upper right arm and pulled the trigger.

The man staggered back and fell. He clutched his arm and rolled from side to side, scarcely believing the misfortune that had befallen him. He felt blood pulsing from his brachial artery against his hand. He thought of his girlfriend and how angry she would be to discover he had drawn almost $800 from their joint bank account to buy heroin, only to have it swiped by a couple of punks. He thought of the cops and the hospital--assuming he lived long enough to get to one. He thought of his job. Surely, he would be fired. All this crossed his mind before his wound caught up with him and sent him to dreamland.

***

The firefighter had stopped to rest several times. At one point, fairly close to the hotel, he had passed out momentarily. Awakening from that, his head injury prevented him from reaching any practical conclusions about where he was or how he’d arrived there. Sometimes his vision cleared; sometimes he could see only the blurred features of the walls and streets around him. Sometimes he knew who he was; sometimes he did not.

Looking around, he noticed a bundle of clothing lying just beyond the curb. This was not a very interesting item, but he moved toward it anyway. Getting closer he realized the bundle was actually a person. Blood spurt from a wound in his arm.

The firefighter leaned over the man. An idea was bubbling up from his addled memory, trying to force itself past disorientation. Something primal, an inkling that he had to help this person.

***

“I’m driving, Verducci! Move over!”

Lowry gave his best friend a hefty shove, sending him sprawling halfway across the front seat of their freshly stolen Ford LTD. He got in and started the engine. He couldn’t believe his luck. A car! He examined the dash, marveling at the car’s features--tape deck, AM/FM radio. This was some piece of machinery!

“Hey, Lowry,” Verducci grabbed his arm. “Look at that!”

They gazed through the windshield. Some guy was leaning over the dopehead they’d just shot.

“What’s he got on?” asked Lowry. “What is he, some kind of a sewer worker or something?”

“You moron, look at him! He’s a fireman!”

Lowry considered this information for several seconds, trying to process what it meant. A fireman is just one step down from a cop. If he sees us... Lowry smiled once again. This was going to be good! Tires squealing, he pulled away from the curb and floored the accelerator. In the beam of his headlights, he could see the shining reflective bands on the fireman’s turnout coat. He saw the fireman stand up and take a step out into the street, his arms rising to indicate he wanted Lowry to stop. In the instant before the car hit the fireman, Lowry saw a look of dumb incomprehension on his face.

***

Their search had taken them into the blackened remains of the Biltmore Hotel. They had combed the alleyway behind it and the streets and doorways in a two-block radius around it. Still no sign of Captain Hank Stanley. Now they huddled by the engine, weariness from their hours-long battle and their worry almost overtaking them.

“The police are sending out extra officers,” said Chet Kelly. “It should be light soon. It’ll make looking for him easier.”

“Yeah,” said Mike, impatiently scraping wet ashes from his boot onto the tire. “Maybe someone will come across him and phone it in.”

Captain Springer of Station 24 walked up to the group. “The cops can take it from here, guys. Why don’t you head back to the station, try to get some rest.”

They said nothing, but nodded their assent. Packing up and leaving was not a pleasant option, but, considering their exhaustion, they agreed that, at least for the meantime, they would return to 51. While at the station they would contact Gage and DeSoto, paramedics who had ridden in with residents injured in the fire, and give them the bad news.

* **

“YOU IDIOT! What’d you do that for?” Verducci rolled down the window, stuck his head out and looked back at the man lying in the roadway. “Stop the car!”

“Why? You want someone to come along and find us just sitting around?”

“I said stop the car, Lowry!”

Lowry slowed to a stop. He didn’t leave the car, but let Verducci walk back. Verducci leaned over the fireman and shook his shoulder. The fireman lifted his arm, as if trying to defend himself. Then Verducci returned to the car, leaning into the passenger side window.

“He’s alive, man.”

“So?”

“So, we’re going to pick him up. Take him with us.”

“Oh, for crying out loud! What do you want to do that for?”

“Because it’s one thing to shoot some smack addict and it’s another to run over a fireman. You’ll probably get life for that!”

“So? We just leave him here and take off.”

“No way. We got to get rid of him. He’s pretty out of it. We’ll just put him in the trunk and then dump him somewhere once we get out of town.”

Lowry considered this for a minute. He wanted to drive off as fast as he could. The guy he’d shot had seen his face and, if he lived, could probably identify him. Lowry even considered going back to the addict and finishing him off. He didn’t really see himself as a murderer, though. He saw himself as a person destined to become famous somehow, but not for killing people. What fame could he achieve spending the bulk of his life behind bars? No, he only wanted to be remembered for what he hadn’t done, for the lives he allowed to continue on. This thought gave him a feeling of extraordinary power.

“Back up the car, Lowry. Hurry up!”

Lowry knew that Verducci was smarter than he was. It had been his idea to rob someone and steal his car, thus facilitating their escape from the confines of Los Angeles. It had been Verducci who suggested playing up a fake dope deal and then stealing the idiot’s money. Although taking the firefighter with them didn’t quite sit right with him, he put the car in reverse and rolled it back to the scene of his crimes.

***

Station 51 was not very large. Its retinue of firefighters and paramedics consisted of three shifts of six men each. The A shift had worked the Biltmore fire. Now five men returned to the station.

Among firefighters everywhere there is always the unspoken knowledge that colleagues sometimes end up in the hospital or in the morgue. That is part of the thrill of their profession: Tempting death, then conquering it. Or sometimes being conquered by it. Like a mythical knight calling the dragon out of his cave, the firefighter steps off the engine to stand before his enemy. It is a frightening moment, to take that first step toward the danger. One’s heart pounds in anticipation, one’s stomach tightens in fear.

When a firefighter does not return from his quest, the others left behind feel their own guilt, their own terror at the notion that it could have been them, their relief that it wasn’t.

Imagine, though, a firefighter who simply disappears. There is no glory in it, no certainty of death or relief at getting better news. In their puzzlement, the A shift had little to say to each other. The now leaderless group simply nursed their sore muscles and their tired minds. Some of them lay down in their bunks, trying to catch an hour’s sleep before the next shift arrived. Some of them sat morosely in the kitchen, hoping that coffee would console them. Surely, Captain Stanley would be found soon, they thought. If he were injured, he could not have gone far. If he were dead... The thought passed silently by...

***

Neither Lowry nor Verducci was a prime physical specimen. By the time they had heaved the fireman into the trunk of their car, both were winded. The guy whose car they had stolen was still unconscious. Verducci noticed the fireman had knotted the guy’s tie around his upper arm, tight enough to staunch most of the bleeding. He didn’t mention this to Lowry, however, who he felt was just stupid enough to go and untie the tourniquet.

All Verducci had wanted to begin with was a car and some money. He had no desire to be an accomplice to a malicious wounding--or a murder. He was certain the fireman was close to the end of his life, that Lowry had killed him. He wanted to dump him someplace where he wouldn’t be found for a while. It bothered him that Lowry had gotten him into this mess with his infernal whining. He blamed him for everything. Such are the pitiable thoughts of a stupid man.

***

Hank Stanley regained his some of his wits only to find himself bending over a seriously injured man. He could not remember what had brought him to this place or even where this place was. He was nonetheless able to remove the man’s tie and use it as a tourniquet. Then, seeing a car approaching, he had tried to signal it to stop. To his utter amazement, the car did not stop. It veered in his direction and sideswiped him. The powerful jolt took him down hard onto the pavement. He lay there, stunned once again, fighting to catch his breath, to remain aware. Eventually, someone came and stood above him. He wondered whether this was the man with the wounded arm, although this did not seem very likely. The person above him shook his shoulder and Hank raised his arm to protect himself, for he feared what was happening to him. Then he was alone again. Then he was unconscious.

***

When a person first awakens from unconsciousness, one of the first things they perceive is sound. Oftimes, they will listen to and understand conversations and environmental noise long before they have the ability to respond to it. Many people incorporate these ambient rustlings into dreams or hallucinations, creating a half-real world with vivid images.

This is how Hank Stanley woke up the second time. He saw himself in a car with his family, a car he was driving. He noticed the trees and buildings rushing by. The asphalt road slipped under his car. The sun shone on the pavement ahead, making watery mirages in the distance. All was right in his world.

Gradually, the brilliant day faded into total blackness. As he opened his eyes, Hank could see nothing at all. At first he thought he might be blind. Then he thought he might be dead. Then he didn’t know what to think. He remembered little of the extreme events he’d just endured. There had been someone in the street, headlights in his face.

He felt the car’s movement, felt the hood of the trunk, the ratty carpet on the floor beneath him. He noted the musty smell of tire rubber and the heavy scent of car exhaust. He noted also his own discomfort, the many places that begged for attention. Trying to shift into a halfway comfortable position, Hank groaned at a burgeoning pain in his head and in his leg. Nausea swelled as the car turned on the road. He knew for certain that he was in very big trouble.

***

Eric Lowry had waited for this day his entire life. He couldn’t believe how easy it had been. Take some money, take a car and, suddenly, a free trip to paradise! California is a huge place. It goes from seashore to rugged mountains to the bleak, extra-terrestrial landscape of Death Valley with lots and lots of pleasant farmland in between. Everything grows there. As he drove northward, Lowry developed a whole new perspective on life. He was going to start all over again! He was going to make something of himself!

Verducci noticed him smiling.

“What’s so funny, asshole?”

Lowry’s smile continued. “I’m just thinking about how great it’s going to be, living out here.”

Verducci didn’t quite share Lowry’s optimism.

“Yeah? Well, first we got to get rid of the guy in the trunk.”

Lowry’s expression soured. He had forgotten about that.

Verducci persisted. “When are we gonna dump him? And where?”

“Later. Somewhere,” Lowry said, with more flippancy than he felt.

***

“Just his helmet? That’s it?”

Mike Stoker slumped against his refrigerator. He had expected the ringing phone to bring him news--good or bad. But this, this was nothing!

“That’s not it.” His crew mate, Roy DeSoto, sounded impatient. He’d been awake for far too many hours to have to deal with this.

“What then?”

“A few blocks away the cops discovered some guy who’d been shot.”

“And he saw the Cap?”

“No, he didn’t. But someone had put his tie around his arm to stop it from bleeding. Probably saved his life. So no one’s really saying anything, but they think maybe Cap came across this guy and helped him out a bit before...”

“Before vanishing.”

Roy paused. “Look, Mike, all I’m telling you is what I’ve heard. There isn’t a whole lot to go on, here, but at least it’s something.”

They said nothing for a while. In their years of experience, they had never had to cope with a situation quite like this one. People sometimes went missing for a time, but they were all eventually found, either dead in the debris or nearly so someplace not too distant. An injury will limit the journey of even the strongest person. It was extremely unlikely that their Captain, assuming he was in fact hurt by the collapsing brick wall, could have gone a tremendous distance by himself.

In the meantime, Captain Fred Morrow had been assigned to the A shift in Stanley’s absence.

***

Frank Verducci could tolerate it no longer. Lowry had been driving almost nonstop since before dawn, and had now swung into an agricultural area populated by grapevines and little else. He watched arbors swing by, row after row of them. His traveling companion had no map, no idea of where he actually wanted to go. Lowry was always talking about “the country,” as if it were a clearly signposted destination. It was now apparent that “the country” was an absolutely enormous, amorphous area that took up most of the available land on the planet.

The mid-day heat began to bother Frank. He considered the man in the trunk and wanted to unload him now. If the man were dead, he didn’t want him stinking up the car; if he were still alive, it was best to get him someplace where he could die in peace. Verducci possessed somewhat more empathy than Lowry. He could, for small moments in time, put himself in the place of others and imagine what they might be feeling. As the sun rose higher, he imagined the fireman in the overheated trunk. He imagined himself in the fireman’s place.

“There’s no one around for miles, Lowry. I say we dump the fireman out here somewhere.”

Lowry was quiet for a minute. Verducci was familiar with his pal’s long thought processes. Sometimes he wondered if the guy was slightly retarded.

“You think we’ll be seen?”

“Look around! Nothing. Just grapes and more grapes!”

Lowry pulled to the side of the road. He shut off the engine and got out, scanning the silent terrain. They were on a gravel shoulder that lead down about 15 feet to a small vineyard. A nearby driveway stretched at least a quarter-mile to a falling-down shack.

“You think someone’s there?” he asked his friend.

Verducci chuckled. “What, in that outhouse? No one’s lived there for years! The roof’s got a hole in it and the porch looks like it’s going to come down with the next big gust of wind!”

Lowry thought about this. Then he opened the trunk.

The fireman lay on his back, semi-conscious, blinking into the sunlight. His boots were off, but the rest of his turnout gear was still on him. He had been perspiring heavily; Lowry noticed his flushed complexion, his lethargy.

With tremendous effort the two youths pulled the fireman from the trunk and leaned him against the side of the car.

“Get his stuff off!” Verducci said.

“Nah, let’s just get this done!” replied Lowry, who continued to peer around him, fearful of being seen.

“This coat and pants have all this shiny tape on them. If we leave them on him, he’ll be too easy to find.”

So, with some effort, the coat and trousers were removed and thrown back into the trunk. All this time, the fireman was thanking them. Lowry thought this was exceedingly amusing. Then fireman looked Lowry straight in the eye, obviously having pulled in an idea worth using his last ounce of strength to utter.

“My family...you need to call them. I’ll...I’ll give you the number.”

“Yeah, right, ol’ man. We’ll do that.”

His speech was slurred, but, as the coat and pants came off, he managed to recite the number fairly clearly. Then he tried to walk away. Verducci grabbed his arm and led him back to the car, wondering how much energy a guy so beat up and overheated could possibly have left in him,.

“C’mon back here, Fireman. We’re almost done.”

Lowry tried to remove Stanley’s badge and nameplate. His clumsy fingers fumbled with the pins.

“I’m with Company 51,” the fireman continued. “My men...probably concerned. The number is...it’s...” but he couldn’t hold this idea long enough. “Just call the operator. Do you have any water? I’m awful thirsty.”

Lowry gave up trying to finesse the pins and finally tore them off his shirt. These were thrown into the trunk, as well.

Then both Lowry and Verducci led the fireman to the edge of the road and shoved him off the shoulder. He rolled down the hill, coming to rest just at the edge of the vineyard. They waited to see if he would try to rise, but he lay still.

***

Verducci was correct: It had been oppressively hot in the trunk. So hot in fact that Hank had sweated himself into a stupor. He had tried to remove his turnout gear but had gotten off only his boots before he felt himself falling away.

He didn’t notice until the truck opened that the car had ceased moving. Someone dragged him out and stood him against something. Then someone was removing his coat and pants. If the sensations of liberation had not been so intoxicating, Hank would have protested the divestiture of his clothing. He would have been shocked to feel someone tugging on his uniform shirt, claiming the badge and nameplate pinned there.

Later, he would not recall any of this. Neither the disrobing, nor what he said to the person or people doing it. His tumble down the hill would escape him, as well.

***

It rained that afternoon. He heard droplets falling upon the grapevine leaves. He felt the cold moisture on his skin. Rolling onto his back, he opened his mouth to savor this replenishment. It was all that he had wanted for hours and hours--a great drink of water. After a long while, his thirst sated, Hank attempted to rise. It wasn’t so much the pain that prevented him from doing so. It was sheer abuse--the hyperthermia from being in the hot trunk of a car, the effects of the pummeling his head had taken at the fire and the staggering impact of Lowry’s car.

Hank cared very much about getting home. He was a strong man and a smart one, who used these assets every day of his life. Sinking into a deep sleep, though, he wished to be something more. He wanted to be a lucky man, as well.

***

Graydon Snyder stepped out onto the sagging porch of his farmhouse and lit his first--and only--cigarette of the day. When the fields were lush like this, he felt protected, as if each arboreal vine were a soldier guarding Snyder’s territory. Sometimes, he spoke to the fields. “Keep them damn pilferers out, ya lazy bastards!” he commanded. Sure, he was a bit of a loon; just crazy enough to not mind living by himself in the family shack, distant from neighbors, talkers and door-to-door salesmen.

He hadn’t always lived alone. For 42 years he’d lived with his wife, Mary, until she succumbed to leukemia 8 years ago. Mary had been the communicator of the two. Graydon didn’t talk much; didn’t really want to. They had lived together peacefully, without children and only an occasional dog or cat. Now he was by himself, tending the fields that surrounded his house. It was a simple life that excluded phones and television, newspapers and radios. Behind Snyder’s house grew a vegetable garden. He raised chickens in the henhouse. On the first of the month, he took the bus into town to pick up his Social Security check and acquire what few supplies he felt he needed there. Then it was back to his farm, his grapes and his solitude.

Late each afternoon, Snyder sat on the rusting metal porch rocker, conversing with his crop, smoking. He stayed there for a couple of hours until his drooping eyelids told him it was time to end the day.

Lately, he’d noticed that thieves had come in the night to steal ripened clusters from the roadside vines at the edge of the field. It annoyed him greatly that these punks stole what he had worked so hard to grow. In the weeks since the thefts began, he had developed an almost psychotic hatred of the silent fiends who trespassed against him.

As the sun began its descent, Graydon paced up the long drive to his mailbox. Usually there was nothing in it, but you never knew. Having checked the box, he decided to examine the area where the damned pilferers had acquired their latest booty. He stepped off the drive into the field. Sure enough, entire plantings had been picked. It was almost time for the Alanzo family to come harvest for him. The grapes were ripe enough to burst this time of year. Their sweetness permeated the air.

Snyder looked up the hill towards the road, wondering if he should invest in a fence. He tried to calculate the cost of such an expensive deterrent against the market value of the stolen fruit. Stomping along the damp mud, gazing up at the road, Snyder tripped and fell, keeling over onto his side in the moist loam. A fall can be serious at any age, but at 76 a man had to be especially careful. He pushed up a bit, assured himself that nothing was hurting. Then at last he stood.

In the dim light, he blinked. A dead man lay at his feet.

***

He was as drunk as a skunk. Living it up as though $800 were a king’s ransom, Lowry pulled at his beer, relishing the golden brew as it hit his stomach and leapt up into his head. One thing he really enjoyed was sitting around, smoking cigarettes, drinking one beer after another. Eight hundred dollars! Wow! That was enough to keep him rolling for weeks.

“What are we gonna do with these?” Verducci called from below. Their motel room was situated on the second floor of a long, two-story unit. Leaning over the railing Lowry saw Verducci gesturing towards the turnout coat and pants in the open car trunk.

“Frank, close the lid, man! You want somebody to see you?”

“This dump is practically deserted. Who’s gonna see me?”

Saying nothing, Lowry walked down the nearby stairs and met his old pal at the bottom. He stared into the trunk, remembering the fireman. He had seemed--he really couldn’t get the right word. “Grown up” came to him and he stuck with that for a moment. Lowry was only 16. He’d never spent much time considering what it meant to be an adult. The ones he’d met so far had been pretty pathetic examples. The fireman had been different. It wasn’t just his sheer size, which was considerable compared with Lowry’s. It was his presence. He looked at the name plate lying on the floor of the trunk: H. Stanley. Lowry remembered the sounds of sirens just before he shot the junkie. Perhaps something terrible had happened at the fire to send the fireman wandering around in a daze like that. After all, no one came to that part of town just to see the sights.

He lifted the turnout coat. It smelled of old sweat and burned wood. He thought about the places it might have been, about the character of the person who had worn it. In his intoxicated state, Lowry felt the first tuggings of something bordering on shame. He told himself that it was probably time to crash. Dropping the coat, he slowly climbed the stairs.

“Hey, Lowry, I asked you what we’re going to do with this stuff.”

“Just leave it there,” Lowry called, without looking back. “I’ll take care of it in the morning.”

***

He stopped to catch his breath. Although in excellent shape for a man his age, Snyder didn’t usually spend his evenings hauling grown men around in his wheelbarrow. The moon rose unobscured by city haze. It shone brightly on the light gravel driveway, casting a pale aura around the stranger who had invaded his field. Snyder figured this man was probably one of the fellows who had been raiding his grapes of late. Having determined that the man wasn’t quite dead yet, he decided to bring him in and, if he ever woke up, scare the living shit out of him. Then, no doubt grateful for being allowed to live, the man would probably high tail it off his farm, leaving him and his crop alone.

Arriving at the front porch steps, Snyder tipped the barrow, allowing the man to fall out. Then he drew him by his arms up the two steps, across the porch and into his house. At first, he wasn’t sure where to put him. He looked as sick as a dog. Thinking that the bedroom was just a tad too cozy for such vermin, he settled him on his lumpy brown sofa. He didn’t know anything about pulse rates or breath quality. Such things mattered not to him, anyway.

He gazed down at the stranger for a while before going into the tiny bedroom. From the back of his closet, he produced a double-barreled shotgun, which he loaded. Then he took a seat in his favorite chair, the La-Z-Boy Mary had bought him for his birthday the year before she died. Situated thus, he could observe the man closely but comfortably. He would take good care of him. Very good care.

***

What do firefighters dream about? Can they resolve the events of the day during the night? Does their work enter into the limitless possibilities of their peaceful slumber? For Mike Stoker, the last person to see Captain Stanley two nights ago, his rest brought him into the station house kitchen. There at the table sat Hank, drinking coffee, resting his bare feet on the chair next to him.

Mike smiled in his sleep. “I’m glad you’re back!,” he said to this apparition. “What happened to you?”

Hank shrugged it off. “I was there all the time. Guess you just didn’t stick around long enough to find me.”

Mike’s smile faded. “We looked all over the place. The cops canvassed the whole neighborhood. We really tried, honestly. I’m sorry you had to make it back here all by yourself.”

Hank shook his head. “I don’t want your sorrow. Next time it might be someone else, someone not so lucky.”

The wake-up tones sounded. Mike lay in his bunk, still hearing his captain’s words in his head.

“Stoker? You getting up” Chet asked as he pulled on his clothing.

“Yeah, in a minute.” Like any reticent man, Mike was not easily provoked into conversation. He knew Stanley’s disappearance was weighing heavily on everyone. Only now did he realize how heavily it weighed on his own conscience.

***

At the same time Mike Stoker was having his wish-fulfilling meeting with Hank Stanley, Eric Lowry was busy barfing up most of the beer he’d ingested the night before. He sat on the bathroom floor with one leg on either side of the porcelain alter, resting his head on the seat, aching from his efforts. His heading pounding, he heaved ever more debris into the commode, until he thought he might rupture something.

By the time 51 had finished their breakfast, Lowry felt well enough to stand and splash some water on his face. Despite his youth, Lowry had been drunk many, many times. This time his high had been tainted by a grinding anxiety. It had something to do with the fireman, but he wasn’t sure what. As he left the bathroom, however, he idly considered going back to see if the fireman was still there, lying in the field.

Lowry sat on the bed and lit a cigarette. He tried to dissociate himself from the nagging thoughts that now entered his mind. Turning on the television, he found himself focusing on the commercials, the weather, anything to keep away the apprehension. It would pass, only to return, stronger and more insistent.

His first cigarette gone, Lowry reached for another. The newscaster’s words stopped him: “An L.A. county firefighter was reported missing yesterday after a four-alarm blaze that destroyed the Biltmore Hotel near Tajunga. Fire and rescue and law enforcement personnel searched the area, but have been unable to locate Henry Stanley, a Captain at Station 51...”

He went to the connecting room door and pounded on it. “Hey, Verducci! You awake? Get up, man, I want to talk to you!”

”Go away, Lowry. I’m sleeping,” came the muffled reply.

“Frank, we got to back to the farm. We got to see if he’s still there!”

There was a pause from the other side of the door. He heard Verducci rustling around, opening the door.

“We got to what?”

“I wanna go back and see if he’s still there.”

“That’s the stupidest thing you’ve ever said. What you want to do, take him to Disneyland?”

“No, man, I just want to see if...if he’s okay.”

Verducci could barely keep from laughing. “Jeez, Lowry, you’re all upset. Maybe you should take an aspirin and lie down.”

“No, man, I’m going back to find him. I don’t...I don’t want to kill anybody. Look, we go back and if he’s still alive I’m gonna take him to a hospital or something. They don’t have to know who we are. We’ll just drop him off at the emergency room and scram.”

Though he maintained his incredulous expression, Verducci could see Lowry really meant what he was saying. In all the years he’d known the guy, this was a completely unique event. Lowry didn’t give a shit about anybody but himself. Why all of a sudden this Florence Nightingale thing?

“You are the weirdest turd in the bowl, you know that?”

“Well? Are you coming with me?”

Verducci’s shoulders sagged. He certainly didn’t want to go looking for the fireman, but Lowry was such a stupid guy he’d probably forget the way and then end up driving to Nevada, leaving Frank without wheels.

“Okay, okay. Let me get dressed.” He closed the door.

Lowry was relieved Verducci was going to accompany him. If the fireman were still alive, it would take the efforts of two men to hoist him up the hill, back into the car.

***

At the exact moment that Verducci was calling his best friend a turd, Hank Stanley was staring up at the sagging wooden ceiling of Graydon Snyder’s meager shack. He hurt everywhere and felt feverish and nauseated. The ceiling provided no answers to the many questions he asked himself, not the least of which were his location and how he’d come to be there. After a long, long upward gaze, he opted to do a bit of experimentation to see if any part of his body was functioning properly. He wiggled his toes and his fingers. He smelled the mildew in the walls around him. He could hear. In fact, he could make out wet snoring from somewhere quite nearby. In trying to turn his head, however, Hank gasped at the knife-like pain that pulsed from the top of his head to the upper reaches of his shoulders.

In a moment, the snoring stopped. He heard someone get up and approach him. Then he saw the barrel of a shotgun pointing between his eyes.

”Well, well, well! Looks like today is your lucky day, mister!”

Hank closed his eyes. “What makes you say that?”

”’Cause you didn’t die last night!” There was wheezing laughter and the cold steel of the shotgun probing his right temple. He opened his eyes to find a decrepit old man narrowing his watery blue eyes at him. “You just stay right where you are. You play your cards right, tomorrow might be your lucky day, too!”

Then the man walked away.

”Hey! Come back here!” Hank called, surprised at the weakness of his voice. “I need your help!”

”Help?” the old man sounded miles away. “You come and steal my grapes and then you ask me for help!” He muttered something to himself.

”I didn’t steal anything from you,” Hank croaked.

”What’s that now? I didn’t hear you.” The old man shuffled back towards the sofa.

”I said I didn’t steal anything from you. I’m an L.A. County firefighter. Somehow I...I don’t know...I was in a car and then I was in some bushes and now I’m here.”

”Woo-hoo, a fireman is it?” The old man laughed. “So where’s your helmet, Fireman? Humm?”

Stanley was at a complete loss. In fact, he didn’t know much more than he’d already told the man. His helmet could be in Montana for all he knew.

”I’m sorry, uh, Sir. I know you probably don’t believe me. I should have a badge on my shirt...”

”You don’t have nothing on your shirt, you lyin’ little rat! I’d’ve seen it if you did. I might be old, but I’m not blind!”

Hank made a tentative pat along the front of his shirt. He felt where his badge and nameplate had been torn from the fabric. His heart sank to realize that he was probably not going to get home that day. And maybe never.

***

Some people talk all the time. Although living with such verbose souls presents unique challenges, spouses and roommates have the advantage of knowing when talkative people are upset: They quiet down. To anyone familiar with the A shift at Station 51, the fact that you could hear the refrigerator humming all through lunch was a major indication of just how tumultuous the past three days had been. Firemen are usually quite talkative. So hearing the monotonous droning while a room full of firemen ate lunch was highly unusual.

Quiet men are more difficult to read. They don’t always show obvious signs of the things weighing them down. For years at 51 the joke had been, “Hey, Mike’s upset about something.”

“Really? How can you tell?”

“He talked!” In fact, Mike never expressed his emotions verbally. It wasn’t his style, it hadn’t been his father’s style and probably hadn’t been anyone’s style in his family tree.

Mike Stoker picked at his salad and sandwich. His stomach had tightened three days ago and hadn’t let up since. He rewound the tape in his head over and over. Stanley on the fire escape. Orders to bring the engine around. Arriving with the engine to find the disaster and the dead and injured. Failing to locate his captain. He often imagined how his actions could have played out differently. He could have requested additional men to the area before going to retrieve the engine. He could have radioed for another engine all together. It had been a mistake to leave Stanley alone, even when ordered to do so. Like most firefighters, he often second-guessed himself, especially when something terrible occurred during a call. Had he shared his feelings with his colleagues, he might have been able to come to terms with Stanley’s disappearance. And with his feeling that he was solely responsible for it.

After a suitable try at lunch, Stoker walked into Stanley’s office and sat at the desk there. He gazed around at the photographs on the walls, the commendations and academy certificates, the family photograph on his desk. Stoker had been a firefighter for a long time and had worked with many captains. He wanted to think of Stanley as the bravest and the coolest under pressure. But he couldn’t. He wanted to feel that Stanley had all the qualities of the chief, himself, but he really didn’t feel that way, either. No, Stanley had his own special qualities that made him great to work with: He was very smart. Very experienced. Stoker felt that experience is what made a good firefighter into a great one. Not just the number of experiences, either, but the quality of them, how a firefighter incorporated what he learned into what he did the next time, or the time after that. Stanley was also fair, considerate and had a great sense of humor. Stoker had to admit that most of the captains he’d worked with were so unbelievably overbearing, their crewmembers stopped laughing, stopped talking, when such captains entered the room.

Stanley wasn’t like that at all. It was easy to like the man and easier still to respect him. He wasn’t always right but he trusted his men and they trusted him.

Capt. Morrow entered the office. Stoker rose. “Sorry,” he mumbled. He watched the Cap’s replacement sit at the desk and begin the bane of every captain’s job: paperwork. As Mike was leaving, Morrow called after him, “Close the door, won’t you, Mark?”

“Sure,” he replied. “And it’s Mike.”

***

The elderly man didn’t like venturing from his routine. He felt that at this point in life, a man should be allowed his particular daily agenda. Now this “fireman” was ruining it for him and this stuck like a thorn in his side. The fireman had slept for a couple of days. Now it was high time to rouse the lazy bastard and send him on his way.

Nearing the sofa, he began a lengthy soliloquy. This was another thing he didn’t like. Company always made him talk and he really didn’t like gabbing on about things. Still, it had been years since any sentient creature had crept (or been carried) past his doorframe. Could be years more before another man showed his face there, and he would probably be the coroner. Snyder supposed he wouldn’t be doing much talking by then.

”So, Fireman,” he began. Then he laughed. “Fireman! My pa used to tell me when I was a kid that if I was ever lost I should go to the fire station and ask the firemen to help me. So one day that’s what happened. I was out shopping with my ma and we got separated at the May Company. So, instead of asking the sales lady there to go find my ma, I just left the store and started asking people on the street where the firehouse was!”

He paused and laughed again.

”Took me a couple of hours to find the place, but I finally made it. I was all sniveling and shaking. The fire guys were so big. I remember that most of all--just big, big men...”

He looked over at Stanley, who slept on.

”You don’t seem so big to me. Course, back then, I was all of six. I suppose if I were six today, you’d look pretty big, huh?”

No response from the supine man on the sofa.

“You know what those firemen did? They called the police! Didn’t get their boots on or anything! Just called the cops, who already had my ma in there. Then we waited for my ma to come pick me up. ‘Course, they gave me a soda pop and a sandwich. They seemed nice enough. Certainly, none of ‘em ever went onto someone’s private property and stole their grapes!”

He listened to the silence around him. Even with another person in the room, Snyder was talking to himself. Finally, he walked to the sofa and shoved Stanley.

”Fireman!” he said mockingly. “Hey, Fireman! Time to get your carcass off my sofa and out of my house!”

***

Hank had heard the old man speaking, but had only a vague idea of what he was saying. Only the shove to his shoulder brought him back to the present, and that had elicited a flurry of discomfort in his head and just about everywhere else. He understood that the man was trying to get him to leave. The image of the shotgun returned to him. Was the old man going threaten him once more?

To Hank, even the idea of sitting up seemed Herculean. Getting up and walking anywhere was an absolute impossibility. All the little nerve impulses from the stricken parts of his body were communicating well with his brain. They spoke of aspirin, water and sleep. Some of them hinted at x-rays, as well.

“I can’t go anywhere,” he said, pleased to be able to speak a bit louder this time. “If you have some aspirin, I’d be happy to pay you back for it.”

Snyder now held the shotgun slung back over his shoulder. “You got money on ya?” He leaned closer to the sofa. “I’ll take all ya got. Pay me back for my grapes.”

“Honestly, I haven’t taken a thing from you. I’m a captain with the fire department. If you call my station, they’ll tell you so themselves!”

The old man laughed again. He seemed so amused, so very delighted to hold so much power. “Well, I would call, son, but I don’t have no phone.”

Hank rolled his eyes. His nature was a proactive one. It galled him to be lying there, dependent upon the whims of this nut who didn’t believe a word he said. Frustration made his head pound. “Do you have a neighbor you can ask? Surely someone has a phone out here...wherever I am. Where am I, anyway?”

”A long, long way from Los Angeles, I can tell you that.”

”I have a family. I have to contact them somehow.” The old man said nothing.

”Look, if you can give me a couple of aspirin, maybe I’ll feel up to moving around. Okay?”

The stranger’s face was ghostly pale. His hands shook. It was obvious to Snyder that the mere effort to speak had taken a toll on him. Getting up, he went to a tiny alcove bathroom. In the medicine chest, he found a small bottle of aspirin. Not prone headaches or illnesses, Snyder had had this particular bottle for many years. He unscrewed the top and set the bottle down on a small table in front of the sofa. Then he laid a glass of water next to it.

”There’s your medicine,” he said. The stranger had fallen asleep once again. Snyder noticed the golden band on the ring finger of his left hand as it lay across his chest.

***

The LTD kicked up huge dust clouds as it sped along the dirt road. From time to time, the tires hit a rut, causing the vehicle bounce along roughly. From his perch behind the wheel, Verducci looked over at Lowry, who absent-mindedly clutched his sore middle. They had been driving around for a couple of days. Each night Lowry had gotten smashed, sitting on the floor of his room, staring at the television.

“We’ll never find him, Lowry! Let’s go back to the hotel. You’re still drunk!”

“I’m...not...still...drunk,” Lowry panted, trying to tame his nausea. “He’s...around here...somewhere. Just keep looking for...for that old shack.”

Neither man could recall where they’d left the fireman. Each road looked pretty much the same: straight, flat, bordered on either side by vineyards. Verducci channeled his frustration by driving as fast as he could, sometimes plummeting through stop signs with only a cursory glance at the cross streets.

As the hours wore on, Lowry’s anxiety had evolved into fevered desperation. He couldn’t imagine what was propelling him back to the field, only that he had to get there and set things right. Despite his enormous hangovers, Lowry felt strong. He felt he had never wanted anything so much as he wanted to undo what he’d done to the fireman.

Verducci looked over at Lowry and shouted, “I don’t know why I hang out with you! Look at us, out here in Nowhere Land trying to find some guy you wasted!”

“Keep your eyes on the road, Frank. You’re gonna get us both killed.”

But Verducci was livid. “I’ve spent the past eight years listening to you whine and complain about everything, everything, man! You wanna go to the country, you want some money, you want this, you want that! Now here we are with eight hundred bucks and all you want to do is chase down some ghost! I’m going back to town and get some sleep, you can find him your...”

“Frank, stop! Ah, Jesus!”

Verducci looked back at the road seconds before the semi rammed against the left-hand side of the car. The impact threw Lowry from the vehicle; he landed with a thud in a pile of muddy peat moss. He lay there, stunned, watching the semi and the LTD slow in a shuddering dance of death about 50 yards up the road. The semi backed up slightly. The carâ’s left side was crushed. Its hood and trunk had popped open, as if the car had burst like an overripe fruit. Lowry watched the truck’s driver stagger out of the cab and walk up to the LTD. The driver quickly turned away and vomited. It was then that Lowry saw the headless silhouette of his old pal, Frank.

***

“Mike, I’ve got news.” Roy’s voice sounded shaky over the phone.

Stoker sat up in bed, alert. “Tell me.”

“They found Cap’s turnout gear, his badge and ID plate.”

“Where?”

“In the trunk of a car that got hit by a truck near Solvang.”

“He’s dead.” It was more a statement than a question.

“He wasn’t in the car. The driver was decapitated...someone else may have been in the car, as well, but the truck driver can’t say for sure. He thinks another person might have been ejected, but they haven’t found anyone yet.”

Roy paused, letting this information sink in before continuing.

“You know that guy who was shot a few blocks from the Biltmore fire? He woke up last night and gave the cops descriptions of two men, including the guy who shot him.”

“So?”

“So, the car belonged to the man who was shot and the guy who died in the wreck matches the description of one of his assailants. The cops found a gun in the car and think it might be the one used in the shooting. They can’t say whether the person thrown from the car--if there was one--was his partner or...or the Cap.”

Mike was silent for a few moments, pulling together the facts Roy had given him. “Did they find anything else?”

“Yeah.” Mike heard the trepidation in Roy’s voice.

“Okay, so what is it?”

“There was some blood in the trunk, on Cap’s gear. Not a whole lot, though,” he added, hopefully.

“I’m going up there.”

“Yeah. I know.”

***

Eric Lowry didn’t believe in miracles. He believed in luck. Slowly lifting himself from the moss that had saved him, he staggered into the sheltering vineyard. Suitably hidden--for a short while at least--he marveled at how little damage he’d sustained in the crash. Some bruises. A stiff neck. Nothing extraordinary. Huddling among the vines, he thought of Frank--his only friend. His friend no more. His loss opened up a well inside of him, the dark, gloomy chasm where he kept all of his pain. With the sound of sirens reverberating in the distance, Lowry cried for the first time that he could remember.

Then, pushed to resume his search, Lowry rose and, wiping tears from his cheeks, he plunged ahead across the field.

***

Mike Stoker had left L.A. early in the morning, armed with a map, descriptions of the men who had attacked the guy downtown, and the phone number and address of the Solvang police department. He knew that going to this place was foolish; there was practically nothing to be gained from his efforts. What did he have to go on that the cops hadn’t already tried? His world was a logical one. It didn’t stand on fantasy; he carried with him no illusions of finding Stanley by chance. But he had to try. This was his Captain, the man he’d left alone in the fury of the moment. He should have stayed with him and called for another engine. He should have done everything differently. Now there was a place to look for Hank Stanley, as improbable as it seemed.

The Solvang police had told him what little they knew. After waiting impatiently at the station for over an hour, Mike was presented with Cap’s turnout coat, trousers, his badge and nameplate. He stared at these items as they lay on the desk before him.

“You can go on out there and snoop around if you want,” the sergeant had told him. “From what L.A.’s told us, seems this headless joker ran down your Captain and then packed him into the trunk. Probably let him out somewhere. Maybe around here, maybe along the way. Guy could be anywhere, really.”

“His name’s Hank Stanley.”

“Stanley, right. We already got about a hundred people out there, right now, looking for him. Just stay in touch if you find anything. You got a CB in your car?”

Stoker looked up from the items on the desk. “Ah, no. No CB. How do you know the Cap was run down?”

“Found a piece of his bunker pants hung up on the front fender. That hole, there, that’s the part that was ripped out.”

Mike looked grimly at the bloody tear in the fabric. The sergeant produced a hand radio. “Go on and take this. Just bring it back before you leave the area, okay? You L.A. guys probably get these by the boxful but around here they’re as rare as movie stars!”

Mike took the radio. Then, gathering the bundle from the desk, he’d left the station.

The late afternoon sun caressed the Captain’s gear as it lay on the passenger seat of Mike’s car. He was driving southward, towards the site of the wreck, passing one vineyard after another. He felt tired. His once unshakable determination faded as the afternoon wore on. Rounding a small curve, he thought he saw a lone figure striding awkwardly by the roadside. The sun fell into his eyes. Once the glare had passed, he saw only the empty roadway and the endless crops it bisected.

***

Graydon Snyder was thinking that maybe he’d made a mistake. The wedding ring on the stranger’s hand bothered him. Surely, a thief stood little chance of being married. Even if he were a married criminal, it was unlikely he’d keep a nice gold band like that; he’d probably have pawned it long ago. Still... The old man shook his head. If this fellow were telling the truth about being a fireman, then Snyder was sinning something awful by not contacting the police, getting the guy to a hospital. Night approached. It was too late to begin the trek to his nearest neighbor’s house, almost four miles away. Best to tend the man during the night and set out in the morning.

Trying not to awaken the firefighter, he cleaned and covered his wounds. There was quite a large cut on his head, matched by one on his leg, which was now swollen and festering. Tremendous bruises had blossomed everywhere.

At last, the clean-up done, Snyder placed a cool cloth on the man’s head, which burned with fever. The aspirin bottle and water glass remained untouched where he’d left them two days before.

Snyder began to worry. What if the man never woke up? What if he died right there on the sofa, away from his family and his mates?

”Fireman?” he asked. “Can you wake up, Fireman?” He spoke quietly, all gruffness gone. “Hey, Iâ’ll try to get to a phone. Tonight. I’m going tonight!”

***

Hank awoke to the sight of Graydon Snyder’s porous nose mere inches away from his face. He cringed in trepidation, then grimaced at the pain in his head and neck.

”Fireman!” the old guy was saying. “Oh, thank the Lord you’re not dead!”

”What?” was all Hank could manage.

”Look,” Snyder said, holding up Hank’s left hand. “You’re married!”

Hank stared at him.

”I’m sorry. You’re not a thieving punk, are you? You really are a fireman, right? And a married one, at that!”

”Right.”

Snyder rose and donned his old, gray sweater from the closet. He searched around for something, muttering. “Flashlight...you to a hospital...stay here...I’m going to Mrs. Natali’s place down the road.”

Spying the aspirin and water nearby, Hank reached for them.

“Go on and take as many as you want, Sir...”

“It’s Hank. Hank Stanley.”

“Right, uh, Mr. Stanley.”

He swallowed three tablets and gulped the water greedily, trying to ignore his discomfort while doing so.

“Hank. Just call me Hank.”

“I’m gonna get some help for you right now, Hank. You just rest. Is there anything I can get for you before I go?”

Hank thought for a moment. Then he said, “More water. Lots more water.”

Snyder proceeded to set six filled glasses of various sizes on the table by the sofa. Then he crouched down once again before the fireman.

“I’m sorry about the misunderstanding, Hank. See, I live out here by myself and...uh...I’m not real good with people. Don’t know the good from the bad and never did. Used to leave all that up to my dear wife, Mary. She would have had you pegged in a second! So, well...I’m going to call the ambulance at my neighbor’s house. She lives a bit away, so don’t expect anything too soon. I’ll leave on the light over there, so if you’re feeling up to moving around, you won’t bark you shins.”

With that, he rose and, flashlight in hand, opened the squeaking front door and disappeared into the night.

***

To Lowry, the peaceful rural landscape had become a nightmarish blend of gnarled vegetation, buzzing insects and swooping fruit bats. He sought solace in the grapes, which he ate by the handful, surprised at how they quenched his thirst and eased the cramps in his stomach. Wallowing in the plentiful bounty, he allowed their sweet, red juices to run down his chin onto his tattered T-shirt. His mission foremost in his mind, he had found it easiest to walk along the road, but ducked into the vegetation whenever a vehicle approached.

As night crept over the land, he sought a place to rest until morning. Searching about him, he could find no spot that seemed at all restful. It was either too mucky or too exposed or too frightening. He stopped again and looked around. His heart quickened. In the distance he discerned a wooden structure with a dim light shining from the window--and peeking out from a hole in the roof.

His energy returned instantly. First walking, then trotting along the road, Lowry began the last leg of his journey.

***

Stoker reported in several times during the afternoon and early evening. No one had any new information. Night had come; weariness and frustration had worn him down. He was not the kind of man to lose hope quickly. He’d seen enough miracles in his life to keep open the possibility of finding something--or someone--that would help him locate his captain.

A lone figure appeared in the beam of his headlights--a man tottering along the road with a flashlight. Pulling up to the man, Mike rolled down the passenger-side window and called, “Hey, Fella, need a ride”

The man stood still for a moment, then approached the car.

”I certainly do, young man. Got to get me to my neighbor’s house so I can use the...what’s this?” He seemed surprised at the sight of Stanley’s turnout gear in the seat. Looking up at Mike, he exclaimed, “You a fireman?”

”Yes. I’m here looking for someone.?

The old man beamed a wide, toothy smile. “His name Hank, by any chance?”

***

He scarcely believed that anyone lived in such a moldy structure. It smelled heavily of decay and neglect. Peering through a cloudy window, Lowry saw the few ratty pieces of furniture within and the ancient accouterments of what might at one time have been a cozy cottage. He stepped back off the porch and took in the hole in the roof. Certain that this was indeed the right place, he mounted the steps and gently knocked on the door. No answer. Turning the knob, he entered the structure. “Anyone here?” he whispered.

Hearing a quiet moan, the looked to his left to see the living, breathing fireman attempting to sit up on a filthy sofa, cradling his head in his hands.

”Mister, are you okay?”

The fireman slowly lifted his head. “Are you from... Do I know you?” The youth worried that the fireman recognized him, that he would turn him in. He resisted the impulse to bolt for the door. Instead, he strode towards the fireman, who was trying to stand.

“Where’s the phone here?” Lowry said. “I’ll call the medics or something.”

”No phone,” the fireman replied, giving up the effort to stand and lying down once again. “Where’s the guy who lives here? He was going to a neighbor’s house to use the phone.”

“I dunno, Mister.” Lowry moved a couple of glasses on the table and sat there. “Can I do anything? At all?”

”No. The old man should be back soon.”

Lowry looked out the front window. Seeing no headlights on the driveway, he turned back to the fireman.

“I’m sorry I got you hurt. I didn’t mean...I don’t know what got into me. I just wanted a car to get out of the city.”

Stanley tried to make sense of what this boy was telling him. This was just a kid. How could he be responsible for his ending up here?

”I’m not following you, son.”

Lowry took a deep breath. He suddenly felt much older than his years, as if admitting his responsibility were aging him.

“You were there, standing by the guy I...the guy I shot. You were trying to help him, but I hit you with the car and put you in the trunk and dumped you in the field out there!”

Stanley appeared to be watching the ceiling again. In fact, he was beginning to recall some of the events of the night of the fire. He remembered the brick wall collapsing on top of him, and the gnarled bodies of people landing around him. He saw a wounded man lying in the street, felt the jolt of some tremendous force hitting him and hurling him to the pavement. As these episodes from his recent history became clearer, he wondered why this boy was back before him once again.

“Are you going to shoot me, too?” he asked, trying to control the fear in his voice.

“No! No, man, I came back here to see if you were okay. I don’t know why. It’s just that you’re a fireman, I guess. You go out to save people, to rescue them...” His voice trailed off when he heard a car approaching the house, saw its headlights shining through the window. “Ah, Jeez! I’m just a loser and now I’m gonna go to jail. I’ve never done anything good in my life. Even got Frank killed. I don’t care anymore. I just want to tell you that I’m sorry for what I done.”

Lowry sat there, twisting his hands in his lap. To Stanley he looked like a small child waiting for his father to come home and spank him for some childish misdeed. He reached over and put his hand on the boy’s arm.

”What’s your name?”

“Eric Lowry.”

“Eric, I’d like to tell you that everything’s going to be okay, but I can’t. You did some pretty bad things.”

“I know.” He looked out the window again. Two men approached the house.

“It’s not going to be easy, but you’ve got the rest of your life to change and make something of yourself. It’s not too late to change the path you’re on.”

The front door opened. Two men entered, an old fellow and a younger one. Lowry stood, ready to accept the fate he deserved. He expected handcuffs and a ride in the back seat of a police cruiser. What happened next took him by complete surprise.

***

It happened so quickly, that Mike had only a moment to take in the scene. Captain Stanley lay on a sofa. Seated next to him was a boy who had obviously been crying. The old man, Snyder, erupted in a fury Stoker had rarely seen in his life. With the speed and agility of a man half his age, Snyder grabbed his shotgun by the barrel and swung the post at the youth’s head, connecting with a gut-wrenching wallop. The boy fell to the floor, bleeding from a massive head wound. He jerked a few times before lying still.

The old man was stood over the boy, clutching his stained shirt front, shouting, “You stole my grapes, you lousy, thieving, little creep! You stole my grapes!”

Mike restrained Snyder, as Stanley rolled off the sofa and crawled to the prone youth. His head spun from his exertion and from the shock of witnessing such a brutal attack. Lowry’s eyes were open. One pupil was larger than the other. Turning him onto his back, Stanley felt for a carotid pulse and, finding none, weakly compressed his chest in a feeble attempt to restart his heart.

The drive outside had exploded with sirens and flashing lights. Police officers, fireman and medics who had been searching for Stanley piled into the tiny house. Some knelt by the boy, some pulled Stanley away, battering him with questions. The next few moments were a blur to him. He felt himself being laid down on the dirty floor, saw penlights shining in his eyes, heard medics speaking of him and of the boy.

He lifted his head to look at Lowry, who was now surrounded by EMS personnel. They were intubating him, performing CPR. From time to time, he heard Graydon Snyder’s gravely voice, sometimes sounding angry, sometimes keening with regret and despair. His vision dimmed until all he saw was the worried face of Mike Stoker beside him.

“It’s okay, Cap,” Stoker said. “You’re going to be fine. You’re going home.”

***

“Hank? Wake up, Honey.”

He wondered where he was this time. Home in his own bed, he hoped.

“Open your eyes, Hank.”

“I wouldn’t push it, Mrs. Stanley. At least until the anesthesia wears off a bit more. A couple of hours at least.”

He recognized Joe Early’s calming voice.

“Sorry,” replied his wife. “I’ve been so worried about him. I just want to know that he’s going to be okay.”

Now he knew where he was. Not in a car trunk or in a field or in some old guy’s hovel. Relief washed over him. He slept on.

When he awoke again, he was alone in a hospital room. Flowers and cards bedecked the windowsill. Dr. Early entered and beamed delightedly.

“Good morning, Captain Stanley! How are you feeling?”

“Well, I’m glad to be back in civilization. Is my wife here? I’d really like to see her.”

“She’s downstairs having some breakfast. I’ll tell her you’re awake when I’m finished examining you.” He sat at the foot of the bed, a serious expression clouding his face. “You’re a very lucky man, Captain. You sustained a head injury that fractured your skull. I don’t know if this occurred at the fire several nights ago or sometime after, but we had to perform a craniotomy to reduce a subdural hematoma.”

The Captain’s perplexed and worried features stared back at him.

Early smiled slightly. “In English, we had to open your head up to relieve the pressure on your brain. When you came in, I thought the pressure would resolve itself. This does happen. But, after a couple of days, I saw no real improvement in either your CAT scans or your level of consciousness, so I decided to go ahead with the surgery. Fortunately, the injury was easy to access. I think that, after a time, you will make a complete recovery. You were also quite dehydrated and suffering from an infection to a wound in your leg. From what the authorities have been able to piece together, you went on quite an adventure.”

”That I did. I don’t remember all of it, but, I’d rather not take a vacation like that one ever again.”

Dr. Early had just finished his exam when Mike Stoker opened the door.

“Hi, Cap, Dr. Early,” he said quietly. “I’ll wait outside if you want.”

“No, come on in, Mike,” said Early, collecting his chart. “I was just leaving. Make your visit brief, though. The Captain here needs his rest.”

“Sure, okay.” He walked to the bed and produced a large paper sack, from which he pulled cards of all sizes and shapes.

“What’s all this?” asked Stanley.

“They’ve been arriving at the station since you...since you were found. It was on the news and everything. Do you want to look at them now?”

“Just leave them on the table here and I’ll get to them a little later.”

The two men were silent for a few moments.

Finally, Mike spoke up.

“Do you remember what happened at the fire?” he asked.

“Not really. I recall the wall collapsing, people falling from the fire escape. Maybe you can enlighten me further.”

Mike sat on a nearby chair. He was uncomfortable, earnestly wishing to be just about anyplace else in the world.

“You sent me to get the engine and, when I brought it around you were gone. I think you got hit by some debris, maybe some bricks fell on you. You must have wandered away because we couldn’t find you anywhere. They think you bumped into some people committing a robbery...”

Stanley started at the sudden recollection of the boy. What was his name again? He struggled to remember. Stoker noticed Hank’s puzzled expression.

“You know about the car? The guys running you down?”

“Yes. Someone...there was a boy, he was there telling me about it. I was trying to remember his name.”

“Eric Lowry.”

“What happened to him? Did I dream this? The old man hit him over the head. The kid wasn’t breathing. Did that happen?”

Stoker shifted uncomfortably in his chair. “Yes, it did happen.”

“Is…is he dead?”

“No, Cap. He’s not dead. Not yet, anyway...” His voice trailed away.

“Meaning?”

“He’s got some brain damage. They don’t know how much, yet. They’re still waiting for him to wake up.”

“Damn!”

“Look, maybe I should go. Doc said not to be here too long.” He rose to leave.

“No, wait. What about the old man?”

Mike returned to his seat. “His name’s Snyder, Graydon Snyder. He was behaving so strangely, the medics took him to the hospital, as well. Turns out he’d had a series of small strokes that made him kind of crazy. The police up there don’t want to charge him with anything. They feel he wasn’t responsible for his actions. He feels real bad about not getting help for you sooner and for hitting the Lowry boy.”

Mike paused. He wanted to leave, but felt compelled to impart one last morsel of information. Leaning over with his elbows on his knees, he looked at the floor.

“Cap, I wish I’d called another engine instead of leaving you there at the fire. I think if I’d done that all of this would never have happened. It, uh, it’s been bothering me a lot.”

Hank considered his words. He had to agree with Mike: The unbelievable string of events that began in the ally behind the Biltmore Hotel and ended here at Rampart hospital were ushered in by a decision Hank himself had made to bring in 51. For all of his experience, he knew that the unpredictability of life never escaped anyone and that the smallest action could set into motion enormous repercussions for people far, far away. He looked at the engineer, saddened that one of his men was now bearing the cross for someone else, for Hank Stanley.

“Mike,” he said. “It was my mistake. You were following orders. Neither one of us could have predicted what would happen. I don’t want you to blame yourself for this, okay?”

Mike nodded. “Well, I think I’d better go. The guys and I’ll come see you tomorrow, if you want.”

“Sure. If you see my wife wandering around out in the hallway, ask her to bring me some food, will you? I’m starving.”

“Sure, Cap.” With that, he left.

Hank puzzled over their conversation for a long time. Mike was such a quiet guy, the two of them had never really had a long talk about anything. He nodded off again, this time imagining the Lowry boy smiling and shaking his hand.

***

In the weeks following his return to L.A., Hank made a slow but steady recovery. His hospital stay was followed by recuperation at home. Eventually, the dizzy spells ended and his strength returned. Each day someone from the department called or came to visit him, sometimes bearing a gift from one of the stations, sometimes bringing just himself and a couple of good stories. Hank appreciated the thoughtfulness of his brethren. This was one of the best things about his job: The concern one firefighter felt for another, even one from another part of town or another town all together.

His first day back at 51 was greeted with more glee than he expected. His men were almost giddy.

“Well,” he said, “Looks like it was hell here while I was gone.”

Mike Stoker said quietly, “Morrow...he’s a great guy. Right, fellas?”

They nodded and muttered affirmations.

“But?” asked the Captain suspiciously.

“But,” Mike began. He blew out a breath. “As of yesterday, he still thought my name was Mark. Marco, here, was Mike. Chet was Chuck. And Johnny and Roy were, uh, what was it now?”

“Ronny and Leroy,” said John, sounding annoyed. “And I was Leroy!”

Popping into his office, Hank sat at his desk, pleased to see the familiar walls and file cabinets. Mike appeared at the door and knocked.

“Come on in, Mike.”

Handing his captain an envelope, Mike said, “This came for you yesterday. I saved it because I thought you should read it first instead of Capt. Morrow.”

It was a letter from Graydon Snyder, which read:

Dear Capt. Stanley,
I am surely glad to hear that you are doing fine back in L.A. I’ve never been there, but I hear that it is some place indeed. My Mary went there a couple of times to visit her sister. Came back with a map showing where all the movie stars live and a little plastic copy of that statue they give to them for acting there.

The police told me you were in some bad shape up here. I’m real sorry about that. The doctors told me I wasn’t thinking straight on account of something with my head, but they gave me some medicine and it’s better, now.

That boy I hit was not doing too good for a long time. Then he woke up and they said he was not going to be right anymore. Said he was okay to do some work, but not much ever again. Even though they said it wasn’t my fault, I didn’t believe that. I wanted to make it up to him, so I asked if he could come stay with me and help with the place here. They said that was fine, so a couple of days ago they dropped him off. We hit it off pretty good, Eric and me. Maybe he can help me get the house fixed up a bit. He’s a real nice fellow. And he don’t talk much, either.

If you’re ever up this way, I’d like to sit with you awhile. Show you I’m not such a bad character. But I don’t blame you for maybe not wanting to do that.

My best regards to your family and to the fellows you work with at the fire station.

Sincerely yours,

Graydon Snyder

Stanley read the letter several times. Then he folded it and put it back into its envelope. Leaning back in his well-worn chair, he smiled. His vacation next year was going to be an interesting one.

Yes, indeed.