Previously Loved Treasures (Serendipity #2)(72)
“Wilbur?” he called again, but still there was no answer. He came near the center of the room when he saw a bright green glow a foot, maybe two, from where he was. He blinked several times, and the light came into focus.
It was the numbers on a glow-in-the-dark watch.
If it was Wilbur, he was in the path of the rapidly spreading flames. Calvin dropped to his knees and crawled toward the green glow. Before he got there he bumped up against Wilbur’s foot. He reached out, grabbed the leg, pulled it toward him, and caught hold of the torso. Wilbur was unconscious but still alive. Dragging him across the floor, Calvin moved swiftly and called out to George, “I’ve got a survivor.” George twisted the bale and aimed the nozzle upward. A powerful spray of water slapped against the ceiling and cascaded down the walls. The fire sizzled, spat, and steamed, then quickly died away.
“We’ve got to get this guy on oxygen!” Calvin yelled. He pulled Wilbur close to the doorway, then knelt and lifted the big man across his shoulder. Wilbur was dead weight and not easily carried. Calvin braced himself against the doorframe and stood. Following the hose line, he made his way back through the hallway and out onto the porch. When the crowd saw the firemen carrying Wilbur to safety, a cheer rose up.
“Wilbur!” Caroline screamed and ran to him. She fell to her knees alongside the lifeless body. “Please be okay, Wilbur. Please, please…” A cascade of tears rolled down her face and she began to pray, something she’d not done in a very long time. After years of disappointment and heartache she’d given up believing in miracles, but now she needed one and it was bigger than anything else she’d ever asked for.
“Please, God,” she said, “I swear I’ll never ask for anything else. Just please let Wilbur be okay…please…” Her voice was small and frail, but it carried a sense of urgency impossible to miss.
Caroline couldn’t say how many minutes passed as she knelt beside Wilbur; she only knew it seemed a lifetime. When he finally blinked his eyes open and let go of a choking cough, the ambulance had already arrived.
As they lifted Wilbur into the ambulance, the captain’s radio squawked again.
“We’ve got another survivor,” Fred Marcaine said. Fred was part of the team that had gone around to the back of the house to wet down the wall and check for hot spots.
Hearing the call, Caroline turned and searched the faces in the crowd. All of the residents were present and accounted for. She turned to the captain. “Another survivor?”
The captain shrugged. “A neighbor maybe?”
When two firemen came from the rear of the house carrying Joe Mallory he’d already passed out. Not from injury but from a full bottle of Jack Daniels.
The captain leaned over him and caught a whiff of the whiskey. “Whew, this guy’s not injured, he’s drunk!”
That’s when the police got involved. Once they’d pulled Joe’s wallet from his pocket, it took mere minutes to learn he was wanted in Mackinaw for theft of a tow truck.
Caroline
I’ve never been so frightened in all my life. Being frightened for yourself is bad enough, but it’s ten thousand times worse when you’re frightened for someone you love. When I heard the sound of Rowena’s name, my only thought was to get her and Sara to safety. When the police found that man in the backyard, they said his driver’s license identified him as Joe Mallory. I didn’t need anything to tell me who it was; I’d heard the call of Rowena’s name.
With all the craziness going on I didn’t stop to count heads until after Rose left with Barbara Ann; that’s when I discovered Wilbur wasn’t with the others. I was turning back to look for him when that fireman, Calvin I think his name is, stopped me. “Too dangerous,” he said, and he wasn’t about to let go of my arm.
I’m not a particularly brave person—in fact I’m not brave at all—but when someone you love is in danger, you don’t stop to think about yourself. All you can think about is saving them. One summer Mama and I were at the city pool, and a little kid who’d been running around fell in the deep end. Without stopping to think about it, his mama jumped in to save him even though she couldn’t swim a stroke herself. She was standing in water over her head, but she grabbed that toddler and held him up high over her head so he wouldn’t drown. When people saw she couldn’t swim, a bunch of bystanders pulled them both out. Well, I felt just like that mama when I realized Wilbur was still inside.
Much as it breaks my heart to see Grandma’s house in such a shambles, I’m just happy to have Wilbur alive.
Later that night when I got to thinking about Rowena’s husband being the cause of all this, I started wondering if I’d done the right thing in bringing her here. It didn’t take a whole lot of thinking to come to the realization I had no other choice. When you know somebody’s in trouble, you’ve got to stretch out a hand and help. If you don’t you’ll come to hate yourself, and that’s not something anybody wants to live with.
It’s funny, I came here a few months back with no family at all. Now I’ve got a great big family, and Rowena and Wilbur, they’re an important part of it.
The Aftermath
On the same night Wilbur was taken to the hospital, Joe Mallory was taken to jail. The fire had destroyed the kitchen and the back wall, and although the remainder of the house still stood it would be uninhabitable for a few days mostly because of smoke and water damage.