Ahead, he watched Stefanie’s dark figure pause at the front door of the shelter, pounding at it, then fumbling with her keys to release the lock. The building was dark, save for a glimmer of night-lights in the upper dormitories and front lobby. Inside, everything was silent and still.

Then the front door was open and Stef was inside, disappearing into the gloom. As he drew nearer, he saw rolling gray smoke leaking from the basement windows and the front entry, escaping the building to mix with the mist and rain outside. His chest tightened with fear. In an old building like this, a fire would spread quickly. He shouted after Stefanie, trying to warn her, but his words were blown away on the wind.

He reached the front door, still open from Stef’s entry, and rushed inside. The interior was murky with smoke, and he could barely see well enough to make his way across the lobby to the hallway and the offices beyond. The stairway door to the upper floors was open, and he could hear shouts and cries from above. He coughed violently, covered his mouth with his wet sleeve, and tried to find some sign of the night manager. He couldn’t remember who had the duty this week, but whoever it was, was nowhere to be found. He searched the length of the hallway and all the offices without success.

The basement door was closed. Smoke leaked from its seams, and it was hot to the touch. He ignored his instincts and wrenched it open. Clouds of smoke billowed forth, borne on a wave of searing heat. He shouted down the stairs, but there was no response. He started down, but the heat and smoke drove him back. He could see the flames spreading along the walls, climbing to the higher floors. Wooden tables, filing bins and cabinets, records and charts, and even the stairway were burning.

He slammed the door shut again, backing away.

There were footsteps on the stairway behind him, the women and children coming down from the upper floors. He limped over to meet them so that he could direct them to the front door. They appeared out of the gloom, dim shapes against the haze of smoke. They stumbled down in ones and twos, coughing and crying and cursing in equal measure, the children clinging to their mothers, the mothers clinging back, the women without children helping both, the whole bunch wrapped in robes and coats and even sheets. The smoke was growing thicker and the heat increasing. He shouted at them to hurry, urging them on. He tried to count heads, to determine how many had come out so he could know how many were still inside. But he couldn’t remember the number in residence, and he didn’t know how many might have been admitted that afternoon after he left. Twenty-one, twenty-two, twenty-three—they were filing past him in larger groups now, bumping up against one another in their haste to get out. Thirty-five, thirty-six. There had to be at least ninety, probably more like a hundred.