“It’s going to get worse, much worse,” said Bell slowly. He turned to Marion. “I want you to go to Golden Gate Park; you’ll be safe there. I’ll come and find you later.”

“Where are you going?” she whispered, shuddering at the thought that she would be alone.

“To the Van Dorn office. The city is going to need every law enforcement agent available to help control the chaos.”

“Why can’t I stay here, near my apartment?”

He took another look at the growing conflagration. “It’s only a matter of a few hours before the fire reaches Russian Hill. You can’t stay here. Do you think you can make it on foot to the park?”

“I’ll make it,” she said, nodding gamely. Then she reached up and circled her arms around his neck. “I love you, Isaac Bell. I love you so much I hurt.”

He slipped his arms around her slim waist and kissed her. “I love you, too, Marion Morgan.” He hesitated before pushing her back. “Now, be a good girl and get a move on.”

“I’ll wait for you at the bridge over the pond.”

He held her hand a moment before turning away and moving through the mass of people who were crowded in the center of the street as far away as they could get from the buildings as a series of light aftershocks rippled through the city.

Bell took one of the long stairways leading from Russian Hill. It was split apart in several places but did not block his way down to Union Street. Then he cut over to Stockton and then to Market Street. The scene of destruction went far beyond anything his mind could have created.

There were no streetcars running, and all automobiles, many of them new models commandeered from dealer showrooms, as well as horse-drawn vehicles, were being pressed into service as ambulances to carry the injured to makeshift hospitals that were springing up in the city squares. The bodies of the dead, those who could be retrieved, were carried to warehouses that had been turned into temporary morgues.

The falling walls had not only crushed unlucky humans walking the sidewalks but also horses pulling the city’s huge fleet of freight wagons. They were felled by the dozens under tons of bricks. Bell saw a driver and horse that had been smashed to pulp by an electrical pole that had fallen on their milk wagon.

Reaching Market Street, Bell ducked into the remains of a still-standing doorway that was once the entrance into the Hearst Examiner Newspaper Building. He sought refuge as a herd of cattle appeared that had escaped their pen at the docks. Maddened by fright, they charged down the street and almost immediately vanished, swallowed up by one of the great chasms where the violent thrust of the earthquake had split the streets.