I am happy for her that she has a home to go to after this soul-crushing journey. I am envious she does.

And so we ask for passes—the only way you are legally allowed to be out among the ruins of the city—and begin the walk along with thousands of others east to the bay. Tens of thousands remain at the park as we leave it. We have somewhere to go; countless others do not.

I carry the travel case containing Kat’s clothes, the strongbox—which I still have not found a way to open—and all the documents that prove who Martin Hocking is, or was. Kat carries the pillowcase bag with the diapers and baby blankets. Belinda carries Sarah. We are told there is no safe water anywhere to drink on the way, and we are each given one can of milk to last us until we reach the ferry building.

The first two miles we walk in silence, as if in preparation for what we will see when we cross Van Ness. Our throats and eyes burn with the acrid smell of smoke and fluttering ash, but there is no damage from the fires here. Not yet. The dynamiting of all the houses and buildings on the east side of Van Ness stopped the fire’s westward progress, and we are only seeing damage here and there from the earthquake. Toppled chimneys, leaning walls, cracks in the street. We pass people whose houses are still standing and who ask if we have any food. They don’t want to leave their homes unguarded and go to the overcrowded refugee camps at the park and Presidio, where relief supplies are available. We have no food to give them.

Belinda, Kat, and I take our time and reach Van Ness an hour and a half after setting out. Up and down the street on its eastern side is a long vista of ruin and rubble, black and gray and smoking. We cross Van Ness into what had been the fire’s domain and make our way to Market Street, passing Polk first, which is a black ribbon of devastation as far as I can see. For one blink of a moment I see in my mind the image of Martin wrapped in flames as he sits slumped and broken and bleeding in the kitchen. I see him with his eyes open and I can’t tell if he is dead or alive as the damnation he deserves overtakes him. I don’t want to know which it is. I don’t. Perhaps he got out. Perhaps. At some point I’ll have to return to what’s left of the house if I want to know for sure. But I can’t think about that. Not right now. Not today.

We walk past the wreckage of the once massive city hall. What the earthquake did not dismantle the fire consumed. The dome still stands, but it is purposeless and naked against the low gray sky. The Mechanics’ Pavilion, where Sarah was born only three days earlier, is completely gone. It was made of wood, and there is nothing left to mark its former existence but ash and soot. We walk past piles of still-hot bricks and twisted iron and the skeletal, blackened shells of buildings that were constructed of heartier materials than wood. Automobiles flying the Red Cross flag and with soldiers in the front seat bearing rifles pass us. Chinatown off in the distance to our left is gone. All of it. Swept off the face of San Francisco as if it had never been there.