Chapter Thirty-One
Nibbler on the Scene
With its lights flashing and its siren wailing, the Hollow Oak police cruiser screeched to a halt in front of the museum. Chief Fresco quickly silenced the siren and leaped from the driver’s side of the car.
He stood beside his vehicle, leaning on the open door, gaping up at the building before him. With a trembling hand, he removed the aviator sunglasses from his face, so as to get a better look. His eyes were wide, revealing his astonishment at what faced him.
Chief Fresco was well beyond the limits of the jurisdiction that his badge permitted him, but this did not bother him. He was not here in any official capacity – he had arrived on scene because the children of his town were in danger. Of the greatest concern to him was the news that his daughters were in peril, and he would do anything he could to help bring them home safely.
From the passenger side, Coach jumped out of the car, and he appeared to be equally flabbergasted by what had happened to the museum. His jaw dropped open, and his eyeballs bulged behind the lenses of his spectacles.
Nibbler, the faithful, friendly Labradoodle, had been riding in the front seat, sandwiched between the two men as the police cruiser had barreled along the roads at full speed. He now wiggled his way out of the passenger door, and came to stand beside Coach.
Even Nibbler was visibly taken aback, for his tail remained still, which was a stark contrast to its usual condition of wag-o-matic. He somberly gazed at the deteriorating museum, while his snout sniffed at the air, perhaps in an effort to gain olfactory clues as to the curious happening.
The museum was bucking and shuddering, as if it was being torn apart from the inside out. Pieces of rubble and broken glass were falling to the pavement. Most alarming of all, flame was pouring from the doors and windows of the museum.
Three fire trucks from the city of Portsmouth were already on the scene, and their hoses were directed at the blaze, blasting water onto the structure. The firefighters were hustling and bustling, calling to one another and shouting instructions.
But no matter how effectively they battled the flames, they could not seem to gain an upper hand. As soon as they managed to extinguish some of the fires, new ones would spring up… it was almost as if something was inside the museum, starting fires quicker than they could stop them. As Chief Fresco and Coach beheld this, they could not help but wonder… what was going on in there?
From within the building came sounds that were downright eerie. They almost sounded like enormous, beastly bellows from the mouth of some unfathomable creature. The firefighters, of course, attributed these noises to what they perceived to be splintering wood and collapsing support beams, yielding to the enormous pressures of the deteriorating structure.
Fortunately, it appeared as if the students had been successfully evacuated from the building before it had come undone. There was a huge group of schoolchildren gathered near the charter buses that had delivered them to their field trip’s destination. All things considered, they were behaving remarkably well, for they were collectively stunned by the devastation that had been wrought upon the museum in such a short period of time, not to mention their perilously close escape.
Chief Fresco and Coach ran over to the buses, and Nibbler trotted faithfully at their heels, easily keeping up with them. When they arrived at the herd of students, Chief Fresco desperately searched for his daughters, while Coach called for Neil and Jack.
“Right here, Dad!” Neil shouted. He emerged from the mass of students, with Jack by his side.
“Boys! You’re okay!” Coach exclaimed.
He slapped one hand down on Neil’s shoulder, and grabbed Jack’s collarbone with the other. He then shook them vigorously, as if to confirm to himself that they were, in fact, present and accounted for, and not simply a panic-induced illusion of his frazzled mind. Nibbler greeted the boys with his usual exuberance, which included smiles, slobber, and boatloads of tail wagging.
“Woof!” Nibbler barked, greeting the both of them. “Woof!”
Chief Fresco turned to Neil and Jack. “What about my girls?” he asked. “Did they make it out?”
“We haven’t seen them, and there’s no sign of Jasper, either. They went off after that crazy janitor, and they never came back,” Neil quickly explained. “We don’t know where they are now.”
“Chief!” Ms. Waffler called.
She had emerged from the mass of students, looking exhausted and overwhelmed by the bizarre crisis, and the speed with which it had developed. Nonetheless, Ms. Waffler had done well. Despite her reputation for being eccentric and somewhat addle-minded, the teacher had risen to the challenge. When disaster had struck, she had remained calm and successfully directed the evacuation of the students.
“Have you seen my kids?” Chief Fresco asked.
“I’m sorry,” Ms. Waffler answered. Her perpetual exuberance was gone, and her face was drawn with anxiety. She indicated the clipboard that she held in one hand, where long lists of names were printed. “I did a headcount, and we’re still missing two – Maria and Sara. We’ve let the firefighters know, but they haven’t been able to battle their way inside yet… I’m terribly sorry.”
Chief Fresco’s face grew taut, and his eyes hardened with resolve. Absent of any hesitation or fear, he announced, “I’m going in.”
“You can’t!” Coach argued. “There’s no way past the flames!”
Ignoring the protest, Chief Fresco marched toward the museum, his fists clenched in determination. But as he drew closer to the building, it became clear that Coach was right… there was no way to get inside. The inferno was impenetrable, and the heat that it threw was staggering.
Some firefighters were huddled nearby, awaiting any opportunity they might get to penetrate the blaze, but they had not yet been successful. Even in their protective gear, they could not face down the terrible heat of the roaring fires.
Each time the hoses would gain some advantage, the flames would once more lurch from the windows and doors, forcing them backward. They shielded their helmeted heads with their heavy gloves and the sleeves of their fireproof coats, stumbling away from the heat.
It was like no fire they had ever before seen… like something that had a mind of its own, actively fighting back and attempting to block their passage. Chief Fresco’s light brown police uniform and wide-brimmed hat would do nothing whatsoever to shield him from the inferno.
“This can’t be…” Chief Fresco murmured. “There must be something we can do.”