Trial by Fire

Chapter 5

The driver Agnes had hired for Dahlia in San Francisco found her at baggage claim and gave her a hand. He was young and energetic, got her bags off the carousel, and left them with her on the sidewalk when he went to get the car. He had a big friendly smile, and on the way into the city, he told her he was a graduate student at UC Berkeley, and driving was his summer job. He said he had met a writer and two movie stars so far, and asked her where she was from. When she told him Paris, amused by how chatty he was, and how open and agreeable, he said he had a French girlfriend freshman year, but she’d gone back to Paris two years later, and they still wrote to each other. She was from Lyon, he told Dahlia. He was from North Carolina. He was going into his second year of school.

He told Dahlia she should visit the Napa Valley while she was there, saying it was beautiful and looked just like Europe. She enjoyed talking to him and thanked him with a big tip when she got to the hotel. She was staying at The Ritz-Carlton halfway down Nob Hill, at the edge of Chinatown. She had stayed there before and liked it. It was a short walk, although down a steep hill, to Union Square, where all the high-end shops were. She had a beautiful view of the Bay Bridge from the windows of her suite. It was her favorite hotel in San Francisco, and the service was excellent, better than the other hotels she’d tried before.

At the top of Nob Hill was small, elegant Huntington Park; the old Flood Mansion that was the Pacific-Union Club now, the most elite men’s club in the city; the Fairmont and Mark Hopkins hotels; and Grace Cathedral, with its spectacular carved bronze doors. San Francisco was a small city, with a thriving financial district, composed of a cluster of skyscrapers, that were out of step with the rest of the architecture in town. The city boasted a still-busy port, full of cruise ships—it was mostly a tourist town now—and the residential area was full of old Victorian homes, some of which had been turned into apartment buildings, but many of which were still grand homes, where the wealthy population lived. None of the buildings, or very few, were more than six stories high, and there was still a genteel feeling to Pacific Heights, full of family homes, and a few very impressive ones. It was a city that had known great wealth and had had a resurgence with all the young investors in technology who had made big money. Many of them lived south of the city in Palo Alto, where Stanford University was, while others lived in Marin County, some on the island of Belvedere, or in the city proper. And curled around the city was the Bay, with the Golden Gate Bridge at the mouth of it, leading to the Pacific Ocean. Dahlia had heard that there were some lovely beaches nearby but had never been to them, nor had she been to the wine country in Napa Valley, so highly recommended by her young driver. On a spur-of-the-moment whim, she asked the concierge at the front desk how far the Napa Valley was from the city, and if it was worth the trip just for the day.

“Definitely,” he said, agreeing with what the driver had told her. “It’s lovely country, with many excellent wineries you can visit. The vineyards are beautiful to see. You shouldn’t miss it. It’s an hour and a half away, and an easy drive. We can get you a car and driver, if you’d like, or arrange to rent a car for you. It’s directly north of the city, with gorgeous warm weather, and some of our best restaurants. Would you like me to arrange a car for you, Ms. de Beaumont?”

In the spirit of the moment, Dahlia decided to try it. She could always change her mind and drive around the city instead, or go across the Golden Gate Bridge and visit the charming town of Sausalito on the other side. It was all very picturesque, which was why it was so popular with the tourists. The Lambert store in San Francisco was on Post Street, half a block from Union Square, where the department stores were, and it shared the block on Post Street with the most exclusive jewelers in the city, Harry Winston, Graff, and Cartier. And once again, Hermès was their neighbor a few doors away, around the corner, with Christian Dior across the street. The Lambert customers in San Francisco were mostly Asian and European tourists. Their second store was in the Stanford Shopping Center in Palo Alto, where all their high-tech customers lived. The city had been home to people of great wealth since the Gold Rush days. For a small city, the Lambert revenues from the two San Francisco stores were very impressive, and warranted her attention now, more than several other American cities where they had stores.

The concierge promised to rent a car for her and have it ready in the morning, since she told him she’d rather drive herself. She thought it would be relaxing after a week of meetings in New York and Chicago for the last week and a half, and more to come in San Francisco, Los Angeles, and Dallas. The Fourth of July was going to be the only break in her schedule for the rest of the trip, and a day in the Napa Valley appealed to her. She had enjoyed trips to the wine country in France, near Bordeaux, and two people had now told her that Napa was very similar. It sounded like the perfect respite from her busy schedule.

The suite was large and pleasant when the manager took her upstairs, and she liked the view of the colorfully lit Bay Bridge, leading to Oakland, Berkeley, and the East Bay. It was an easy city to find one’s way in. It was all laid out in a very straightforward way.

The management had sent her a bottle of champagne, which she didn’t open, chocolate-dipped strawberries, and a box of chocolates. She was tempted to try one of the Chinese restaurants nearby for dinner, which the concierge had told her were excellent, but she was too lazy to leave her room, after the flight from Chicago, and ordered room service. If she was driving to Napa the next day, she wanted to go to bed early. It had been another long day of meetings and travel. She was about halfway through the trip now, and everything had gone well so far.

She showered and got into bed, and thought about Philippe. She would have liked to tell him about the trip, but he hadn’t called in over a week, and she felt awkward calling him on his family vacation, or even texting him, in case someone saw it, like his son or his wife. She had met his son Julien a few times, but he had introduced her as he would any casual friend, and Julien hadn’t seemed suspicious, but calling him on their family vacation seemed like too much. It was one of the inconveniences of being involved with a married man, which she was well aware of.

She fell asleep as soon as she turned off the light, before she had even watched the movie she had paid for, an old favorite she’d seen before, but the only one she liked on their menu.

—

When she woke up, the sun was streaming into the room, and she felt energetic and refreshed and eager to get on the road and head for Napa, to discover something she hadn’t seen before. She had toast and coffee, dressed in her jeans and sneakers again, took a sweater in case it got chilly, and was at the concierge desk promptly at ten. They had the car ready for her. She hastily signed the rental car forms. They had rented it from a large, well-known international company, so she was sure the insurance was adequate, and didn’t check the box for the additional insurance. She wanted to get going and there were three people behind her, eager for the concierge’s attention. It was a weekend and everyone seemed to have a plan they needed his help with.

“Will you be returning it when you come back at the end of the day, or would you like to keep it for your stay?” the concierge asked her. She thought about it for a minute and couldn’t decide.

“Can I let you know when I get back?” she asked him.

“Of course.” She thought it might be convenient instead of taking cabs. She vaguely remembered that taxis were hard to come by in San Francisco, and a rented car might be a good idea. It was an easy city to drive in, and she had an international driving license for her travels.

The car was waiting for her in the hotel driveway, and as promised, the doorman handed her the keys when she told him her name. It was a small dark blue SUV that suited her purposes perfectly. She didn’t want a big fancy car, and she was looking forward to the drive. She turned the radio on, as she left the hotel. There was a map in the car, but the concierge had already given her a printout of the directions and she used the GPS. She drove west toward Pacific Heights, and then right all the way down to the bay, where she easily got onto the feeder street to the Golden Gate Bridge and headed toward it through the old military preserve, the Presidio. She was on the bridge a few minutes later, and followed the signs and the flow of traffic heading north, driving through Marin County. Eventually, clearly marked signs on the freeway directed her toward Napa. She took the appropriate turnoff, headed right, and drove through farmland, small ranches, and vineyards toward the Napa Valley. And after several miles of green fields, she reached a smaller highway, which ran through the Napa Valley. She had driven past Sonoma on the way, which sounded less interesting to her. She drove straight north, until she began seeing signs to the wineries she was passing, which offered tours and tastings.

She visited two of them, only taking a sip of the wine she was offered, since she was driving, and drove as far north as Rutherford to the Auberge du Soleil, a French hotel the concierge had told her had an excellent restaurant. She parked the car and walked up to the deck off the restaurant, where she had a clear view of the valley. It was every bit as beautiful as the young graduate student had said when he drove her from the airport to the hotel. She sat down to admire the view, and wished that her children were with her, or Philippe, someone she could share it with. It seemed too bad to be alone with such a magnificent view. She asked for a table, and the hostess led her to one with the same view. She had a delicious lunch, sat relaxing with a cup of café filtre, and left the hotel two hours later.

She drove through the Napa Valley for another hour, and then headed back down the valley to return to San Francisco. It had been a perfect day, and they had told her that she would have a front row view from her room of the fireworks on the Fourth, if the fog didn’t roll in. San Francisco was famous for its summer fog and chilly temperatures, particularly in August. But so far, it had been a hot, very relaxing day, without a whisper of fog. The drive back was as easy as the drive to Napa had been.

She was driving through Marin County on the way back, as the fields and ranches gave way to a more suburban landscape, when she noticed dark black streaks in the sky. It looked like someone had painted black brushstrokes on the blue sky and it seemed ominous. It looked like smoke, and had appeared very suddenly. She saw it more clearly from the Golden Gate Bridge. There was obviously a fire somewhere, and the sky was filling with smoke as she drove across the bridge into the city and headed toward the hotel.

She could even smell smoke when she got out of the car at the hotel, and she told the doorman she was keeping it. He said he’d let the concierge know.

“Where is all the smoke coming from?” she asked him.

“A fire started in Napa a couple of hours ago,” he said seriously. “It sounds like a big one. It’s already devastated one of the wineries.” He mentioned the name of a winery she had driven past before lunch. “It’s dry as a bone up there, we haven’t had a decent rain in months.”

“It must have happened so fast. I was there this morning.”

“That’s how these fires happen.” They could smell it distinctly now, as she thanked him and went upstairs to her room.

She turned on the TV in the living room of the suite, and there was live coverage of a raging blaze. It was hard to believe that the fire had gotten so big in only a few hours. The reporter covering it said it had been started by a campfire that was left unattended. A brisk wind had come up and started a brushfire, and it was raging out of control by six o’clock. It was frightening to watch it, and awesome to see the force of nature. Driven by the wind, the fire had jumped from the winery, which was already gutted, to a row of houses that were in immediate danger, and the area had been evacuated. The television cameras showed groups of shocked and crying people a safe distance from the blaze, hugging each other as they watched their homes start to burn, and no one had been able to stop it so far. The commentator added that it was everyone’s hope that the fire wouldn’t grow to proportions of previous fires in the area, which had taken weeks to control, and had devoured millions of acres and thousands of homes.

It was incredible to Dahlia that only a few hours before she had been where the fire now was, and it had looked so perfect and peaceful and now this tragedy had happened. They went on then to show animals fleeing the area—flocks of deer, cows escaped from a dairy, some sheep, two horses that had gotten loose and were rearing on camera, and some cats and dogs yelping and running away from the flames. The whole scene was terrifying.

Dahlia sat mesmerized by the TV until late that night, as the fire leaped over roads and rivers, driven by a strong wind and setting fire to everything in its path. A huge area had been evacuated by then, and firefighters were doing everything they could to stop it, with no success so far. She couldn’t tear herself away and kept watching the TV as the devastation continued.

She stayed awake until three a.m. , and it continued getting worse, advancing relentlessly. A dairy had been burned by then, and two more wineries, houses, churches, schools. The firefighters said they were going to do an airdrop of water and fire-retardant chemicals, but they would have to wait until morning to do it.

Dahlia finally fell asleep in front of the television, and woke at seven in the morning, to the acrid smell of smoke coming in the windows she had left open to get some air in the room.

The news was still live then, and they reported that the fire was not contained, and more firefighters were being called in from other counties. The situation was very serious and still out of control.

She kept one eye on the news, while getting her papers ready for her meetings the next day. It was hard to concentrate, watching what was happening, as the cameras jumped from one reporter to the next covering the fire, reporting one disaster after another. One firefighter had died so far, and a first responder trying to save a ninety-two-year-old woman from a burning building. She had recently suffered a stroke and couldn’t get out of bed on her own, and her family was out when the fire started and engulfed their home. The ninety-two-year-old woman had died too, as well as several others while trying to save their homes or flee them. One man had died trying to save his dog. They had died together with his arms around the husky.

Dahlia turned the TV off while she dressed. She couldn’t stand it anymore. What she had seen so far was so horrible she couldn’t bear it. Her site visit to the store and her meetings the next day seemed so insignificant compared to what was happening in Napa. It was even more real to her and more poignant because she had just been there the day before. The fire continued to rage all day, with heartbreaking coverage on TV. She went for a walk, but the smoke made it hard to breathe and her eyes burned, so she went back to the hotel.

In spite of feeling distracted, Dahlia appeared at the store on time to meet their regional rep on Monday morning, who was talking frantically on her cellphone when Dahlia got there. She explained apologetically that her parents had just been evacuated from an assisted living facility in Sonoma that had burned to the ground. They were uninjured, but understandably distraught.

“Do you want to go up there now?” Dahlia asked her, feeling guilty for meeting her at all. The entire city seemed in distress and a state of emergency had been declared.

“No, it’s okay. My brother and sister are on their way up there. My sister lives in Marin and she’ll get there before I could. The poor things have lived through this twice in the last three years. We can’t go through it again. My other sister lives in New Jersey. We’re going to send them to her. This is the third time for them.” Dahlia felt as though she had landed in the eye of a hurricane, and she felt terrible for all of them.

She tried to pay attention during their store visit, but the regional rep, Mary Thomas, kept getting calls, and Dahlia felt sick as she listened. First she talked to her mother, then her father. She went outside to talk and came back with tears rolling down her cheeks.

“I’m so sorry,” she apologized. Dahlia had made a sketchy list of things the store needed to improve on, which seemed irrelevant now. They didn’t stay long, and spent the entire meeting with the manager talking about the fire.

She let Mary go after that, and she thanked Dahlia, who went back to the hotel, and watched the news for the rest of the day. It was like an addiction she couldn’t stop. There was a whole segment of the news focused on animal rescue—cats, dogs, horses, goats, cows, ferrets, coyotes. Two mountain lions had been at the top of a flaming tree and the rescuers got them to leap to safety into a net, then sedated them in the net so they could take them to a wildcat rescue facility to be treated for burns. Dahlia was crying as she watched. Her site visit to the store had been meaningless and she didn’t care.

They showed a pet rescue center, mostly for cats and dogs, birds, rabbits, hamsters, guinea pigs, and small animals that people were lovingly saving from the fire, some of whom had been badly injured, and whose rescuers had risked injury to themselves to save them. In some cases their owners had died. In other instances, the animals were found in the debris or running down the street, yelping and burned.

Philippe called her at midnight, when it was morning in Paris.

“What in hell is going on?” Philippe asked her. “Are you still in San Francisco? You should get out. Go on to your next stop, or come home.”

“I still have meetings tomorrow. The city is safe, except you can smell the smoke. We’re not in danger here. It’s just so tragic to hear what’s happening. People, animals, homes, it looks like hell on earth.” She had tears in her eyes as she said it. She had been watching tragedies unfold all day, and she couldn’t stop watching into the night.

“Fire is a terrible thing,” Philippe agreed. “I’m worried about you, Dahlia. The smoke is dangerous too.” The air quality had gone from green to orange alert that afternoon.

“I’m fine. I just feel so awful for the victims. I went to Napa on Saturday, before the fires started. It all happened just hours afterward, and it’s happening so fast.”

“I think you should leave,” he said again.

“I’ll fly out tomorrow night. My meetings are all south of San Francisco tomorrow. Far from the fires. My meetings today were a disaster. Nobody could think straight and people were crying.”

“Come home,” he said firmly.

“I really should do L.A. and Dallas, as long as I’m here. How are you?” she asked him. “Everything okay?”

“Perfect. Everything is fine. Julien and I went out on a boat yesterday and were fishing together all day. He was actually pleasant and interesting to talk to. Maybe he’s finally growing up.” His relaxed family vacation on the Riviera was hard to relate to compared to the immediacy of the fires, and how close they were.

“I’m glad,” she said, sounding distracted again. He could tell she really didn’t care about his vacation.

“Let me know where you are and if you’re coming home early. I might be able to fly to Paris for the day.” It was the first time he had ever offered to do that, and she was touched. He sounded worried about her. The French media had made a big deal of the Napa fires. They were a big deal, and she was only an hour or two away from them.

“I will. Thank you for calling.” She got off when Delphine interrupted the call. Charles was in the room with her, and they were on speaker.

“Are you all right? Shouldn’t you leave?”

“I just want to see the store in Stanford tomorrow, while I’m here. I’m not in any danger in the city,” except from the smoke. There was a new store manager in Palo Alto and Dahlia wanted to see how she was doing, and if it was the right fit. They talked for a few minutes and Dahlia assured them she would leave after the meetings and fly to L.A.

After they hung up, she watched another segment about the pet rescues. A San Francisco vet had set up a whole field hospital in Napa, with vets and volunteers, to save the animals who were injured. There was a separate one for animals in nature coming out of the hills, looking for food and water and to escape the fires. But it was the pet rescue hospital which seized Dahlia’s heart. The animals all looked so pathetic, and some were badly burned.

She slept fitfully that night and was up early the next day. The sky was black with smoke, and the smell was much stronger than the day before. The hotel distributed N95 masks to all the guests, and told them not to go out without them, and to stay in the hotel if they could.

Dahlia was less worried because she was driving an hour south to Palo Alto, away from the fires. She was sure the air would be better there.

Mary Thomas joined her at the hotel so they could drive down together. They didn’t speak in the car, and listened to the radio the entire time. The fires were still out of control. The water planes were dumping thousands of gallons of water on the fires, with no effect so far. Mary Thomas told her that her sister had brought their parents to Marin. They were shaken but they were all right. Her brother was flying them to New Jersey that weekend. They had lost all their personal possessions in the assisted living facility fire, but were handling it well. They were just grateful to be alive. Two of the other residents had died.

The visit to the Stanford store went more smoothly than the one the day before. They were doing a good job, and the new manager was excellent. One of their best customers wanted to meet Dahlia and they arranged it, and she came to the store to meet her and was thrilled. They had a new anti-aging product meeting to bring the manager up-to-date about what would be arriving in the coming months, and how to use it.

At least for a few hours, Dahlia put the fires out of her mind. She and Mary left Palo Alto at four. Traffic was heavy and they got back to the hotel at six. Mary Thomas left, and Dahlia thanked her for her help, and went to the concierge desk to ask them to get her a flight out that night. She said she could make a nine o’clock flight, and he shook his head.

“The SFO airport closed an hour ago, and they just closed Oakland and San Jose. The smoke is too heavy to fly safely. The winds are too strong and are blowing the smoke our way.”

Dahlia thought about it for a minute. “How long would it take to drive?”

“At least six hours on I-5, on the inside route the truckers use. Eight or nine straight down 101.” She was tired and it sounded like too long a night. It was easier just to delay a day and fly out when the airport reopened in a day or so.

“I’ll wait it out.”

“That’s what most of the guests have decided. And we’re recommending that people not open their windows. The smoke is really bad. We’re very sorry.” The concierge looked harassed and distracted, and was in a rush.

“It’s all right,” she said, and went up to her room, took off the suit she’d worn, and lay on her bed. She was exhausted. It was stressful being there, knowing what was happening an hour or two away. So much tragedy and heartbreak.

Dahlia called the rep in L.A. and explained to her that she wouldn’t be arriving the next day unless the airports opened. She had her cancel all their meetings for the next day. Dahlia had been planning to take either a late flight that night or an early morning flight the next day and start the meetings at noon.

“I’m not surprised,” Lotte Hershey, the L.A. rep, said. “I’ve been watching the news. It looks terrible up there. We’re probably next. We get fires almost as bad every year now. Our forests are so dry they turn into instant firewood by the end of the summer. It’s happening early this year.”

“We had bad fires in France a few years ago, but nothing like this,” Dahlia said.

“Well, stay in your room, wear a mask if you go out. We’ll reschedule everything as soon as the airports open. I’ll keep an eye on it from here.”

“Thank you,” Dahlia said. She felt drained by the drama, and after she hung up, she remembered it was the Fourth of July, and all festivities had been canceled. She fell asleep without putting her nightgown on, or ordering dinner. She woke up at six a.m. and turned the news back on. The air quality and the smoke were worse, and there was ash falling on the city that looked like a layer of snow on the cars. The airports were still closed. The wind had shifted. The fires were moving north to wreak new destruction on areas that had been unaffected until then. She was clearly not going to L.A. today.

She checked in with Delphine, told her she was staying in San Francisco until the airports opened, and assured her she was fine.

“I can’t believe you’ve gotten stuck there in that inferno. Do they think the airports will be closed for long?”

“I don’t think anyone knows. I can’t imagine it’ll be more than a day, or two at most. If I have to, I’ll get driven to L.A. I just didn’t want to deal with it last night. It’s a long trip by car. I’d rather fly.”

“How was the store in Palo Alto and the new manager?”

“She’s doing a great job. I’m glad I went. So far, until now, the trip has been worthwhile. I just don’t want to miss L.A. and Dallas. I’d rather not have to come back soon. It’s a long way from Paris, a very long flight, and a big time difference, nine hours.”

They talked for a few more minutes. Delphine had talked to Alex. “I’m not going to tell her you’re delayed in San Francisco. She’ll go crazy.”

“I’ll still be home on time,” Dahlia said calmly. “You’re right, better not tell her, she’ll be calling me day and night about the wedding.” And Alex hadn’t called to see how her mother was. She just assumed she was fine.

After Dahlia hung up, they ran another clip on TV about the pet rescue center in Napa, asking for donations of pet supplies and for both trained and untrained volunteers. Vet students, retired vets, or people with any experience with animals. After she watched it, Dahlia had an idea. She had nothing else to do, and at least she could do something useful. She still had the rented car in the hotel garage.

She ordered a healthy breakfast, since she hadn’t eaten the night before, and by eight o’clock, she called the concierge and asked them to have her car sent to the front door. She took her mask with her. She wore her running shoes and jeans and a shirt she could get washed afterward, and bought a T-shirt at the gift shop in case she needed a spare. She got the car keys from the doorman and tipped him. The smoke was thick in the air. She put her mask on and got behind the wheel of the rented car. She had jotted down the address of the rescue center and the phone number. They had shown a map on the TV with the exact location, so she had a good idea of where it was, after her visit to Napa on Saturday, but used the GPS anyway. She followed the same route she had taken to leave the city before, down to the water and across the Golden Gate Bridge. There was very little traffic because of the noxious smoke, and the warnings to stay indoors if possible, and she kept her mask on as she drove. She was on the highway leading north twenty minutes after she left the hotel. She had no idea what she could do to be helpful, but she couldn’t just sit there watching the disaster on TV anymore. She felt compelled to volunteer to help. She kept her foot on the gas. She felt better being proactive, even if all she could do was help some injured dogs. It was better than spending the day in her room at the hotel. It was something at least, as she drove past landmarks that looked faintly familiar to her now. The sky got darker and more ominous as she drove steadily north. She followed the GPS. It took her an hour and fifteen minutes to get to the southern part of Napa County. Someone had posted a handwritten sign on the road. It said simply “Pet Rescue Center. Please Help.” It was what she had come there to do.