A shell landed only a couple of blocks away. The floor jerked under Sam's feet from the explosion, as if at a small, sharp earthquake. A moment later, he heard the rumble of collapsing masonry. He'd heard that during earthquakes, too, but not during small ones. Blast and rumble were so loud, he marveled at how faint and distant the following screams seemed.
But, where the roar of the cannons had not, those screams reminded him he was a newspaperman. "Jesus Christ, boys!" he burst out. "We're sitting in the middle of the biggest story that's happened in this town since 1849. We're not going to be able to cover it standing around here or hiding under our desks. Leary! Get over to Fort Point. See what the devil the garrison's doing to drive the enemy away. Sec if they're doing anything to drive the enemy away. See if they know who the devil the enemy is. That'd be a good bit of news to put in a story, don't you think?"
"Right, boss!" Edgar Leary pushed past him and out the door.
"Clay!" Sam snapped. "You go to the Cliff House, fast as you can. Whatever you can see of the enemy fleet, note it down."
"I'll do it," Herndon said. Then he hesitated. "What if they've already blown the Cliff House to hell and gone?"
Clemens' exasperated exhalation puffed out his mustache. "In that case, you chowderhead, don't go inside." Herndon nodded quite seriously, as if that hadn't occurred to him. Maybe it hadn't. More explosions were rocking the city now. How could you blame anybody for having a hard time thinking straight?
Clemens sent someone to the harbor, to see if enemy shells were falling there as well as on San Francisco itself, and also to see what, if anything, the Pacific Squadron was doing about the enemy. He scattered reporters through the city. Whatever happened, he-and the Morning Call — would know about it.
One of the last men out the door asked, "Are you going to stay here and put everything together, boss?"
"That's what I have in mind, yes," Sam answered. "Every one of you will know more about some of this business than I do, but I'll end up knowing more about all of this business than any of you."
"Unless a shell comes down on your head," the reporter said with a nervous chuckle.
"Some people who work for this paper, that would hurt the shell more than the head in question." Clemens fixed the reporter with a glare. "Shall I name names?"
"Oh, no, boss," the fellow said hastily, and departed. Not five seconds after he was out the door, another shell made the building shake. The front window broke in a tinkling shower of glass. Somewhere not too far away, a fire-alarm bell was clanging. Sam grimaced at that. How many gas lines was the bombardment breaking? How many fires had started? How bad would they get? How was the fire department supposed to put them out, with ironclads shelling the men as they worked?
"Those are all good questions," Clemens muttered. "I wonder if any good answers will stick to them."
He stationed himself at his desk. Every time a shell smashed down west of the newspaper office, he scowled and chewed on his cigar. What were Alexandra and Orion and Ophelia doing? This was a nasty way to make war, throwing shells around in the hope of smashing up whatever they hit and not worrying much about what that was.
Most of an hour went by. The local telegraph clicker started to chatter. No one was minding it; Clemens had sent everybody out to cover the story. He got up to see
what the message was. It was from Clay Herndon: ROYAL NAVY SHELLING CITY, CLIFF HOUSE WRECKED AND BURNING. AT NEAREST TELEGRAPH OFFICE TO OCEAN. DAMAGE SEVERE ALREADY. OUR GUNS OF LITTLE EFFECT.
That gave Sam something to write. He wrote it and gave it to the typesetters. Other reports began coming in, some by wire, some by messengers the reporters had paid, some by messengers who loudly demanded to be paid. Sam suspected some of those had already been paid once, but he shelled out. They hadn't had to come here, after all.
A picture began to emerge. The enemy ships did seem to be trying to reach the harbor with their guns, or at least with some of them. Most of the shells were falling short, though. "Thanks," Sam muttered sourly as the Morning Call building rattled again. "I never would have noticed that."
The Pacific Squadron was moving out to engage the foe. He suspected the handful of antiquated gunboats would be sorry in short order, but making the effort was their job. He wished Edgar Leary would send him something, but the cub remained silent. Maybe he'd been hit on the way to Fort Point. Maybe the telegraph lines were down. And maybe Colonel Sherman wasn't inclined to let any news out of the fort and into the city. Considering how little the fort's guns were doing to drive away the British ironclads, the last explanation struck Clemens as most likely.
Men with rifles started running down Market. Other men with rifles started running up Market. "Good to see the Volunteers have everything well in hand," Sam muttered. "Chickens act this way after the hatchet comes down, but chickens aren't in the habit of carrying Springfields." Somebody fired one of those rifles. How many of our own shall we kill? Clemens scribbled. How many of them shall we blame on the British?
The telegraph clicker started up again. He hurried over to it. The message was to the point: MARINES LANDING OCEAN BEACH. HERNDON.
Sam was still carrying his notebook and pen. He looked down at the two sentences he'd just written. They were still true. They were, if anything, truer than ever. With three quick, firm strokes, he scratched them out anyhow. "Who's wearing a hogleg?" he shouted, as loud as he could. "The God-damned Englishmen are landing troops!"
"We'll nail the sons of bitches!" a typesetter yelled. He and two of the men who served the presses dashed out the front door, pistols in their hands. Clemens wondered if the British Marines knew what they were getting into. Apart from the Volunteer companies, a lot of men in San Francisco carried guns for self-protection-not least, for protection from other men carrying guns.
He wondered whether the Regular Army garrison up at Fort Point and the Presidio knew the ironclads out in the Pacific had landed Marines. Anyone with a lick of sense would have posted lookouts-with luck, lookouts with telegraph keys-all along the ocean front opposite the built-up part of San Francisco. "Which means the Army likely hasn't done it," he said. Then he shrugged. "If they don't know about 'em, they'll find out pretty damn quick."
He went back to his desk and started writing up some of the reports he was getting. As soon as he finished one, he carried it back to the typesetters, who set about turning it into something someone besides him and them and perhaps Alexandra could read.
By the time he'd finished a couple, a great rattle of small-arms fire had broken out to the west. It rapidly got louder and closer. People might be shooting at the British Marines, but they were shooting back, too, and evidently to better effect.
Smoke started floating in through what had been the front window. Clemens coughed a couple of times, then called, "Boys, if you want to go out in the street, I won't say a word. This is a fine paper, but it's not worth burning up for."
Most of the printers and typesetters did leave the building. As long as some of them stuck, Sam did, too, figuring the men out there would warn him before advancing flames got too close. He covered page after page of paper, wondering all the while if what he wrote would meet a hotter critic than he'd ever been.
Clay Herndon burst into the offices without his jacket, with his cravat all askew, and with blood running down the side of his face. "My God, Sam!" he cried hoarsely. "They're coming this way! Nobody can stop them. They're coming!"