Deadly Curiosities Read Online Free PDF Page A

actually sounded excited about tracking down what I had seen. “Let’s start with famous theater fires,” he mused, typing the information into the search bar.
    I stroked Baxter’s silky fur and tried to relax, but every time I closed my eyes, I saw flashes of the vision. Although I knew it was only my imagination, the smell of smoke lingered, not the pleasant smell of a campfire, but the acrid smoke of burning fabric, and a faint scent of burning meat. I tried hard not to think about that. My stomach twisted.
    “Anything?” I asked to get my mind off the memories.
    “There’s a pretty long list,” Teag replied, “but if you’re right about the time period, that narrows it down some.”
    “Just because it was snowing doesn’t mean it was in the United States,” I said. “It could have been somewhere else, like London, Toronto –”
    “Chicago,” Teag supplied. “How about Chicago?”
    I opened my eyes, but I couldn’t see past him to the computer screen. “Maybe. They get snow in Chicago. What did you find?”
    “December 30, 1903. The Iroquois Theater caught on fire. Over six hundred people died.”
    I caught my breath. “What else does it say?”
    “There are a lot of articles,” Teag mused, and I saw him clicking on links and scanning down through the information. “The theater had only been open for a few weeks. They did a special holiday performance on December 30, and had a standing room only crowd. It was so full, people were sitting in the aisles.” “Children,” I murmured. “There were children in the aisles,” I said, remembering the vision.
    “Here’s why you thought of a pirate,” Teag said grimly. “The play was called Mr. Bluebeard. It seems to have been a mish-mash of rather forgettable songs and scenery including a castle, and partway through, a spark from one of the spotlights caught the scenery and curtains on fire.”
    “People couldn’t get out,” I said, reliving the horror of what the opera glasses had shown me.
    “Says here that’s because some of the doors were locked to keep out gate-crashers, and other doors were hidden behind curtains,” Teag said, reading down through the articles. “They had even put locked gates at the bottom of the stairs to the upper levels, I guess to keep people from switching to more expensive seats than what they paid for.”
    “They locked them in?”
    Teag nodded. “The theater was supposed to be fire-proof –”
    “Yeah, and the Titanic was supposed to be unsinkable,” I muttered.
    “But apparently, the owners skimped on fire extinguishers, and some of the fire escapes weren’t even finished,” he said. He paused long enough that I looked at him, worried.
    “What?”
    “The fire broke out while the orchestra was playing a waltz,” Teag said quietly. “One of the actors, Eddie Foy, Sr., tried to keep the people from panicking so they could make an orderly exit, but it didn’t work.”
    “Eddie Foy, Sr.” I repeated. “Trinket said her great-grandmother had seen most of the famous actors and actresses of her time. He was one of the names she mentioned. I’d never heard of him before.”
    “He survived,” Teag said. “And everyone hailed him as a hero. They even made a movie about him, and it included the fire.” He drew a deep breath and leaned back in his chair, staring at the screen. “It says here that some of the cast were dressed in holiday costumes,” he added. “And here’s a picture of what the Iroquois Theater looked like before the fire.”
    He scooted the chair aside so I could see. The grand facade of the doomed theater had pillars in front, a Victorian version of a Greek temple, just like I had seen in the vision.
    “Wow,” I said. I took a sip of my soda. My heart was racing. Baxter seemed to sense that I was uneasy, because he gave me a curious look with those little black button eyes and snuggled closer.
    “You’re good, Cassidy,” Teag said, shaking his head. “Sometimes a little too