A siren met him in the cold night outside. The engines were already there. The firemen were heading for the building.
Spray fell back across the street where Pendleton took the chair. "Beth, please," he said in a low voice. "Change now." He tried to go get the other chair, to be sure, but they wouldn't let him.
He fell into the one he'd picked and began crying softly. The sirens stopped. Before he let the ambulance people look at him, he insisted that the chair be looked after.
No trace of Beth was found and Pendleton couldn't explain what had happened. After they let him go, he had the chair sent to his apartment.
He put it very carefully in the living room by the liquor cabinet and sat down near it to wait.