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Delicately, but shaking with the effort, Christian Semmler pulled the smooth blade from his flesh The pain threatened to knock hiered to the life net, propped an elbow on it to keep his balance, and spewed a mouthful of blood Then he slashed his coat sleeve with the razor-sharp knife Spitting more blood, he wadded the cloth, stuffed it in his mouth, and bit down hard to staunch the wound

He had to getHe was afraid he would pass out But a second explosion blowing glass froalvanized hi so fast that if Isaac Bell soe to reach the roof ahead of the flames, he and his bride’s only way doas to jump to the life net

The Acrobat’s sudden laughter lanced pain through his face, but he couldn’t help it It was such perfect justice for all Bell had done to him With Bell’s own knife, he slashed the ropes that held the net

White smoke seeped into the secret stairwell The acrid, tarry stink of nitrate gas clawed at Bell’s lungs As he raced by the file, a judas hole cover blew open and hot flah the spy hole like a fiery arrow Bell ducked it and kept cli three steps at once, pursued by s studio The fire was there ahead of hi leaped up an elevator shaft or another stairway, and he prayed that Marion had not left the temporary safety of the rooftop studio in a doomed attempt to descend

At the fifth-floor landing, when he was halfway to the top of the building, the flae far below breached a vault and detonated tons of film stock stored inside The explosion shook the stairs under Bell’s feet A shock wave traveled up the shaft and lofted him off the rubber treads

He tuht of stairs, cla past Irina’s office on the seventh floor, Clyde’s laboratory on the eighth, and Seht he was at the top, gasping for breath and stymied by walls on every side He yanked open a judas door and saw a studio stage in se Cooper-Hewitt light banks Silhouetted against a lurid sky, Marion was stepping through the door in the northern glass wall, cli out on the terrace that overlooked the life net

Bell shouted The as thick, and she could not hear him

Ree where the wall thickened to make room for the pocket He looked for a lever but saw none He flattened his palainst it and tried to slide it, which had no effect Then he sahat looked like an ordinary electric light switch on the floor lided aside

“Marion!”

A second explosion rocked the building

Bell ran the length of the studio stage, dodging wires and ca a fly lift He rolled to his feet and pulled open the door in the glass wall Marion was cli the steps that had been built in hopes of one day convincing an extra to try t

he life net

“Marion!”

“Isaac? Oh my God, it’s you Hurry! All the stairs are blocked The elevators won’t come We have to jump”