Uprising

Jacob follows Yetta upstairs seconds before the fire arrives. Yetta sees Bella and Jane and warns both of them. The fire escapes seem to have somehow vanished, so she directs them to the Greene Street stairs.

She and Jacob try to open the stairs, but they’re locked. She yells to take the other stairs, but Jacob says they can’t. The flames have taken over.

Yetta tells Jacob she doesn’t want to burn. She remembers what Rahel said about the girl who was gone in a flash during the Russian pogrom. They go out the window and stand on the ledge. Jacob confesses he was a scab in the strike, but when he saw Yetta, he wanted to be on her side.

A fire truck comes with a ladder, but the ladder doesn’t reach high enough. Jacob weakly suggests they jump for the ladder or the nets nine stories below. They jump for the ladder, miss, and hope they will safely reach the net.

As Yetta falls, she contemplates how she wishes she had been kinder to Rahel, how Bella was smart to go looking for love, and how she wanted to change the world. Now, she will be gone in a flash. With this realization, the net breaks beneath Yetta and Jacob’s weight.

Jane manages to put out the fire on her skirt. She is proud that she’s conquered the fire on her own. Jane almost wants to tell Bella to stay with her, but convinces herself that once again, she can manage the situation without relying on others.

Jane imagines that Miss Millhouse would say it serves her right for associating with shirtwaist girls. She feels anger and determination. She runs for the elevator, but the elevator is full. She almost tells the operator he has to save her because she’s Jane Wellington, but she stops and realizes her life isn’t worth more than anyone else’s.

Jane seeks comfort in the company of an old woman, musing that she is probably someone’s mother. She contemplates the potential futures she could’ve had, either going back home as the prodigal daughter or going to college and seeing this as the year she “slummed it” (302). She realizes the fire gives her a way to die with her principles intact, a kind of triumph. She recalls the words of the suffragist at the strike: “the tragedy of the worker’s condition threatens us all” (303). She reflects on how true this now feels, how all of them are threatened by this fire. She takes comfort in the idea that they are all dying together.

Bella makes her way to the 10th floor. Blinded by smoke, she imagines she sees her own siblings from Italy. She calls out to them and imagines she is going to her family. Then, she imagines her family members shaking their heads, signaling that she still needs to save the living.

On the 10th floor, she sees the bows of the two girls’ heads hopping around as they jump over flames. The Washington Place elevator springs open, and Mr. Blanck places Harriet in Bella’s arms, believing that she is Jane. They head for the roof.

When they reach the roof, it is on fire. A man climbs to the law building and raises a ladder to save everyone on the roof. He recognizes Bella. It is Charles Livingston.

Bella ensures that Harriet climbs the ladder to the law building. She follows and Charles leads her to safety. Outside the building, Bella says that she always met the girls by Greene Street, so they go there. On the street, they see cops behaving very differently than they did during the strike, patting crying girls’ backs and comforting them.

Bella realizes that Jane and Yetta aren’t coming. She sees sheets hurriedly dropped over mounds of bodies. She sees firemen carrying more sheet-draped mounds from the building. She feels all of New York City is grieving with her.

The novel returns to the present-day scene in Mrs. Livingston’s room. Realizing that Mrs. Livingston is Bella, Harriet weeps, claiming that she saved her life. Mrs. Livingston protests that “Lots of people helped you” (317). Harriet feels conflicted loyalties. She wonders why, out of the many horrible fires in history, people seem to remember The Triangle fire so strongly. Mrs. Livingston says that she thinks The Triangle fire rings in people’s memories because of the strike.

Mrs. Livingston shows Harriet her two sleeping daughters, whom she has named Yetta and Jane.Harriet is moved by Mrs. Livingston’s tribute to her friends whom perished in the fire. Harriet explains that she went to college because Jane urged her to pursue an education, even though her parents objected. She believes that Jane’s words had a stronger effect on her because Jane died in the fire.

They contemplate other positive outcomes of the fire, including safety laws. Mrs. Livingston says that Charles Livingston became a passionate labor lawyer after the fire. Harriet asks Bella if her last name comes from marrying Charles. Mrs. Livingston explains that she married Rocco, who was adopted by the Livingston family after the fire. The Livingstons paid for Rocco’s school, and eventually he became a doctor.

Mrs. Livingston tells Harriet that after Jane’s father died, he willed most of his fortune to the suffrage movement. Harriet questions whether or not he earned his atonement with this donation. Mrs. Livingston scoffs, “I’m not a priest. I’m not a rabbi. Who am I to decide?” (325). Harriet is concerned with the atonement of her own father. She bemoans his acquittal of responsibility for the fire, explaining that he actually profited by collecting insurance money. Furthermore, he continued to lock his employees inside the factory during the workday, and he’s “lucky there wasn’t another fire” (325). Harriet feels torn between the anger she feels toward her father as a businessman and the love she feels toward him as a father, but she recognizes that nothing she does can bring back Yetta and Jane.

As if in response to Harriet’s thought, young Yetta rises from bed in search of her mother. Mrs. Livingston introduces Harriet to Yetta as her friend. Mrs. Livingston gently whispers into Yetta’s hair, “We will not be stupid girls. We will not be powerless girls. We will not be useless girls” (330).