| Throng Just Waits, Looks |
| CHICAGO, Dec. 2 - (AP) - The milling throng had a life of its own - stretching and straining at a leash that was fastened to disaster. |
| As each lifeless form, shrouded in canvas, came on the hands of firemen to the waiting line of ambulances, faces and forms surged forward, then back. |
| Some heads turned aside at the sight of the pitifully small figures. Others faced ahead; blank, unbelieving. Monday as they watched firemen carry the dead from Our Lady of the Angels Catholic grade school. |
| Through the broad door and stairway the tragic procession came - under the arch chiseled with “Our Lady of the Angels.” |
| An old woman held a black kerchief to her thin lips. She crossed herself, her lips moved in prayer. |
| Two men wept openly. They talked to each other in Polish. Hushed, soft Italian voices joined the murmur. |
| Most just looked. A man touched the woman by his side - they turned away without words. |
| And others waited. Those closest to the tragedy, the parents, went to hospitals, then to the morgue in a bitter search for their children. |
| Nuns who taught the children, knew them, loved them, sat silent in the convent. |
| Shades were drawn, but lights still burned in every home. |
| Searchlights still bathe the ruin - but it was over. |
| The new came, but for many the memory of the old was an etching in sorrow that will not yield to the dawn. |
