Part 14

At the prayer-meeting, Uncle Billy Nicholson was giving in his experience and had just got to that part about: “Sometimes on the mountaintop, and sometimes in the valley, but still, nevertheless--” when, all of a sudden, something happened.

The mandolins stopped with a jerk. Mr. Riley stood tranced at: “And ten is thirty-five.” Mr. Ball was stricken dumb in the celebration of his own great physical powers. The crowd in Oesterle's forgot Columbus, and were as men beholding a ghost. The drowsy congregation sat up rigid, and Mr. Silverstone gave a guilty start. He had been thinking of that very thing!

The next instant, front doors were wrenched open, and the street echoed with the sound of windows being raised. Fathers and sons rushed out on the front porch, followed by little girls, to whom any excuse to stop practising was like a plank to a drowning man.

They had heard aright. Up by the Soldiers' Monument fell the clump of tired feet, and upon the air floated the wild alarm of--.

“FIRE! Pooh-ha! FIRE! Poof! FIRE!”

Mat King, the assistant chief, kicked off his slippers, and swiftly laced up his shoes, grabbed his speaking-trumpet and his helmet, and tore out of the house. If he could only get to the engine-house before Charley Lomax, the chief! But Charley was the lone customer in the barber's char. With the lather on one side of his face, he clapped on his hat and broke for the firebell, four doors below.

“Where's it at?”

“FIRE! Pooh-ha! FIRE! Sm-poohl Fi--(gulp)--FIRE!”

“It's Linc Hoover. Hay, Linc! Where's the fire?”

“FIRE! Pooh-ha! FIRE! ha, ha! FIRE!”

“Hay, Linc! Where's it at? Tell me and I'll run. Hay! Where's it at?”

“FIRE! Swope's be--(gulp) Swope's barn. FIRE!”

“Which Swope? Henry or the old man?”

“FIRE! Pooh! J. K. Swope. Whoo-ha, whooh-ha! Out out on West End Avenue. Poof!”

The news thus being passed, the fresher runners scampered ahead, bawling: “FOY-URRR' FOY-URRR! and Linc, the hero, slowed down, gasping for breath and spitting cotton.

“Whew!” he whistled, gustily, his arms dropping and his whole frame collapsing. “Gee! I'm 'bout tuckered. Sm-pooh! Sm-pooh! Run all th' way f'm--sm-ha, sm-ha!--run all th' way f'm--mouth's all stuck together--p'too! ha! Pooh! Fm West End Avenue and Swo--Swope's. Gee! I'm hot's flitter.”

“Keep y' coat on when you're all of a prespiration, that way. How'd it ketch?”

“Ount know. 'S comin' by there an' I--whoof! I smelt smoke and--Gosh! I'm all out o' breath--an' I looked an' I je-e-est could see a light--wisht I had a drink o' somepin' to rench mum mouth out. Whew! Oh, laws! An' it was Swope's barn and I run in an' opened the door, didn't stop to knock or nung, an' I hollered out: 'Yib barn's afire!' an' he run out in his sockfeet, an' he says: 'My Lord!' he says. 'Linc,' he says, 'run git the ingine an' I putt.” Linc drew in a long, tremulous breath like a man that has looked on sorrow.

“Why 'n't you--”

“Betchy 't was tramps,” interrupted a bystander. “Git in the haymow an' think they got to have their blamed old pipe a-goin'--”

“Cigarettes, more likely,” said another. “More darn devilment comes from cigarettes--”

“Why'n't you--”

“Ount know nung 'bout tramps,” said Linc. “All I seen was the fire. I was a-comin' long a-past there an' I smelt the smoke an' thinks I--What say?”

“Why'n't you telefoam down?”

Linc, the hero, shrunk a foot. “I gosh!” he admitted, “I never thought to.”

“Jist'a' telefoamed, you could 'a' saved yourself all that--”

“Ain't they weltin' the daylights out o' that bell? All foolishness! Now they're ringin' the number--one, two, three, four. Yes, sir, that's up in the West End. You goin'? Come on, then.”

“No, Frank, I can't let you go. You've got your lessons to get. Well, now, mother, make up your mind if you're comin' along. Cora, what on earth are you doing out here in the night air with nothing around you? Now, you mosey right back into that parlor, and don't you make a move off that piano-stool till your hour's up. Do you hear me? No. Frank. I told you once you couldn't go and that ends it. Stop your whining! I can't have you running hither and yon all hours of the night, and we not know where you are. Well, hurry up, then, mother. Take him in with you. Oh, just throw a shawl over your head. Nobody 'll see you, or if they do they won't care.” The apparatus trundles by, the bells on the trucks tolling sadly as the striking gear on the rear axle engages the cam. A hurrying throng scuffles by in the gloom. The tolling grows fainter, the throng thinner.