PEGGY A HEROINE.
"It's--it's another aeroplane!" cried the officer, with a shout of
amazement.
"What!"
Peggy sprang to her feet.
"A large red one?"
"Yes. Come here and look. They're just running it under the same shed as
ours--yours, I mean."
The girl aviator sprang toward the door. Through the rain she peered to
where, across the meadow, two dim figures, clad in oilskins, could be seen
shoving a big aeroplane under the same shelter that already protected the
_Golden Butterfly_.
"Well, if this isn't the ultimate!" she gasped.
"I beg your pardon?" asked the young man at her side.
"The ultimate! That's my way of expressing what the boys call 'the limit.'
Why, that's Jess and Jimsy Bancroft, in their new aeroplane--the one Roy
built for them. Well, did you ever! Oh, Jess! Oh, Jimsy!"
Peggy raised her voice and shouted. In response they saw the oil-skinned
figures turn, and through the driving downpour came an answering shout.
Presently, across the dripping meadows, the two figures began advancing.
All this time the lightning was ripping in a manner to make Peggy shield
her eyes occasionally. The thunder, too, was terrific, and the earth
seemed to vibrate to its rolling detonations.
"Well, Peggy!" gasped Jess, her dark eyes peering from under her
waterproof hood, as she and her brother arrived at the threshold of the
farm-house, "what on earth does this mean?"
"Yes, give an account of yourself at once," demanded Jimsy. "Roy had us on
the phone. Asked if you'd flown in our direction. We said no, but we'd
take a flight and look for you. In our enthusiasm, we didn't notice the
storm coming up. But luckily, being young persons of forethought, we had
oilskins in a locker of the machine, and----"
"And here we are," finished Jess, shooting a "killing" glance from under
her hood at the good-looking young man at Peggy's side.
"Aren't you going to ask us in?" demanded Jimsy the next minute. "For
hospitality, I don't think you rate very high. We----"
"Well, you see, we are here ourselves without knowing if we have any right
to be," rejoined Peggy. "But come in and I'll explain. First of all, I
want you to meet Mr. Bradbury of the United States Navy. He came to test
the Prescott aeroplanes. Mr. Bradbury, this is Miss Bancroft, and her
brother----"
"Jimsy," put in that irrepressible youth. "Glad to meet you, sir. Almost
as much at sea here as in mid-Atlantic."
Laughing, they all entered the farm-house kitchen, while Peggy hastily
explained the state of affairs there.
"Well, so long as they don't put in an appearance before we get dry, I'm
sure I don't care," said Jimsy airily. "What a delightful old kitchen. It
might have come out of a picture book."
He and the naval officer were soon deep in conversation, leaving Peggy and
Jess alone.
"My dear Peggy," exclaimed Jess, with a smile that showed all her white
even teeth, "what will you do next? Don't you think it's a
bit--er--er--unconventional for one of the foremost members of Sandy
Beach's younger set to be flying about the country with a good-looking
young naval officer?"
"Nonsense," retorted Peggy sharply, "as the only representative of the
Prescott aeroplanes on the ground, I had to do it. If it hadn't been for
this old storm, I'd have been home long ago."
"So should we. What a coincidence we should have met here. Is
this--this----"
"Lieutenant," prompted Peggy.
"Is this lieutenant going to stay long in Sandy Beach?"
"Dear me, no. He is only on a flying visit--no pun intended. He was to
have taken in the establishment of the Mortlake Aeroplane Company this
afternoon. You know, they are in that red, barn-like place, down the road
from our place, although Roy and I only found it out to-day."
"That was one of the things I wanted to talk to you about, Peggy dear,"
said Jess, sinking into an old-fashioned Andrew Jackson chair by the
hearth. "Dad said at dinner last night that he had heard in New York that
a lot of their stock had been floated on Wall Street, and that that
hateful old Mr. Harding was back of it."
"They are actually selling stock?" asked Peggy, growing a bit pale.
"Yes. They have half-page advertisements in a lot of papers, I believe.
Dad said so. But why do you look so distressed, Peggy?"
"Because they must be very sure of the merits of their machines, if they
are going ahead so confidently."
"Rumor has it that their make of aeroplane is the most up-to-date and
complete yet constructed, but nobody knows the details so far. They have
kept that part of it close."
"They are making a bid for the navy contracts, at any rate," said Peggy
presently, after a pause, during which both girls winked and blinked at
the lightning and stared at the red glow of the fire.
"So you said. But you stole a march on them by kidnapping your lieutenant
in this way."
"You ought to give the weather credit for that," laughed Peggy, "but
seriously, Jess, there is no sentiment in things of this kind. If the
Mortlake machine is a better machine than ours, the Mortlake will be the
type adopted by the government."
"I suppose that's so," agreed Jess, with a wry face. "But I hate to think
of that old Harding creature getting any----"
The door flew open suddenly, and a tall, thin-faced woman in a raincoat,
and holding up an umbrella, stood in the doorway.
"Well, for the land's sake!" she ejaculated, looking fairly dumfounded, as
she comprehended the scene and the young folks enjoying the unrequested
hospitality of her kitchen.
But the words had hardly left her lips, and she was still standing there,
like an image carved from stone, when a fearful light illumined the whole
scene. It was followed almost instantaneously by a clap of thunder so
deafening that the girls involuntarily quailed before it.
A fiery ball darted from the chimney and sped across the room, exploding
in fragments with a terrific noise on the opposite side, just above the
heads of Jimsy and Lieut. Bradbury.
Stunned by the shock, they both collapsed in heaps on the floor, while the
farm woman's shrieks filled the air. At the same instant, a pungent,
sinister odor filled the atmosphere.
"The house is on fire!" shrieked the woman in a frenzied voice.
Smoke rolled down into the room, and the acrid fumes grew sharper.
"The house is on fire, and my baby is up-stairs!"
"Where?" demanded Peggy.
"In the room above this!" groaned the woman, taking a few steps and then
fainting.
"Jess," cried Peggy in a tense voice, "take that bucket and get water from
that pump in the corner and then follow me."
"But the boys!" gasped Jess.
"They are only stunned. I saw Jimsy's arm move just now, and the
lieutenant is breathing."
With these words, she started from the room, darting up a narrow stairway
leading from one end of the kitchen to the upper regions.
"What are you going to do?" shouted Jess, her voice shaky with alarm.
"Save that child if I can," flung back Peggy, plunging bravely up the
smoke-laden stairway.
In the unfamiliar house, and half blinded and choked by smoke and
sulphurous fumes, Peggy had a hard task before her. But she pluckily
plunged forward, feeling her way by the walls, and keeping her head low,
where the smoke was not so thick. As she reached what she deemed was the
top of the staircase, she thought she heard a tiny voice crying out in
alarm.
Following the direction of the sounds, she staggered along a hallway and
then reeled into an open door. The smoke was not so thick in the room, but
its fumes were heavy enough. In a crib in one corner lay a child of about
two years of age. Its rose-leaf of a face was wrinkled up in its efforts
to make its terrified little voice heard.
Peggy darted upon it and hugged it close to her. Then, with renewed
courage, she started to make her way back again. But more smoke than ever
was rolling along the passage, and it was a hard task.
"I must do it--I must," Peggy kept saying to herself, clinging the while
to the terrified child.
But at the head of the staircase the conditions appalled her. The smoke
was thick as a blanket there. Yet plunge through it, Peggy knew she must.
Still holding the child tightly, she bravely entered the dense smother,
stooping as low as she dared.
But before she had taken more than two steps in the obscurity, a dreadful
feeling, as if a hand was at her throat and choking her, overcame the
girl. She tried to call out, but she could not. Her head was reeling, her
eyes blinded. All at once something in her head seemed to snap with a loud
report. Still clutching her little burden tightly, Peggy plunged forward
dizzily--and knew no more.