DAB KINZER AND HAM MORRIS TURN INTO A FIRE-DEPARTMENT.
The Morris farm, as has been said, was a pretty large one; and the same
tendency on the part of its owners which led them to put up so extensive
and barn-like a house, had stimulated them from time to time to make the
most liberal provisions for the storage of their crops. Barns were a
family weakness with them, as furniture had been with the Kinzers. The
first barn they had put up, now the oldest and the farthest from the
house, had been a large one. It was now in a somewhat dilapidated
condition, to be sure, and was bowed a little northerly by the weight of
years that rested on it; but it had still some hope of future usefulness
if it had not been for that tramp and his box of matches.
"There isn't a bit of use in trying to save it!" exclaimed Ham, as they
were whirled in through the wide-open gate. "It's gone!"
"But, Ham," said Mrs. Kinzer, "we can save the other barns perhaps. Look
at the cinders falling on the long stable. If we could keep them off
somehow!"
"We can do it, Ham," exclaimed Dab, very earnestly. "Mother, will you
send me out a broom and a rope, while Ham and I set up the ladder?"
"You're the boy for me," said Ham. "I guess I know what you're up to."
The ladder was one the house-painters had been using, and was a pretty
heavy one; but it was quickly set up against the largest and most
valuable of the barns, and the one, too, which was nearest and most
exposed to the burning building and its flying cinders. The rope was on
hand, and the broom, by the time the ladder was in position.
"Ford," said Dab, "you and Frank help the girls bring water, till the
men from the village get here. There's plenty of pails, but every one of
our hands is away.--Now, Ham, I'm ready."
Up they went, and were quickly astride of the ridge of the roof. It
would have been perilous work for any man to have ventured farther
unassisted; but Dab tied one end of the rope firmly around his waist,
Ham tied himself to the other, and then Dab could slip down the steep
roof, in any direction, without danger of slipping off to the ground
below.
But the broom?
It was as useful as a small fire-engine. The flying cinders of burning
hay or wood, as they alighted upon the sun-dried shingles of the roof,
needed to be swept off as fast as they fell, before they had time to
fulfil their errand of mischief. Here and there they had been at work
for some minutes, and the fresh little blazes they had kindled had so
good a start, that the broom alone would have been insufficient; and
there the rapidly-arriving pails of water came into capital play.
Ford Foster had never shone out to so good an advantage in all his life
before, as he did when he took his station on the upper rounds of that
ladder, and risked his neck to hand water-pails to Ham. It was hard
work, all around, but hardest of all for the two "firemen" on the roof.
Now and then the strength and agility of Ham Morris were put to pretty
severe tests, as Dab danced around under the scorching heat, or slipped
flat upon the sloping roof. It was well for Ham that he was a man of
weight and substance.
There were scores and scores of people streaming up from the village
now, arriving in panting squads, every moment; and Mrs. Kinzer had all
she could do to keep them from "rescuing" every atom of her furniture
out of the house, and piling it up in the road.
"Wait, please," she said to them very calmly.
"If Ham and Dab save the long barn, the fire won't spread any farther.
The old barn won't be any loss to speak of, anyhow."
Fiercely as the dry old barn burned, it used itself up all the quicker
on that account; and it was less than thirty minutes from the time Ham
and Dabney got at work before roof and rafters fell in, and the worst of
the danger was over. The men and boys from the village were eager enough
to do any thing that now remained to be done; but a large share of this
was confined to standing around and watching the "bonfire" burn down to
a harmless heap of badly smelling ashes. As soon, however, as they were
no more wanted on the roof, the two "volunteer firemen" came down; and
Ham Morris's first word on reaching the ground was,--
"Dab, my boy, how you've grown!"
Not a tenth of an inch in mere stature, and yet Ham was entirely correct
about it.
He stared at Dabney for a moment; and then he turned, and stared at
every thing else. There was plenty of light just then, moon or no moon;
and Ham's eyes were very busy for a full minute. He noted rapidly the
improvements in the fences, sheds, barns, the blinds on the house, the
paint, a host of small things that had changed for the better; and then
he simply said, "Come on, Dab," and led the way into the house. Her
mother and sisters had already given Miranda a hurried look at what they
had done, but Ham was not the man to do any thing in haste. Deliberately
and silently he walked from room to room, and from cellar to garret,
hardly seeming to hear the frequent comments of his enthusiastic young
wife. That he did hear all that had been said around him as he went,
however, was at last made manifest, for he said,--
"Dab, I've seen all the other rooms. Where's yours?"
"I'm going to let you and Miranda have my room," said Dab. "I don't
think I shall board here long."
"I don't think you will either," said Ham emphatically. "You're going
away to boarding-school. Miranda, is there any reason why Dab can't have
the south-west room, up stairs, with the bay-window?"
That room had been Samantha's choice, and she looked at Dab
reproachfully; but Miranda replied,--
"No, indeed. Not if you wish him to have it."
"Now, Ham," said Dabney, "I'm not big enough to fit that room. Give me
one nearer my size. That's a little loose for even Sam, and she can't
take any tucks in it."
Samantha's look changed to one of gratitude, and she did not notice the
detested nickname.
"Well, then," said Ham, "we'll see about it. You can sleep in the spare
chamber to-night.--Mother Kinzer, I couldn't say enough about this house
business if I talked all night. It must have cost you a deal of money. I
couldn't have dared to ask it. I guess you must kiss me again."
A curious thing it was that came next,--one that nobody could have
reckoned on. Mrs. Kinzer--good soul--had set her heart on having Ham and
Miranda's house "ready for them" on their return; and now Ham seemed to
be so pleased about it, she actually began to cry. She said, too,--
"I'm so sorry about the barn!"
Ham only laughed, in his quiet way, as he kissed his portly
mother-in-law, and said,--
"Come, come, mother Kinzer, you didn't set it afire. Can't Miranda and I
have some supper? Dab must be hungry, too, after all that
roof-sweeping."
There had been a sharp strain on the nerves of all of them that day and
evening; and they were glad enough to gather around the tea-table, while
all that was now left of the old barn smouldered peaceably away with
half the boys in the village on guard.
Once or twice Ham or Dab went out to see that all was dying out rightly;
but it was plain that all the danger was over, unless a high wind should
come to scatter the cinders.
By this time the whole village had heard of Dab's adventure with the
tramp, and had at once connected the latter with the fire. There were
those, indeed, who expressed a savage wish to connect him with it
bodily; and it was well for him that he had done his running away
promptly, and had hidden himself with care, for men were out after him
in all directions, on foot and on horseback. Who would have dreamed of
so dirty a vagabond "taking to the water"?
"He's a splendid fellow, anyway!"
Odd, was it not? but Annie Foster and Jenny Walters were half a mile
apart when they both said that very thing, just before the clock in the
village church hammered out the news that it was ten, and bedtime. They
were not either of them speaking of the tramp.
It was long after that, however, before the lights were out in all the
rooms of the Morris mansion.