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[Illustration: "The other animals followed in an instant."]
THE YOUNG FIREMEN OF LAKEVILLE
OR HERBERT DARE'S PLUCK
BY
FRANK V. WEBSTER
Author Of "Only A Farm Boy," "The Newsboy Partners," "The
Young Treasure Hunter," "Bob The Castaway," Etc.
ILLUSTRATED
1909
BOOKS FOR BOYS
By FRANK V. WEBSTER
12mo. Illustrated. Bound in cloth.
ONLY A FARM BOY, Or Dan Hardy's Rise in Life
TOM THE TELEPHONE BOY, Or The Mystery of a Message
THE BOY FROM THE RANCH, Or Roy Bradner's City Experiences
THE YOUNG TREASURE HUNTER, Or Fred Stanley's Trip to Alaska
BOB THE CASTAWAY, Or The Wreck of the Eagle
THE YOUNG FIREMEN OF LAKEVILLE, Or Herbert Dare's Pluck
THE NEWSBOY PARTNERS, Or Who Was Dick Box?
THE BOY PILOT OF THE LAKES, Or Nat Morton's Perils
TWO BOY GOLD MINERS, Or Lost in the Mountains
JACK THE RUNAWAY, Or On the Road with a Circus
CONTENTS
CHAPTER
I A MIDNIGHT ALARM
II IN PERIL
III TALKING IT OVER
IV BERT HAS A PLAN
V BUYING THE ENGINE
VI THE FIRST RUN
VII BERT SAVES A TRAMP
VIII ON THE LAKE
IX A NARROW ESCAPE
X MYSTERIOUS ACTIONS
XI SUSPICIONS AROUSED
XII SAGGER'S FIRE LOSS
XIII SINGING A DIFFERENT TUNE
XIV A DANGEROUS GAME
XV A GENEROUS OFFER
XVI MR. BERGMAN'S PLANS
XVII THE ENGINES ARRIVE
XVIII THE PARADE AND PICNIC
XIX WINNING THE TRUMPET
XX A FALSE ALARM
XXI THE MYSTERIOUS MESSAGE
XXII THE STENOGRAPHER'S SUSPICIONS
XXIII A BRAVE RESCUE
XXIV AN ENCOUNTER WITH MUCHMORE
XXV THE MYSTERY SOLVED--CONCLUSION
CHAPTER I
A MIDNIGHT ALARM
"Fire! Fire! Turn out, everybody! Fire! Fire!"
This cry, coming like a clarion call, at midnight, awoke the
inhabitants of the peaceful little New England village of Lakeville.
"Fire! Fire!"
Heads were thrust out of hastily-raised windows. Men and women looked
up and down the street, and then glanced around to detect the
reddening in the sky that would indicate where the blaze was. Timid
women began sniffing suspiciously, to learn if it was their own homes
which, unsuspectingly, had become ignited.
"Fire! Fire! Stimson's barn is burning! Fire! Fire!"
A man ran down the principal village street, shouting as he ran. At
some doors he paused long enough to pound with his fist, awakening the
dwellers who had not heard his call, for he was Rodney Stickler, the
town constable and watchman, whose duty it was to sound the fire
alarm, and summon the bucket brigade, in the event of a blaze.
"Hurry up!" Constable Stickler shouted, as he ran from house to house,
striking with his fist on the doors of the residences where the
members of the bucket brigade lived. "The barn is 'most gone! Fire!
Fire!"
Men jumped from bed, pulled on shirts, trousers, and shoes or boots,
and thus scantily attired, rushed forth to do battle with the flames.
In a small cottage, near the end of the village street, a lad, hearing
the midnight alarm, got up and hurried to the window. He could make
out the short, stocky form of Constable Stickler rushing about. Then,
off to the left, he could see a dull glow in the sky. There was, also,
the smell of wood burning.
"What is it, Herbert?" asked a woman's voice from another room.
"Fire, mother," replied Herbert Dare. "Mr. Stickler is giving the
alarm."
"Whose place is it? I hope it isn't around here. Oh! fire is a
dreadful thing! Where is it, Herbert?" And Mrs. Dare put on a
dressing-gown and came into her son's room.
"I think he said it was Mr. Stimson's barn, mother. I can see a blaze
over in that direction."
"Mr. Stimson's barn? He has a fine lot of cattle in it. Oh, I hope
they save the poor creatures!"
Herbert, or, as he was usually called by his chums, Bert, grabbed up
his clothes from a chair, and began to sort them in the darkness,
looking for his trousers.
"What are you doing, Herbert?" asked his mother.
"I'm going to dress."
"What for?"
"I'm going to the fire."
"Herbert! Don't go! You might get hurt. Suppose some of the horses
should run away and trample on you? Don't go!"
"I must, mother. They'll need all the help they can get. I must go!"
From the village street once more came the alarm.
"Fire! Fire! Fire!"
Now, however, more voices were shouting it. There was also the rush of
feet, and Bert, peering from the window, saw a crowd of men and boys,
many of them carrying buckets, hastening along. The glare in the sky
had become brighter.
"I'm going to dress and go, mother," said the boy. "I want to aid all
I can. We'd like help if our house was on fire."
"Oh, Herbert! Don't suggest such dreadful things!"
Mrs. Dare left her son's room, and in a few minutes he had dressed
sufficiently to go out.
"Now do be careful, Herbert," called his mother, as he ran downstairs.
"If anything should happen to you, I don't know what I'd do."
"I'll be careful."
Herbert Dare was the only son of a widow, Mrs. Roscoe Dare. Her
husband had died several years previous, leaving her a small income,
barely sufficient to support herself and her son. It may be added here
that Mr. Dare had been a city fireman before his marriage. This,
perhaps, accounted in a measure for the interest Herbert took in all
alarms and conflagrations.
"It certainly looks like a big fire," thought the boy, as he broke
into a run down the street. He soon caught up with the crowd hastening
to the blaze.
"Hello, Bert!" shouted a lad to him. "Going to help put the fire out?"
"If they need me, Vincent. I see you have your bucket."
"Yep," replied Vincent Templer, one of Bert's chums. "It's dad's. He
belongs to the bucket brigade, but he's away from home, and I took
it."
"I wish I had one."
"Oh, I guess they'll have plenty at the barn."
"They'll need 'em, for it looks as if it was pretty well on fire."
The reflection of the blaze was now so bright that objects in the
street could be plainly seen, and faces easily distinguished at a
considerable distance.
"There's Cole Bishop!" said Bert to his chum, pointing to another lad,
who was running along, evidently much out of breath, as he was quite
fat.
"Hello, Cole!" called Bert.
"Hello--Bert! Goin'--to--the--fire?" came from Cole, with a puff
between each word.
"Naw, we're goin' to a Sunday school picnic," replied Vincent, who was
something of a joker.
"Humph! Funny--ain't--you!" remarked Cole.
The boys continued to speed on toward the burning barn, which was one
of the buildings belonging to Anderson Stimson, a farmer, and located
just on the edge of the village. The crowd had increased, and several
score of people were on their way to the conflagration.
"They'll--have--a--hot--time--putting--out--that--fire," spoke Cole,
with labored breath. "They--only--got--buckets."
"That's all they've had in Lakeville since the time it was founded by
Christopher Columbus," remarked Vincent. "It's a good thing we don't
have many fires."
"If I had my force pump I could show--show--'em--how--to--squirt--water,"
said Cole, who had begun the first part of the sentence very
fast, but who had to slow down on the last section. He was almost
completely out of breath.
"Why didn't you bring it along?" asked Bert.
"Huh! How--could--I--when--it's--fast--on--the--cistern?"
That argument was, of course, unanswerable. Cole Bishop was a lad
quite fond of mechanics, and was usually engaged in making some new
kind of machinery. His force pump was his latest effort, and he was
quite proud of it.
"Say! I should think it was burning!" suddenly exclaimed Bert, as he
and his chums turned a corner of the street and came in full view of
the blazing barn. The structure seemed enveloped in flames, great
tongues of fire leaping high in the air, and a black pall of smoke
hovering like an immense cloud above it. "They can't save that!"
"Guess not!" added Vincent. "What good are buckets in a blaze like
that? You can't get near enough to throw the water on."
"Wish--I--had--my--force--pump," panted Cole.
By this time the boys had joined the crowd that was already at the
scene of the fire. The heat could be felt some distance away.
"Come on, everybody with buckets!" cried Constable Stickler, who
sometimes assumed charge of the bucket brigade. "Form a line from the
horse trough to the barn. Pass the full buckets up one side and the
empty ones down the other. Let the boys pass the empty buckets an' the
men the full ones."
"Let's form two lines for full buckets," proposed another man.
"We'll need three," put in a third individual.
"Who's runnin' this here fire, I'd like to know?" inquired the
constable indignantly. "Git to work now."
"Yes, I guess they'd better, or there won't be any barn to save,"
spoke Bert.
The flames were crackling furiously. The crowd was constantly
increasing, and nearly every man had a bucket or pail. Some had
brought their wives' dishpans, as they could not find their pails in
the darkness and confusion.
"Come on, Bert, let's get in line," suggested Vincent.
"Yes--let--me--git--to--a--place--where--I--can--rest," begged Cole.
"Here, I'll help," added John Boll, another of Bert's chums.
"I'd rather pass the full buckets," said Tom Donnell.
"Now then, everybody begin to pass," cried the constable, who had his
men in some kind of shape. There were three lines extending from the
burning barn to the horse trough, some distance away. The trough was
fed by a pipe, running from a spring, and there was plenty of water.
"Dip an' pass," cried the constable, and the word went along the
lines. Men standing near the trough dipped their pails in, handed them
to the person standing next, and so, from hand to hand went the
dripping buckets of water. At last the pail reached the end of the
line, and the man nearest the blaze proceeded to throw on the
quenching fluid.
But here a new difficulty presented itself. The blaze was so hot that
no person could approach close enough to make the water effective. The
whole front of the barn was in flames.
"This ain't going to be no good!" exclaimed one of the men on the end
of a line up which the full buckets traveled. He tried to throw the
water on the flames, but, approaching as close as he dared, he could
not come within ten feet of the fire.
"I should say not," agreed his companion.
"Hey! What's the matter?" called the constable. "Why don't you throw
the water on the flames, instead of on the ground?"
"Let's see you do it," was the angry answer.
"We'll have to go around to the back, and throw the water on there,"
was the advice of a tall, lanky farmer.
"What good'll that do?"
"Wa'al, we can't do no good here."
"That's so," was the general agreement.
The lines began to shift, to get out of the heat of the blaze.
Meanwhile, those at the trough, not understanding what was going on,
continued to pass up the full buckets, but as no one gathered up the
empty ones to pass back, the waiting line of boys had nothing to do.
Several began to leave, to get in a position where they could view the
blaze better.
"Here, where are you boys going?" demanded Constable Stickler, who was
running back and forth, not knowing what to do.
"There isn't anything for us to do," replied Bert. "We can't save that
barn with buckets. We'd better help get some of the machinery and
cattle out."
"That's right," added Vincent, and several men agreed with this.
"You--ought to have my force pump," spluttered Cole Bishop, who had
now recovered his breath.
"Pass up the buckets! Pass the buckets!" was the cry that now came
from the line of men, that had been extended to reach around to the
rear of the barn, where, for the time being, there was no fire. "Pass
the buckets!"
"Yes, pass the buckets!" shouted the constable. "Here, boys, come back
to your places!" For a number of the boys had left, and there were
long gaps in the line.
"Can't something be done to save the barn?" cried Mr. Stimson, who had
been rushing back and forth, mainly engaged in carrying out some
valuable harness from the blazing structure.
"We're tryin' to," replied the constable.
"Are all the cattle out?" asked Bert.
"Cattle? Land, no; I forgot all about them!" exclaimed the farmer. "I
was busy taking my valuable harness out, and saving some of my deeds
and mortgages in the house. I'm afraid that'll go next!"
"The house is in no danger as long as the wind keeps this way," said
Bert, "but the cattle are. How many are in the barn?"
"Five horses and six cows. The cows are in the lower part. They're in
no danger yet, but I guess the horses are done for. I forgot all about
'em!"
At that moment a shrill cry, almost like a human being in agony, rose
above the crackle of the flames.
"Those are the horses!" cried Bert. "Come on! We'll try to save 'em!"