FIRE!
“There it is, down there!” exclaimed Tubby, pointing back toward the
part of the village they had just left.
A red, flickering glare was already illuminating the sky in that part of
the place. Clearly it was the fire. As they gazed, other shouts were
added to the first outcry.
“Come on!” shouted Rob, starting off at top speed in that direction. But
as he set off another idea occurred to him. The firehouse was not far
from Tubby’s house—on the next block, in fact.
“You fellows go ahead!” shouted Rob, turning. He dashed off toward the
firehouse in which the old-fashioned hand pump engine was kept. On top
of the place was a big bell, the rope of which hung down in front of the
building. Rob seized it as he arrived at the place, and started a wild
clamor ringing out.
“That will rouse out the Boy Scouts,” he muttered; “they all know what
to do when they hear the fire bell.”
The boy was right. Hardly had the echoes of the tocsin died out before
from dozens of houses boyish figures came pouring. Boy Scouts every one
of them, and ready for active duty. Little Andy, the Eagles’ bugler,
went tearing past as Rob dropped the bell rope, satisfied that the alarm
had been well-sounded. He was racing on when Rob seized him by the
shoulder.
“Sound the assembly!” he ordered.
Andy, considerably startled at first, quickly recovered himself, and
placed the bugle to his lips. The sibilant call was soon sounding. In
less than five minutes the Boy Scouts had obediently gathered at the
firehouse, and, under Rob’s directions, were falling in to await orders.
Dale Harding was there, too, with the Hawks, and the two patrols eagerly
hung on the next word of command.
Down the street came Boffy Groggs, the janitor of the firehouse. He was
half asleep and was regarding the key he carried in his hand as if he
hardly knew what to do with it. The volunteer firemen of the village had
not yet put in an appearance.
“Putting on their fancy uniforms,” guessed Rob, as Boffy came mooning
along.
“Hey, Boffy, give me that!” shouted Rob, as he saw the key in the sleepy
old man’s hand.
“Fire in your hat?” inquired old Boffy, who was somewhat deaf.
“No, give me that!” snapped Rob. “Quick, there’s no time to lose!”
“I haven’t got on my shoes, and that’s a fact,” grunted Boffy,
comprehendingly. “I’ll go back and put them on.”
He was actually starting back when Rob seized the key from his hand.
“Hey! Hey!” shouted Boffy, indignant at being robbed of his authority,
as he deemed it, “give that back, Rob Blake, you’ve got no right——”
“To be wasting time here,” exclaimed Rob, impatiently, and hastily
opening the firehouse door; “that’s true enough, Boffy—Hullo, Tubby,
where is the fire?”
“It’s—it’s at Paul Perkins’s,” exclaimed the fat boy, who had just come
racing up; “the wagon house—poof—it——”
He stopped, all out of breath, and gasped like a newly-landed fish.
“Out with the engine, boys, and race her down to Paul Perkins’s place!”
ordered Rob, not waiting to hear the rest.
With a shout the Boy Scouts swept into the engine house, and soon were
tailing onto the long ropes by which the engine was dragged.
“Forward! Double quick!” came the next order.
“Here! Here!” shouted Boffy.
“We’re going to the fire. Out of the way, Boffy!” yelled the boys.
“It’s not for hire! Bring it back!” shouted the hard-of-hearing janitor.
“Forward!” roared Rob and Dale Harding in a breath.
Instantly the wheels began to revolve, and the ponderous machine came
trundling out of the shed, and an instant later was being raced down the
street, drawn by strong, young arms. Cheering like soldiers, the Boy
Scouts dashed along. Old Boffy sprang back as the big machine crashed
past him.
“Come back! Come back!” he yelled, as it vanished in the distance.
As Tubby had reported, it was the wagon house which was on fire. As the
Boy Scouts came racing up with the engine, yellow flames were licking
hungrily at its eastern end. A red glow spread all about, and the air
was filled with the sharp, acrid smell of blazing wood.
“Here you, and you, and you,” ordered Rob, singling out three lads,
“take that hose down to the brook. The rest of you tail on to the
hand-brakes.”
In an instant the lads ordered to carry the hose to the creek were off,
and it was not more than five minutes before the pumps began to suck.
Presently, from the clanking apparatus, there began to pour a feeble
stream. It strengthened as the engine got limbered up and soon quite a
force of water was spurting upon the flames. They hissed and set up
clouds of steam as the cold water struck them.
“Hooray!” shouted the boys at the brakes, but their leaders quickly
silenced them.
“Save your wind to work the pumps,” ordered Dale Harding.
“The machine! The machine!” cried a voice, and Paul Perkins, pale and
blackened with soot and flying embers, came dashing in among them. The
lad’s hands were cut and bleeding.
“I tried to drag it out by myself, but I couldn’t,” he explained to Rob.
“Great Scott, I forgot all about that,” exclaimed Rob. “Come on,
fellows, let’s get Paul’s machine out of there. I guess we can save it
yet.”
It looked doubtful, however, if this could be accomplished. The flames
now were leaping savagely up, but as yet they were confined to one end
of the building. The wind, though, was driving them angrily forward,
devouring the old dried timbers with the greed of a ferocious monster.
“Open those doors!” shouted Rob, and the next instant the big wooden bar
had fallen from the portals as Paul unlocked the stout padlock holding
them. As they swung open, the boys could see the machine standing in the
centre of the place, illumined with a red glare. The heat that drove out
was as intense as if they had opened the doors of a bake oven, but they
didn’t flinch. Led by Rob and Dale Harding, they plunged into the fiery
place. The heat seemed as if it would split their skins and singe their
hair, but they paid little attention to it in the excitement of the
moment.
“Lay hold of those runners, boys,” cried Dale, “we’ll drag her out that
way.”
“Good scheme,” panted Rob, bending over and seizing hold. But the
machine was heavy and refused to budge.
“We need a rope,” suggested Merritt.
“No time to get it,” panted Rob; “come on, try again.”
They strained till their muscles cracked, and this time the bulky
contrivance slipped forward a little. Working with might and main, they
had almost succeeded in getting it to a place of safety when there was a
sudden shout from Paul.
“The gasolene. That tank’s full of it.”
“Great Scott, it will blow up!” cried Dale Harding.
As he spoke a cloud of sparks and hissing embers flew about them, driven
from the burning end of the barn by a puff of wind.
“Don’t quit!” urged Rob, as they hesitated; “no Boy Scout ever quits.
We’ve tackled this job; let’s see it through.”
His words put heart into the somewhat scared boys, and once more they
bent their efforts to dragging out the machine. This time they managed
to run it fairly beyond the danger line, and it was as well that they
did so at that moment, for the feeble stream thrown by the hand-engine
had had little effect on the flames, and by now one entire end of the
wagon house had been burned away.
By this time, also, a big crowd had gathered, and as Rob and his
companions, scorched and singed, stood triumphantly by the side of the
machine they had rescued, they could hear angry shouts and the sounds of
an argument coming from the direction of the engine. Elbowing their way
through the throng, many members of which sought to detain and
congratulate them, the lads found that the regular firemen had arrived
and were attempting to wrest the hand-brakes from the Boy Scouts.
The boys were, somewhat naturally, protesting. Just as Rob and his
friends came up, one big, hulking fellow laid hands on little Joe Digby
and was about to hurl him backward out of the crowd.
“You young monkey!” he exclaimed; “you kids had no business to steal our
engine!”
“Good thing they did,” howled the crowd. “If they hadn’t the whole
village might have been burned by the time you fellows got on your
uniforms.”
“You’re all right at a firemen’s picnic, but no good at a fire,” shouted
someone.
“’Ray for the Boy Scouts,” came another cry.
“Shut up!” roared the exasperated firemen, reddening under their shiny
helmets, all glistening with paint and decorations.
“Here, this has got to stop,” said Rob, stepping forward. “Scouts, let
go of the engine. We’ve done our part of the work; now let them get
busy.”
“That’s right, Rob,” came his father’s voice out of the crowd; “while
they were arguing the fire was burning. Work those pumps, boys.”
“’Ray!” yelled the crowd again, as the firemen began to pump
strenuously.
The machine clanked and rattled like a thresher, and a great stream of
water poured forth, but, unfortunately it had no effect upon the blaze.
“The house! The house!” came a sudden cry in a woman’s voice. “Sparks
are falling on the roof. It’ll be on fire in a minute.”
It was Mrs. Perkins. With her hair in curl papers and a wonderful
flannel nightgown on, she stood in the back door of her home and yelled
this warning. At any other time the boys might have felt inclined to
laugh. The situation now was too serious for that, however. As she
spoke, a perfect hail of sparks were being driven upon the shingled
roof. It was dry and old, and was already beginning to smolder.
“Get that ladder,” shouted Merritt, whose sharp eyes had spied one
leaning against an old tree some distance from the house. In an instant
a dozen pairs of Boy Scout hands had carried it to the scene.
“Run her up, boys, and get all the buckets you can,” ordered Rob, as the
ladder was placed in position.
Calling Dale Harding, Merritt and Tubby, the boy sprang up toward the
roof. Behind him, upon the ladder, stood the others. They had guessed
his purpose—to form a bucket line from the pump to the roof. With Hiram
at the pump handle, and plenty of willing volunteers to relieve him when
he tired, buckets and tin pails of water were soon passing rapidly along
the line and being splashed over the roof. As fast as Rob got one
section wetted, he passed on to another, till the whole covering of the
house was drenched, and there was no danger of the place catching.
By this time, the wonderful motor-scooter had, too, been dragged beyond
the reach of the flames, and although the wagon house was speedily
reduced to a heap of glowing embers, the invention, for which Freeman
Hunt and his father had striven so desperately, was safe. As the crowd
saw that the excitement was over, it began to break up and melt away,
till only a few persons were left about the ruins.
Among these lingerers were Stonington Hunt and his worthy son. The elder
of the two seemed to be in a great rage. He gritted his teeth as he
gazed at the Boy Scouts clustering about Paul’s machine, and spoke to
his offspring in a low voice.
“Luck seems to have turned against me of late,” he muttered, savagely;
“another failure. But either I’ll have that machine or no one else
shall, or my name’s not Stonington Hunt.”
“We started the fire at the wrong end of the wagon house, pop,” rejoined
his son, in a low voice, but low as his tones were, his father seemed
seized with alarm.
“Not a word, Freeman,” he muttered hoarsely, looking about him in a
scared sort of way. “Remember we know nothing about the fire. We were in
bed when it started, and raced down here to find out what terrible
calamity threatened our fair village.”
Freeman Hunt nodded comprehendingly.
“All right, pop; mum’s the word,” he breathed, “but we’ll try again.”
“Those brats are not through with me yet by a good sight,” rejoined his
father, vindictively, by way of reply.
“Nor with me,” chimed in Freeman.
Soon after this worthy pair left the place, having been unnoticed by Rob
or any of his chums or scouts. It was Tubby who, poking about the ruins
after his usual inquisitive fashion, made a sudden discovery, a short
time later. He had come across a piece of wood which was unburned,
having been thrown aside by Paul Perkins in his first efforts to quell
the fire.
The boy sniffed this bit of wood curiously and then summoned his
friends.
“Smell that,” he demanded of them in turn.
Each lad took a sniff of the proffered bit of wood and passed it on to
the next in silence.
“Well?” interrogated Tubby, after it passed a dozen hands, “what is it?”
“Kerosene,” was the unanimous answer.
“That’s right,” rejoined Rob; “fellows, it’s up to the Boy Scouts to
find out who set fire to Paul Perkins’s wagon house, and tried to
destroy his machine.”
“Maybe this will help us do it,” suggested Tubby, meditatively. As he
spoke he extended the oil-soaked fragment into the glare of a lantern
hanging from the fire engine. On it they could then see distinctly was
the impress of a man’s thumb.
“I’ve heard of robbers and bad men being detected through just such
imprints,” declared Rob; “may be it will work in this case. They say no
two men’s thumb prints are alike.”
“If that’s so, we’d better start out making a collection,” suggested
Tubby, “and I’ve got an idea that there is one man in this town whose
imprint would be of interest in that connection.”
“Who?” queried a dozen eager Boy Scout voices.
“The man in the moon,” laughed the fat youth, pocketing the fragment of
wood. But it was to be a long time before he had an opportunity to use
it to confirm his suspicions.