THE HERO FRIEND
“Gracious!” cried Randy. “See! See! Flames!”
Both boys ran to the rear of the place. A puff of smoke had entered
the open window of the last door. Then there came a tongue of
flame--fierce, devouring--then more smoke.
Pep uttered a shrill cry--half moan, half sob. His vivid imagination
depicted the splendid playhouse going up in flames. He was trembling
all over as he approached the open sash. He tried to look out, but a
great cloud of dense black smoke drove him back, choked and blinded.
“It’s a real blaze!” shouted Randy. He had stuck his head through a
window farther from the rear. He saw that the garage was all ablaze,
the flames leaping towards the rear wall of the playhouse.
In an instant Randy guessed that oil or gasoline stored in the shed had
become ignited.
“Fire! Fire!” he yelled at the top of his voice, dashing toward the
street. “Follow me,” he called to Pep. “There’s no good staying here.
Send in an alarm!”
Pep paid no heed to the words. By the time Randy had reached the
entrance lobby and was half-way down its length, his comrade had run to
the lever operating the side exit doors. He gave this a turn. Then he
dashed outside.
Pep headed for the rear of the playhouse to see how far the fire had
progressed. Turning the corner of the building a great quantity of
water struck him in the face.
It drove him back and he dodged out of range. In half a second,
however, there came a drenching shower. Then it turned from him again,
and Pep descried the cause of the flood.
Half-way down the vacant space between the garage and the playhouse,
stood a boy. He held in his hand the nozzle of a large hose, connected
with a water plug farther away.
The lad was shielding his eyes with one arm and bending over as smoke
and cinders enveloped him. He staggered back as a sheet of flames
swept over him. Resolutely, even defiantly, however, he maintained his
position.
He would direct the hose at the flaming garage. Then he would sweep
the stream around. This was why its cascade had showered Pep. Then
the boy would shoot the torrent up and down and across the wall of the
playhouse. This was blistered with the heat, and smoking.
Some projecting timbers were ablaze. He extinguished these, turned the
stream back of him and directed it towards the garage. There, however,
the blaze was too fierce--had gained too strong a headway to subdue.
In fact, the lad seemed more anxious to protect the playhouse than the
sheds.
“Oh! will he make it? Why don’t somebody come? Fire! Fire!” screamed
Pep frantically, and then from the rear of the buildings fronting
on the Common their occupants began to pour. Randy must have acted
quickly, Pep realized, for he heard clanging bells in the distance.
Suddenly the boy with the hose staggered as a dense cloud of smoke
enveloped him. Pep saw him fall, the hose dropping from his hand. Pep
ran to where he lay and dragged him out of range of the leaping flames.
He darted at the hose, lifted it and began playing the water on the
rear of the playhouse, now burning in half a dozen places.
“If they’d only hurry!” he gasped. “I can’t stand this!”
Pep was obliged to stand to one side as the end of the garage was now
a mass of flames. The wooden wall of the playhouse would smoulder, then
it would blaze up. All Pep could do was to play the stream of water
against this.
A great uproar rang through the vacant space alongside the garage shed.
Amid shouts and orders the groups crowding from the rear doors of the
surrounding buildings drew back, as a dozen helmeted firemen came
dragging a hose through one of the stores. Pep sprang out of the way as
a great rush of water came shooting from a nozzle. It drenched him from
head to foot and almost carried him off his feet. Then the stream was
steadied and played upon the burning shed.
Pep continued his efforts against the playhouse wall. He felt a thrill
of hope as the dousing extinguished the blazing timbers and they did
not relight. For two seconds the big hose was played across the wall.
This dashed out farther danger to the playhouse and the firemen began
to fight the blaze in the garage shed.
“It’s safe--it won’t burn!” quavered Pep. “And that boy--he did it! You
brave fellow!” he cried, running up to the strange lad.
The latter had by this time gotten to his feet. While he rubbed his
eyes, supporting himself by leaning against the show building, he
swayed to and fro. In his excitement and gratitude Pep put his arms
around him and almost hugged him.
The strange boy gazed at Pep blinkingly. Then rubbing the cinders from
his eyes he took in the scene about him. He uttered a glad cry.
“The theatre’s all right; isn’t it?” he asked. “That’s all I care for.”
“What?” stammered Pep, opening his eyes wide at this manifestation of
interest in the Standard.
“Yes, you see I know the fellows who own it. They’re friends of
mine--that is, I hope they are.”
“Oh, is that so?” observed Pep, wonderingly. “You mean Mr. Strapp.”
“Who’s he? No, I don’t know him. It’s Frank Durham whom I know, and
Professor Barrington. Say, look at the fire, I reckon they’ll save the
storage house yonder; but the garage and shed are gone. They’ve got it
under control now. Heigho! There goes my lodging--my supper, too, if I
don’t see Mr. Ridge, the man who runs the garage.”
“Why, what do you mean?” asked Pep.
“I’ve been working there. It wasn’t much of a job; but you see I was
waiting for Frank Durham--”
The speaker shook himself as if to get the chill out of his limbs. He
pulled off his coat and began wringing out the soaked sleeves.
“Br-r-r!” he shivered, as the coarse cloth grazed a seared and
blistered hand, “that hurts.”
Pep caught hold of the lad’s arm, his face full of sympathy.
“See here,” he said, “you’re hurt and chilled. You’re a hero; do you
know it? You’ve saved Our beautiful playhouse----”
“Who played that hose?” demanded a hoarse voice, and looking up the
boys faced a tall fireman wearing a silver badge of office on his white
rubber coat.
“This boy did,” Pep hastened to reply.
“Yes, sir,” explained the strange lad, “you see the hose is always
attached to wash the mud off the machines. I sort of hang around here
and have been sleeping in the office for two nights. I don’t know how
the fire started; but when I came out some rags soaked with cylinder
oil were ablaze. I did what I could.”
“What you did saved that theatre building,” announced the battalion
chief. “If that frame end there had got blazing--good-bye to the whole
block, maybe. You’d make a good fireman, son.”
“You come with me,” said Pep, grasping the arm of the lad firmly.
“Why, what for?” inquired the boy.
“To get dry clothes--to be made just as comfortable as can be--to give
me and my friends a chance to show you what we think of the fellow who
has saved our beautiful new playhouse!”