Fighting the Flames by Robert Michael Ballantyne (read novels website txt) 📖

Instructed by the conductor, the two strangers and the policemen lent their willing aid. Before ten minutes had passed, the tall machine was run up to a burning house, the lower part of which was blazing; while, from the upper windows, frantic cries were heard for help, and sundry figures in dishabille were seen waving their arms. The escape was run up, and one after another the inmates were rescued from their perilous position.

While this scene was enacting Frank was pursuing his way to the Regent Street Fire Station; but news of the fire got there before him. He arrived just in time to don his helmet and take his place on the engine. Away they went, and in ten minutes after the arrival of the fire-escape, they dashed up, almost running into an engine which appeared from an opposite direction.

The fire was blazing brightly by this time, and the whole neighbourhood was in a state of commotion and excitement.

The two engines were got to work with as little delay as possible. A body of police kept the gathering crowd back, and soon volumes of steam began to mingle with the black smoke of the burning building. The superintendent was early on the scene, and he directed Frank and another fireman to try to persuade the people in the adjoining houses to remain quiet, and not throw their furniture over the window; but this, some of them would not consent to do. It was plain that one or two were mad with fear and excitement; and as the ruling passion is strong in death, so it would seem to be by no means weak in the midst of danger from fire; for many of them bent their whole energies to the saving of their goods and chattels--regardless of their lives.

One stout old gentleman, in particular, was seen at a third-floor window, heaving out chairs and stools and books, and small tables, and clocks, and even quantities of crockery, with desperate energy, to the great danger of the onlookers, at whose feet the various articles fell, and were dashed to atoms!

Frank darted up the stairs that led to this man's apartments, and burst in upon him.

"Oh! come along, fireman; help me to save my things," he exclaimed, as he struggled with superhuman efforts to thrust a table through the window, which was too small to permit its passage.

"Stop, sir, are you mad?" cried Frank sternly.

"Help me! help me! Oh! fireman, it will be all burned. Fire! fire! fire!!!"

His voice rose into a fierce yell, as he strove in vain with the table.

"You're quite safe," cried Frank, holding him; "_your_ house ain't alight, and the engines have got it almost under."

But Frank spoke to deaf ears; so he coolly lifted the man in his arms, carried him kicking downstairs, and placed him in charge of a policeman.

Just then, a cry was raised that there were two kegs of gunpowder in one of the shops on the ground floor. The owner of the shop came up in a frantic state, and corroborated this statement.

"It'll blow the house to bits, sir," he said to Mr Braidwood.

"Of course it will," remarked the latter in a quiet voice. "Come here, my man," he added, taking the shopkeeper apart from the crowd, and questioning him closely.

Immediately after, he ordered the engines to play on a particular part of the building.

Just then, Frank came up to the superintendent.

"There's gunpowder in the back-shop somewhere, I'm told, sir; shall I go in for it?"

"No, Willders; you couldn't find it in the smoke. Take the branch, lad, and get up into that window above the door."

Frank sprang to obey. At the same time, Mr Braidwood suddenly seized a horse-cloth, and dashed in through the smoke. In a few seconds, he returned with one of the kegs of powder in his arms. Giving it to one of his men, he darted in again, and speedily re-issued with the second keg of powder, amid the frantic cheering of the crowd. Having done this, he continued to superintend the men until the fire was got under, which was soon accomplished, having been attacked promptly and with great vigour soon after it broke out.

"You needn't wait, Mr Dale," said Braidwood, going up to his foreman. "It's all safe now. I'll keep one engine; but you and your lads get off to your beds as fast as ye can."

Dale obeyed, and a few minutes after, the engine was galloping homewards.

Willie Willders was in the station when it arrived, and so was Fred Auberly, who, having accompanied Willie, had got into such an interesting talk with the sub-engineer in charge, that he forgot time, and was still in animated conversation when the wheels were heard in the distance.

The three were out at the door in an instant.

On came the engine, the horses' feet and the wheels crashing harshly in the silent night. They came round the corner with a sharp swing. Either the driver had become careless, or he was very sleepy that night, for he dashed against an iron post that stood at the corner, and carried off two wheels. The engine went full thirty yards on the two off-wheels, before it came to the ground, which it did at last with a terrific crash, throwing the firemen violently to the ground.

The sub-engineer and Fred and Willie sprang forward in great alarm; but the most of the men leaped up at once, and one or two of them laughed, as if to show that they had got no damage. But one of them lay extended on the pavement. It needed not a second glance to tell that it was Frank Willders.

"Lift him gently, lads," said Dale, who was himself severely bruised.

"Stop," exclaimed Frank in a low voice; "I've got no harm except to my left leg. It's broken, I think. There's no use of lifting me till you get a cab. I'll go straight home, if--" He fainted as he spoke.

"Run for a cab, Willie," said Fred Auberly.

Willie was off in a moment. At the same instant, a messenger was despatched for Dr Offley, and in a short time after that, Frank Willders was lying on his mother's sofa, with his left leg broken below the knee.


CHAPTER TWENTY THREE.


MR JAMES AUBERLY.

With a very stiff cravat, and a dreadfully stiff back, and a painfully stiff aspect, Mr James Auberly sat by the side of a couch and nursed his sick child.

Stiff and starched and stern though he was, Mr Auberly, had a soft point in his nature, and this point had been reached at last, for through all the stiffness and starch there shone on his countenance an expression of deep anxiety as he gazed at Loo's emaciated form.

Mr Auberly performed the duties of a nurse awkwardly enough, not being accustomed to such work, but he did them with care and with an evident effort to please, which made a deep impression on the child's heart.

"Dear papa," she said, after he had given her a drink and arranged her coverings. "I want you to do me a favour." She said this timidly, for she knew from past experience that her father was not fond of granting favours, but since her illness he had been so kind to her that she felt emboldened to make her request.

"I will do it, dear," said the stiff man, bending, morally as well as physically, as he had never bent before--for the prospect of Loo's death had been presented to him by the physicians. "I will do it, dear, if I can, and if the request be reasonable."

"Oh, then, do forgive Fred, and let him be an artist!" cried Loo, eagerly stretching out one of her thin hands.

"Hush, darling," said Mr Auberly, with a look of distress; "you must not excite yourself so. I have forgiven Fred long ago, and he has become an artist in spite of my objections."

"Yes, but let him come home, I mean, and be happy with us again as he used to be, and go to the office with you," said Loo.

Mr Auberly replied somewhat coldly to this that Fred was welcome to return home if he chose, but that his place in the office had been filled up. Besides, it was impossible for him to be both a painter and a man of business, he said, and added that Loo had better not talk about such things, because she did not understand them. All he could say was that he was willing to receive Fred, if Fred was willing to return. He did not say, however, that he was willing to restore Fred to his former position in regard to his fortune, and as Loo knew nothing about her brother having been disinherited, she felt that she must be satisfied with this cold concession.

"Can you not ask some other favour, such as I could grant?" said Mr Auberly, with a smile, which was not nearly so grim as it used to be before "the fire." (The family always talked of the burning of Mr Auberly's house as "the fire," to the utter repudiation of all other fires--the great one of monumental fame included.)

Loo meditated some time before replying.

"Oh, yes," she exclaimed suddenly, "I _have_ another favour to ask. How stupid of me to forget it. I want you very much to go and see a fairy that lives--"

"A fairy, Loo!" said Mr Auberly, while a shade of anxiety crossed his face. "You--you are rather weak just now; I must make you be quiet, and try to sleep, if you talk nonsense, dear."

"It's not nonsense," said Loo, again stretching out the thin hand, which her father grasped, replaced under the coverings, and held there; "it's quite true, papa," she continued energetically! "it _is_ a fairy I want you to go and see--she's a pantomime fairy, and lives somewhere near London Bridge, and she's been very ill, and is so poor that they say she's dying for want of good food."

"Who told you about her, Loo?"

"Willie Willders," she replied, "he has been to see her and her father the clown a good many times."

Mr Auberly, frowned, for the name of Willie Willders did not sound pleasantly in his ears.

"_Do_ go to see her, pray, dear papa," pleaded Loo with much earnestness, "and give her some money. You know that darling mamma said, just before she was taken away," (the poor child persistently refused to use the expression "when she died"), "she wanted you to take me sometimes to see poor people when they were sick, and I've often thought of that since--especially when I have come to the verse in my Bible which tells me to `consider the poor,' and I have often--oh, so very often--longed to go, but you were always so busy, dear papa, that you never had time, you know," (the stiff man winced a little at this) "but you seem to have more time now, papa, and although I'm too weak to go with you, I thought I would ask you to go to see this poor fairy, and tell her I will go to see her some day--if--if God makes me strong again."

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