Part 14 (2/2)

Gringo received his share of training, at first to his intense disgust.

Twice he refused obedience, and the matter being pressed, resorted to the simple expedient of retiring from the scene. Keith dropped everything and pursued. Gringo crawled under things, but was followed even to the dustiest and cob-webbiest farthest corner under the porch; he tried swiftness and dodging, but was trailed in all his doublings and twistings at top speed; he tried running straight away over the sand hills, and at first left his horrible master behind, but the horrible master possessed a horrible persistence. Finally he shut his eyes and squatted, expecting instant annihilation, but instead was haled back to the exact scene of his disobedience, and the command repeated. Nan laughed until the tears came, over the large, warm, red-faced man after the small, obstinate, scared pup, but Keith refused to joke.

”If he finds he can't get away, no matter what happens, I'll never have to do it again,” he panted. ”But if he wins out, even once, it'll be an awful job.”

Gringo tried twice. Then, his faith in his ability to escape completely shattered, he gave up. After that he adored Keith and was always under his feet.

Keith saw nothing of any of the women. Mrs. Sherwood seemed to have dropped from their ken when they left the hotel. Once Keith inquired casually about Mrs. Morrell.

”She's been over twice to see the place,” replied Nan.

”We ought to go over there to call,” proffered Keith vaguely; but there the matter rested.

XIV

One night Keith was awakened by Nan's suddenly sitting up in bed. There came to his struggling consciousness the persistent steady clangour of many deep bells. Slowly recognition filtered into his mind--the fire bells!

He hastily pulled on some clothes and ran down the front stairs, stumbling over Gringo, who uttered an outraged yelp. From the street he could see a red glow in the sky. At top speed he ran down the street in the direction of the Monumental. In the half darkness he could make out other figures running. The deep tones of the bells continued to smite his ear, but now in addition he heard the tinkling and clinking of innumerable smaller bells--those on the machines. He dashed around a corner to encounter a double line of men, running at full speed, hauling on a long rope attached to an engine. Their mouths were open, and they were all yelling. The light engine careened and swayed and b.u.mped. Two men clung to the short steering tongue, trying to guide it.

They were thrown violently from side to side, dragged here and there, tripping, hauling, falling across the tongue, but managing to keep the machine from das.h.i.+ng off at a tangent. Above them, high and precarious, swayed the short stout figure of Bert Taylor. He was in full regalia--leather helmet, heavy leather belt, long-tailed coat, and in his free hand the chased silver speaking trumpet with the red ta.s.sels that usually hung on the wall. He was in his glory, dominating the horde. His keen eye, roving everywhere, seeing everything, saw Keith.

”Catch hold!” he roared through the trumpet.

Keith made a flying grab at a vacant place on the line, caught it, was almost jerked from his feet, recovered himself, and charged on, yelling like the rest.

But now Bert Taylor began to shriek something excitedly. It became evident, from glimpses caught down the side streets, but especially through the many vacant lots, that another engine was paralleling their own course a block away.

”Jump her, boys, jump her!” shrieked Bert Taylor. ”For G.o.d's sake, don't let those Eurekas beat you!”

He danced about on top of the waterbox of the engine, in imminent peril of being jerked from his place, battering his silver trumpet insanely against the brake rods, beseeching, threatening profanely. And profanity at that time was a fine art. Men studied its alliteration, the gorgeousness of its imagery, the blast of its fire. The art has been lost, existing still, in a debased form, only among mule drivers, sailors, and the owners of certain makes of automobiles. The men on the rope responded n.o.bly. The roar of their going over the plank road was like hollow thunder. A man dropped out. Next day it was discovered he had broken his leg in a hole. At tremendous speed they charged through the ring of spectators, and drew up, proud and panting, victors by a hundred feet, to receive the plaudits of the mult.i.tude. A handsome man on a handsome horse rode up.

”Monumentals on the fire! Eurekas on cistern number twenty!” he commanded briefly.

This was Charles Duane, the unpaid fire chief; a likable, efficient man, but too fond of the wrong sort of friends.

Now it became evident to Keith why Bert Taylor had urged them so strongly in the race. The fire was too distant from the water supply to be carried in one length of hose. Therefore, one engine was required to relay to another, pumping the water from the cistern, through the hose, and into the waterbox of the other engine. The other engine pumped it from its own waterbox on to the fire. The latter, of course, was the position of honour.

The Eurekas fell back grumbling, and uttering open threats to wash their rivals. By this they meant that they would pump water into the Monumentals faster than the latter could pump it out, thus overflowing and eternally disgracing them. They dropped their suction hose into the cistern, and one of their number held the end of the main hose over a little trapdoor in the Monumental's box. The crews sprang to the long brake handles on either side, and at once the regular _thud, thud, thud_ of the pumps took up its rhythm. The hose writhed and swelled; the light engines quivered. Bert Taylor and the Eureka foreman, Carter by name, walked back and forth as on their quarterdecks, exhorting their men. Relays, in uniform a.s.sumed on the spot, stood ready at hand.

n.o.body in either crew knew or cared anything whatsoever about the fire.

As the race became closer, the foremen got more excited, begging their crews to increase the stroke, beating their speaking trumpets into shapeless battered relics. An astute observer would now have understood one reason why the jewellery stores carried such a variety of fancy speaking trumpets. They were for presentation by grateful owners after the fire had been extinguished, and it was generally necessary to get a new one for each fire.

Keith, acting under previous instructions, promptly seized a helmet and poleaxe and made his way to the front. The fire had started in one of many flimsy wooden buildings, and had rapidly spread to threaten a whole district. Men from the hook and ladder companies were already at work on some of the hopeless cases. A fireman or two mounted ladders to the eaves, dragging with them a heavy hook on the end of a long pole.

Cutting a small hole with their axes, they hooked on this apparatus and descended. As many firemen and volunteers as could get hold of the pole and the rope attached to it, now began to pull.

”Yo, heave ho!” they cried.

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