Barriers Burned Away Part 53

"h.e.l.lo! my young colt. How are you? give us yer hand. But come, don't let's stop to talk about snow in this h.e.l.l of a place with that young filly whinnying up there."

"Right!" cried Dennis. "Let us find a ladder and rope; quick--"

At a paint-shop around the corner a ladder was found that reached to the second story, and some one procured a rope.

"A thousand dollars," cried another familiar voice, "to the man who saves that woman!"

Looking round, Dennis saw the burly form of Mr. Brown, the brewer, his features distorted by agony and fear; then glancing up he discovered in the red glare upon her face that the woman was no other than his daughter. She had come to spend the night with a friend, and, being a sound sleeper, had not escaped with the family.

"Who wants yer thousand dollars?" replied Bill Cronk's gruff voice.

"D'ye s'pose we'd hang out here over the bottomless pit for any such trifle as that? We want to save the gal."

Before Cronk had ended his characteristic speech, Dennis was half-way up the ladder. He entered the second story, only to be driven back by fire and smoke.

"A pole of some kind!" he cried.

The thills of a broken-down buggy supplied this, but the flames had already reached Miss Brown. Being a girl of a good deal of nerve and physical courage, however, she tore off her outer clothing with her own hands. Dennis now pa.s.sed her the rope on the end of the buggy-thill and told her to fasten it to something in the room that would support her weight, and lower herself to the second story. She fastened it, but did not seem to know how to lower herself. Dennis tried the rope, found it would sustain his weight; then, bringing into use an art learned in his college gymnasium, he over-handed rapidly till he stood at Miss Brown's side. Drawing up the rope he fastened her to it and lowered her to the ladder, where Bill Cronk caught her, and in a moment more she was in her father's arms, who at once shielded her from exposure with his overcoat. Dennis followed the rope down, and had hardly got away before the building fell in.

"Is not this Mr. Fleet?" asked Miss Brown.

"Yes."

"How can we ever repay you?"

"By learning to respect honest men, even though they are not rich, Miss Brown."

"Did you know who it was when you saved me?"

"Yes."

"Mr. Fleet, I sincerely ask your pardon."

But before Dennis could reply they were compelled to fly for their lives.

Mr. Brown shouted as he ran, "Call at the house or place of business of Thomas Brown, and the money will be ready."

But Thomas Brown would have found it hard work to rake a thousand dollars out of the ashes of either place the following day. The riches in which he trusted had taken wings.

Cronk and Dennis kept together for a short distance, and the latter saw that his friend had been drinking. Their steps led them near a large liquor-store which a party of men and boys were sacking. One of these, half intoxicated, handed Bill a bottle of whiskey, but as the drover was lifting it to his lips Dennis struck it to the ground. Cronk was in a rage instantly.

"What the ---- did you do that for?" he growled.

"I would do that and more too to save your life. If you get drunk to-night you are a lost man," answered Dennis, earnestly.

"Who's a-goin' ter get drunk, I'd like ter know? You feel yer oats too much to-night. No man or horse can kick over the traces with me;" and he went off in the unreasoning anger of a half-drunken man. But he carried all his generous impulses with him, for a few minutes after, seeing a man lying in a most dangerous position, he ran up and shook him, crying, "I say, stranger, get up, or yer ribs will soon be roasted."

"Lemme 'lone," was the maudlin answer. "I've had drink 'nuff. 'Tain't mornin' yet."

"Hi, there!" cried a warning voice, and Cronk started back just in time to escape a blazing wall that fell across the street. The stupefied man he had sought to arouse was hopelessly buried. Cronk, having got out of danger, stood and scratched his head, his favorite way of a.s.sisting reflection.

"That's just what that young critter Fleet meant. What a cussed ole mule I was to kick up so! Ten chances to one but it will happen to me afore mornin'. Look here, Bill Cronk, you jist p'int out of this fiery furnace. You know yer failin', and there's too long and black a score agin you in t'other world for you to go to-night;" and Bill made a bee line for the west side.

Struggling off to windward through the choked streets for a little distance, Dennis ascended the side stairs of a tall building, in order to get more accurately the bearings of the fire. He now for the first time realized its magnitude, and was appalled. It appeared as if the whole south side must go. At certain points the very heavens seemed on fire. The sparks filled the air like flakes of fiery snow, and great blazing fragments of roofs, and boards from lumber yards, sailed over his head, with the ill-omened glare of meteors. The rush and roar of the wind and flames were like the thunder of Niagara, and to this awful monotone accompaniment was added a Babel of sounds--shrieks, and shouts of human voices, the sharp crash of falling buildings, and ever and anon heavy detonations, as the fire reached explosive material. As he looked down into the white upturned faces in the thronged streets, it seemed to him as if the people might be gathering for the last great day. Above all the uproar, the court-house bell could be heard, with its heavy, solemn clangor, no longer ringing alarm, but the city's knell.

But he saw that if he reached his own little room in time to save anything he must hasten. His course lay near the Art Building, the place so thronged with a.s.sociations to him. An irresistible impulse drew him to it. It was evident that it must soon go, for an immense building to the southwest, on the same block, was burning, and the walls were already swaying.

Suddenly a man rushed past him, and Mr. Ludolph put his pa.s.s key in the side door.

"Mr. Ludolph, it is not safe to enter," said Dennis.

"What are you doing here with your ill-omened face?" retorted his old employer, turning toward him a countenance terrible in its expression.

As we have seen, anything that threatened Mr. Ludolph's interests, even that which most men bow before, as sickness and disaster, only awakened his anger; and his face was black with pa.s.sion and distorted with rage.

The door yielded, and he pa.s.sed in.

"Come back, quick, Mr. Ludolph, or you are lost!" cried Dennis at the door.

"I will get certain papers, though the heavens fall!" yelled back the infuriated man, with an oath.

Dennis heard an awful rushing sound in the air. He drew his hat over his face as he ran, crouching. Hot bricks rained around him, but fortunately he escaped.

When he turned to look, the Art Building was a crushed and blazing ruin. Sweet girlish faces that had smiled upon him from the walls, beautiful cla.s.sical faces that had inspired his artist soul, stern Roman faces, that had made the past seem real, the human faces of G.o.ds and G.o.ddesses that made mythology seem not wholly a myth, and the white marble faces of the statuary, that ever reminded him of Christine, were now all blackened and defaced forever. But not of these he thought, as he shudderingly covered his eyes with his hands to shut out the vision; but of that terrible face that in the darkness had yelled defiance to Heaven.

CHAPTER XLIII

"CHRISTINE, AWAKE! FOR YOUR LIFE!"

Dennis was too much stunned and bewildered to do more than instinctively work his way to the windward as the only point of safety, but the fire was now becoming so broad in its sweep that to do this was difficult.

The awful event he had witnessed seemed partially to paralyze him; for he knew that the oath, hot as the scorching flames, was scarcely uttered before Mr. Ludolph's lips were closed forever. He and his ambitious dream perished in a moment, and he was summoned to the other world to learn what his proud reason scoffed at in this.

For a block or more Dennis was pa.s.sively borne alone by the rushing mob. Suddenly a voice seemed to shout almost in his ear, "The north side is burning!" and he started as from a dream. The thought of Christine flashed upon him, perishing perhaps in the flames. He remembered that now she had no protector, and that he for the moment had forgotten her; though in truth he had never imagined that she could be imperilled by the burning of the north side.

In an agony of fear and anxiety he put forth every effort of which he was capable, and tore through the crowd as if mad. There was no way of getting across the river now save by the La Salle Street tunnel.

Into this dark pa.s.sage he plunged with mult.i.tudes of others. It was indeed as near Pandemonium as any earthly condition could be. Driven forward by the swiftly pursuing flames, hemmed in on every side, a shrieking, frenzied, terror-stricken throng rushed into the black cavern. Every moral grade was represented there. Those who led abandoned lives were plainly recognizable, their guilty consciences finding expression in their livid faces. These jostled the refined and delicate lady, who, in the awful democracy of the hour, brushed against thief and harlot. Little children wailed for their lost parents, and many were trampled underfoot. Parents cried for their children, women shrieked for their husbands, some praying, many cursing with oaths as hot as the flames that crackled near. Mult.i.tudes were in no other costumes than those in which they had sprung from their beds. Altogether it was a strange, incongruous, writhing ma.s.s of humanity, such as the world had never looked upon, pouring into what might seem, in its horrors, the mouth of h.e.l.l.

As Dennis entered the utter darkness, a confused roar smote his ear that might have appalled the stoutest heart, but he was now oblivious to everything save Christine's danger. With set teeth he put his shoulder against the living ma.s.s and pushed with the strongest till he emerged into the glare of the north side. Here, escaping somewhat from the throng, he made his way rapidly to the Ludolph mansion, which to his joy he found was still considerably to the windward of the fire.

But he saw that from the southwest another line of flame was bearing down upon it.

The front door was locked, and the house utterly dark. He rang the bell furiously, but there was no response. He walked around under the window and shouted, but the place remained as dark and silent as a tomb. He pounded on the door, but its ma.s.sive thickness scarcely admitted of a reverberation.

"They must have escaped," he said; "but, merciful heaven! there must be no uncertainty in this case. What shall I do?"

The windows of the lower story were all strongly guarded and hopeless, but one opening on the balcony of Christine's studio seemed practicable if it could be reached. A half-grown elm swayed its graceful branches over the balcony, and Dennis knew the tough and fibrous nature of this tree. In the New England woods of his early home he had learned to climb for nuts like a squirrel, and so with no great difficulty he mounted the trunk and dropped from an overhanging branch to the point he sought. The window was down at the top, but the lower sash was fastened. He could see the catch by the light of the fire. He broke the pane of gla.s.s nearest it, hoping that the crash might awaken Christine, if she were still there. But after the clatter died away there was no sound. He then noisily raised the sash and stepped in.