Ethel Morton at Chautauqua Part 11

"Learn how as soon as you can get on pretty well the other way. Throw yourself on your back and push your legs down and as far apart as they will go; then bring them together and forward you'll shoot. Draw them up to the body again, spread out, clap your heels--there you are. It's just like swimming on your face--"

"Except that you're upside down."

"You can help on by putting your arms above your head with the backs of the hands together and then bringing them in a steady sweep down to the sides. You'd better learn this; it's the thing to do when you have the cramp yourself as well as when the other fellow has it."

"Now let us practice on you," suggested Ethel Blue.

"No, you don't," replied Roger emphatically, and seizing his coat he made a run for liberty, escaping through the front door and slamming it after him.

CHAPTER VI

ETHEL BROWN A HEROINE

d.i.c.kY was no longer asleep. Roger's slamming of the front door had roused him and after drowsily rubbing his eyes he had rolled off his cot and stared out of the window to see in what direction Roger was going, for he recognized the footsteps of the brother he admired extravagantly.

Not seeing him from the front window he turned the latch of the door that opened on the upper porch and looked out toward Mayville.

Again there was no Roger and the youngster, still only half awake, wandered about the room hunting for amus.e.m.e.nt. The house was perfectly quiet, for the Ethels, tired after their strenuous afternoon, were lying in the hammocks behind the house, Ethel Blue working on a new basket and Ethel Brown drawing a design that she hoped to develop into a stencil.

d.i.c.ky's cot was in Helen's room and she had acc.u.mulated on her bureau a variety of souvenirs, most of which were pinned to the muslin that framed her dressing gla.s.s. d.i.c.ky climbed on a chair and examined them attentively. Most of them seemed to him quite valueless and he wondered that a person as grown up as Helen should want to keep them.

Wandering into his mother's room his eye was attracted by a shining tray on which stood an alcohol lamp. A box of matches lay beside it ready for instant use if hot water should be needed in the night. d.i.c.ky had not seen the lamp in action many times and never had he had the privilege of lighting it. It seemed an unparalleled opportunity.

Its present situation was not convenient, however. The shelf it was on was far too high. Still, that was easily remedied. Dragging forward a chair he mounted upon it, secured his prize, and then laboriously clambered down, breathing heavily from his exertions. Helen's bureau was not so high and on it he placed his treasure, kneeling in front of it on the chair which was still where he had left it.

Careful scrutiny resolved the apparatus into its parts. On top was a cup. He took it off its tripod and laid it on the tray. The tripod underneath held in its embrace a metal container--the thing out of which the pretty blue flame had shot up when Mother set a match on top. d.i.c.ky separated these two parts and pushed one to one side of the bureau and one to the other.

Where had the matches gone to? There they were, on the floor, and their rescue necessitated a scramble down and up again. They were safety matches and the production of a light from their unresponsive heads was only accomplished by accident after many attempts which strewed the floor with broken bits of wood.

At last, Oh, joy! a flame flashed up and d.i.c.k in ecstasy slipped off the cover of the lamp and dropped the match into the inside. It was a rapturous sight. The light leaped tall and slender, and bent as a breath of air from the window touched it.

d.i.c.ky leaned back in his seat and watched it as from an orchestra stall.

It was the prettiest thing he had ever personally produced and he was proud of his handiwork.

A stronger puff made a fairy dance of flame. Another puff came in from the door and crossed it and together they raced through the door into mother's room and disappeared. But they seemed to have started a small tempest of breezes. One after another dashed in from door and window and played tag and jostled the flickering light. It bent this way and that way and crouched back into its holder and then leaped out just in time to meet a slap from a bold wind that drew heavily across the room and in pa.s.sing, sent the flame, Zip! against Helen's muslin draperies.

In a second they were ablaze, shooting upward toward the ceiling. d.i.c.ky watched the fire, fascinated with its speed and its faint crackle as if it were chuckling with amus.e.m.e.nt at its own pranks.

But fun never lasts very long; d.i.c.ky had found that out before. In a minute pieces of muslin, all turned black now, began to float down on him. The mirror was not so pretty as it had been, even with Helen's silly souvenirs on it; indeed it had a queer look now as if it was cross at what was going on. In fact, it cracked on one side with a noise like a cat spitting with rage.

d.i.c.ky found himself too warm now that one of the muslin curtains from the window had blown over and caught a piece of the flame on its corner. It was nice to watch, but it was rather hot in this room and he was tired of it anyway. He thought he would go down stairs and see if the Ethels were at home.

But when he turned toward the entry door it was closed and another prank of the wind had shut the door into Mother's room. He could not get out anywhere except on to the roof of the porch and that had no stairs. The room roared in his ears and a bit of the hot black stuff fell on his hand. He rushed on to the porch and screamed a strong, piercing shriek that sent all the blood in her body into Ethel Brown's heart when it reached the back of the house and her ears.

With a leap she left the hammock and her drawing behind her and dashed into the house.

"d.i.c.ky! d.i.c.ky!" she called frantically as she plunged upstairs. "d.i.c.ky!

d.i.c.ky!"

Into Mrs. Morton's room she ran and then pushed open the door into Helen's. A rush of smoke and flame filled her mouth and made her eyes smart.

"d.i.c.ky!" she screamed. "d.i.c.ky! Where are you?"

Chiming with the crackle of the fire she heard sobbing.

"d.i.c.ky!" she cried again. "Ethel's coming. Call me again."

She dropped to the floor where the smoke seemed lighter and under it she saw a gleam of blue--d.i.c.ky's rompers--on the porch. Creeping on her hands and knees she reached through the door and seized him by the abundant fulness of his garments. He yelled remonstrance as she tried to draw him back into the smoke-filled room.

"It's all right," she choked. "Shut your eyes and hold your nose. Don't be afraid; Sister's got you," and with talk and wheedling she pulled him through the porch door and across the floor to the entry door. As she opened it the fresh draught caused a new outburst of flame. She managed to shut it in. She and d.i.c.ky were safe on the outside.

"Run down stairs quick," she ordered d.i.c.ky; "run to James Hanc.o.c.k's and tell him the house is on fire."

As she spoke a whimpering caught her ear. It came from Ethel Blue who was crouching on the stairs.

"The house is on fire, don't you hear it?" shrieked Ethel Brown. "What's the matter? Can't you help? Run and call 'Fire.' Run, I say."

Ethel Blue, stirred to life, disappeared, and Ethel Brown seized one of the hand fire extinguishers which are in every Chautauqua cottage, and attempted to open the door into Helen's room again. A scorching blast drove her back and she gave up the attempt. Thrusting her head out of the window she screamed "Fire," and at the same time saw d.i.c.ky running safely toward the Hanc.o.c.ks'. Even in her terror she noticed that in pulling him out of the burning room she had torn his ample bloomers. A hanging rag streamed from them as he ran.

A new thought struck Ethel and she flung herself on the banisters and slid to the foot. When she looked from the window she had seen the red gleam of a fire alarm box on a tree almost in front of the house. She rushed to it and beat on the gla.s.s with her fists.

Almost immediately the wild shriek of a siren tore the air. Footsteps came running from all sides. She had been glad that it happened that no one was at home, but she was equally glad when she saw Mary running from the direction of the Pier. Margaret Hanc.o.c.k called to her that d.i.c.ky was safe. Ethel waved her understanding, and seizing the hand of Ethel Blue who appeared from somewhere and clung timidly to her skirt she ran back into the house to get the silver from the dining-room.

"Take this and this and this," she whispered breathlessly, piling d.i.c.ky's mug and a handful of forks and another of spoons into Ethel Blue's upheld skirt. "Here's the b.u.t.ter dish. It's lucky we left the tea set at home. Now then, take those to the Hanc.o.c.ks' and I'll go upstairs and see if I can save any of our clothes."

"Oh, Ethel, I ought to go with you," whimpered Ethel Blue.

"Run, I tell you," commanded Ethel Brown who found herself growing cooler every minute.

People were coming into the house now and rushing about with chairs in their hands, uncertain where to set them down. A woman from the boarding house next door began to carry out the china and lay it on the gra.s.s, and Mary tossed pans out of the kitchen window and piled the wash tubs full of groceries for the men to move.

From the lake front rose shouting and along the road came one of the chemical engines hauled by the bellboys of the hotel. Another rolled down the steep hill from the Post Office, these men struggling as hard to hold it back as those from the hotel were pulling. Down the same hill came the water hose, and yet other chemicals from the business block, the Book Store, wherever they were kept ready for emergencies. For a few minutes every man was a fire chief and every volunteer shouted commands which he himself was the first to disobey.

But order developed in an amazingly short time. The boarding house between the Mortons and the Hanc.o.c.ks caught fire in spite of the efforts of a bucket brigade which tried to wet down the roof. Consternation reigned when a shout drew the attention of the firemen to the flaming of the sun-dried shingles in one corner and almost at the same moment to the flash of a curtain fired by a ma.s.s of cinders whirled from the Mortons' cottage right through an open window.

It was a shout of apprehension, for if this large building went it would be increasingly difficult to save the houses closely crowded beyond. At this critical instant the honk of an automobile horn drew the crowd's attention. The unusual will do that even in times of stress and automobiles are not allowed inside the a.s.sembly grounds.

"It's Mayville! It's the Mayville hose," cried some one, and a hoa.r.s.e cry of satisfaction went through the onlookers. Just in the nick of time they came, two hose wagons usually drawn by man power but now attached to the automobiles of two public-spirited citizens who heard the telephone summons and offered their cars which happened to be standing at the sidewalk.

The salvage crew was working hard in both houses now, and the Hanc.o.c.ks thought it best to remove some of their goods and chattels in case the flames spread beyond the boarding house. The helpers were increased by the audience from the organ recital in the Amphitheatre who left the program unfinished at the first note of the siren. An unceasing procession marched from the burning and the threatened cottages to Miller Park bearing china and gla.s.s and furniture. Some one threw Grandmother Emerson's trunk out of the window. It proved not to be locked and its contents spurted all over the walk before the house.

Ethel Brown saw it and stuffed clothes and books back into it and called to two men to take it away. Some excited person in the boarding house began to toss bureau drawers down from the top of the front porch. Most of them broke when they struck the ground but the people below gathered up the collars and cravats and underwear and ran with them to the Park.

A young girl who was found wandering about the lower floor carefully carrying half an apple pie which she had rescued from the pantry was led in the same direction.

Mrs. Emerson, rushing across the green from her embroidery lesson on the veranda of the Arcade, met Margaret Hanc.o.c.k tugging d.i.c.ky along in the direction of the lawn. He was sobbing wildly and his grandmother took him in her arms and sat down on a chair amid the piles of furniture to comfort him. From the direction of the Hall of Philosophy where they had been awaiting the coming of the Reading Hour came Mrs. Morton and Mr.

Emerson, breaking into a run as they approached near enough to see that the fire was in the direction of their cottage. As they rushed across Miller Park they almost stumbled over Ethel Blue, curled up miserably on top of the old stump that is said to have supported many eloquent orators in the olden days.