Page:Barbour--Peggy in the rain.djvu/246

 "In the kitchen. Cook had some fat on the stove and the fire was too hot, I guess, and it boiled over and the first thing I knew the house was full of smoke. Seems like them engines might get here some time, don't it?"

As though in reply there came the distant clanging of a bell and the shriek of a whistle. Gordon glanced up at the front of the house. On the third floor a window showed a square of light. He walked to the farther side of the street and peered upward again. As he looked an arm reached up and drew down the shade.

"Somebody's up there yet, ain't they?" asked a voice beside him. It belonged to a tall youth with a cigarette hanging from the comer of his mouth.

"Did you see somebody pull the curtain down?" demanded Gordon doubtfully.

"Sure I did! He'll be comin' down on a ladder if he don't get a move on."

Gordon pushed his way through the growing throng and sprang up the steps. Warnings followed him as he met the first choking gust of smoke at the door. Halfway up the first flight of stairs he heard from behind him the clanging