Page:Baseball Joe on the School Nine.djvu/177

 man to swing himself along above them, though doubtless he would have to pass over a zone of fierce heat.

"All ready! Come on down!" yelled Joe, and the man on the tower lost no time in obeying.

He let go the rope as his feet touched the earth and then with a groan he collapsed. The crowd closed in around him, and two minutes later the tower, with a crash, toppled into the midst of the seething furnace of fire. The rescue had been made none too soon.

"Don't crowd around him so!" shouted Joe, hurrying over to where the man lay.

He pushed his way into the throng, followed by Tom, and the two lads actually forced the men and boys away from the man, who had evidently fainted. Joe whipped off his coat and made a pillow for the sufferer's head.

As he bent over him, the man's face was illuminated by the glare from the burning factory, and our hero started back in astonishment.

"Isaac Benjamin!" he exclaimed, as he recognized the former manager of the Royal Harvester works where Mr. Matson had been employed. Isaac Benjamin, the man who, with Mr. Rufus Holdney, had conspired to ruin Joe's father by getting his patents away from him.