Page:Carolyn Wells - Patty Fairfield.djvu/201



Mr. Harris had expressed himself satisfied with his couch in the music-room, yet as it was hard and narrow, his slumbers were not very profound, and at two o'clock in the morning he awoke from a light doze, and began to sniff in the darkness.

"I believe I smell fire," he said to himself.

He jumped up and ran into the hall, where he found the whole staircase was a charred and smouldering mass ready to break into flame at any moment.

Mr. Harris was a man of quick action, but he paused a moment to consider.

He couldn't go up the stairs, they were ready to give way at a touch. He dared not open the front door, or, indeed, any door that might create a draught which would fan the stairs into a flame.

So he decided he must rouse the sleepers 189