Page:In times of peril.djvu/303

 make more noise about it than you can help. The people below will be removing what things they can and making a row; still, they might hear us; and it is as well they should think us burned in the house where we were. But you must look sharp, lads, for the fire spreads through these dried-up houses as if they were built of straw."

The sailors labored hard, and they worked their way from house to house; but the flames followed as fast; and at last, almost choked by smoke and dust, Dick said:

"Quick, my men, knock off some tiles and get on the roof, or we shall be burned like rats in a trap. This side, the furthest from the street."

The tiles gave way readily; and each man thrust his head out through the hole he had made for a breath of fresh air. In a minute all were on the roof.

"Crouch down, lads; keep on this side of the roof; people are not likely to be looking out for us this side, they will be too busy moving their furniture. Move on, boys; the fire is spreading now pretty nearly as fast as we can scramble along."

It was already a great fire; down both the lanes at whose junction the house first fired stood the flames had spread rapidly, and leaping across the narrow streets had seized the opposite houses. Already fifty or sixty houses were in a blaze, although it was not five minutes from the beginning of the fire.

"There is a cross lane about ten houses ahead, Dick," Ned said.

"We will stick on the last house as long as we can, Ned, and then slide down by the rope on to that outhouse. They are too busy now with their own affairs to think about us; besides, they suppose we are dead long ago, and the fellows who are at the head of it will have