Page:Mrs. Spring Fragrance - Far - 1912.djvu/194

 ever and was just as glad to see him as ever; but if work prevented him from calling he was not to worry. She had found a friend who would cheer her loneliness.

Lin John was surprised, but glad to hear such news, and it came to pass that when he beheld Sin Far, her sweet and gentle face, her pretty drooped eyelids and arched eye- brows, he began to think of apple and peach and plum trees showering their dainty blossoms in the country that Heaven loves.

It was about four o'clock in the afternoon. Lin John, working in his laundry, paid little attention to the street uproar and the clang of the engines rushing by. He had no thought of what it meant to him and would have continued at his work undisturbed had not a boy put his head into the door and shouted:

"Lin John, the house in which your sister lives is on fire!"

The tall building was in flames when Lin John reached it. The uprising tongues licked his face as he sprung up the ladder no other man dared ascend.

"I will not go. It is best for me to die," and Mermei resisted her friend with all her puny strength.