II - 18 The Story Of A Fire

The  Story  Of  A  Fire

Thirteen years have passed since, but it is all to me as if it had happened
 
yesterday,  --  the  clanging  of  the  fire-bells,  the  hoarse  shouts  of  the
 
firemen, the wild rush and terror of the streets; then the great hush that 
 
fell upon the crowd; the sea of upturned faces(1) with the fire glow upon
 
it; and there, against the background of black smoke that poured from roof
 
and attic, the boy clinging to the narrow ledge so far up that it seemed
 
humanly  impossible  that  help  could  ever  come.
 
But  even  then  it  was  coming.  Up  from  the  street,  while  the  crew  of  the
 
truck-company were labouring with the heavy extension ladder that at its
 
longest stretch was many feet too short, crept four men upon long slender
 
poles with cross- bars, iron-hooked at the end. Standing in one window,
 
they  reached  up  and  thrust  the  hook  through  the  next  one  above,  then
 
mounted  a  storey  higher.  Again  the  crash  of  glass,  and  again  the  dizzy
 
ascent. Straight up the wall they crept, looking like human flies on the
 
ceiling, and clinging as close, never resting, reaching one recess only
 
to  set  out  for  the  next;  nearer  and  nearer  in  the  race  for  life,  until
 
but  a  single  span  separated  the  foremost  from  the  boy.  And  now  the  iron
 
hook fell at his feet, and the fireman stood upon the step with :the rescued
 
lad in his arms, just as the pentup flame burst lurid from the attic window,
 
reaching  with  impotent  fury  for  its  prey(2).  The  next  moment  the)  were
 
safe  upon  the  great  ladder  waiting  to  receive  them  below.
 
Then such a shout went up ! Men fell on each other's necks, and cried and
 
laughed at once. trangers slapped one another on the back with glistening
 
faces,  shook  hands,  and  behaved  generally  like  men  gone  suddenly  mad.
 
Women  wept  in  the  street.  The  driver  of  a  car  stalled  in  the  crowd,  who
 
had  stood  through  it  all  speechless,  clutching  the  reins,  whipped  his
 
horses into a gallop and drove away, yelling like a Comanche(3), to relieve
 
his feelings(4). The boy and his rescuer were carried across the street
 
without  anyone  knowing  how.  Policemen  forgot  their  dignity  and  shouted
 
with the rest. Fire, peril, terror, and loss were alike forgotten in the
 
one  touch  of  nature(5)  that  makes  the  whole  world  kin.

Fireman  John  Binns  was  made  captain  of  his  crew,  and  the  Bennett  medal
 
was  pinned  on  his  coat  on  the  next  parade  day.