Ralph in the Switch Tower/Chapter 24
CHAPTER XXIV
FIRE!
A great red glare covered the whole southern sky as Ralph reached the outer air.
"Mother is right, I guess," he spoke quickly—"it is certainly in the direction of the old factory."
The spur switch to the factory had been completed for some days. Ralph had that afternoon operated the levers opening the Farrington extension for the first time.
The new lessee of the factory, he understood, was going to use oil for fuel under some of the boilers. Among the twenty-odd cars switched off on the spur that afternoon Ralph had noticed as many as ten tank cars.
As Ralph ran on, he was surprised to note the extent of the glare. It spread from a point quite remote from the factory right up to the factory location.
He heard shouts in the distance, and scattered figures were thronging the landscape from all directions.
Ralph passed a short timber reach. A vivid panorama now spread out before him.
A thousand yards ahead was the ravine. This the factory switch spur traversed.
Shooting up from the depths of the ravine for nearly a quarter of a mile were leaping, vivid tongues of flame.
Getting where he could command a view townwards obliquely across the ravine, Ralph realized just what had happened.
Outlined against the black sky there showed the framework of several freight cars. They were simply threads of flame now.
In some way the stationary freights had caught fire. The blaze had communicated to an oil tank. There had been an explosion, scattering the burning oil far and wide.
The cars had been blocked on an incline. Apparently the force of an explosion, or the fire, had dislodged or destroyed the blocking plank. Some of the cars had broken free. Scudding down the ravine, they had lodged cinders and flame in all directions.
Coming to a curve, they had jumped the track. About two hundred feet from the factory they had gone down into a gravel pit, piling on top of each other.
The dry grass and shrubbery were on fire on both sides of the ravine for a full quarter of a mile back towards the town. The house Mrs. Davis had lived in was ablaze from cellar to garret.
Suddenly there was an awful roar. It was fortunate that Ralph was no nearer to the center of the explosion than he was.
The tanks that had crashed down into the gravel pit had formed a seething caldron of fire, and had now exploded.
So powerful was the concussion that Ralph was thrown flat. Getting erect again promptly, he saw a great flare of fire leap a hundred feet in the air.
This bore with it blazing planks, fragments of red-hot iron, and dazzling cinders.
They fell all over the landscape. They particularly enveloped the old factory. This, Ralph noticed, took fire instantly in a dozen different places.
"Hello, Fairbanks!" cried a breathless passerby.
"Slavin?" said Ralph.
"Yes, keep on. There's hose and apparatus up at the factory. That's all there is worth saving, now."
"It will never be saved," pronounced Ralph convincedly, but he joined Slavin on a run forward.
They were compelled to make a wide detour here and there of the ravine windings. Even great trees lining it had caught fire. The smoke was dense, and the burning cinders rained down upon them like hail.
"Hold on," ordered Ralph suddenly, but Slavin, catching sight of men and ladders in the vicinity of the factory, dashed on for the main center of excitement and activity.
Ralph had halted. He stood within about a hundred feet of the old house between Mrs. Davis' former home and the factory.
It was across this stretch, belonging to an old invalid widow, that Farrington had forced his right of way. The roof of the house was ablaze. So was one side of the building. Ralph had been checked by a wailing cry.
"Some one shut in there," he decided. "Even if it is only an animal, I must find out, and try to rescue it."
Ralph ran through the open rear doorway. A hall extended the length of the house. The outside blaze shone brightly into a side room, although it was filled with smoke pouring through a sash half burned away.
An old woman in a wheel chair blocked the doorway of the front room. Apparently this was her only means of getting about. She had tried to escape, the chair had got wedged in the doorway, and she was moaning and crying for help.
"Is that you, David?" she gasped wildly, as her smoke-blurred eyes made out Ralph.
"No, but I am here to help you," answered Ralph in a cheery, encouraging voice. "Don't Worry, ma'am."
Ralph soon extricated the chair. As he ran it and its occupant out into the open air, the front windows blew in from the intense heat, and the flames swept through the house.
Ralph ran the chair to a high point of safety.
"Don't go any further," panted the old woman. "My son David is due home. He will be worried to death. I want to be where I can see and call to him, when he comes."
"Very well," said Ralph, "you are safe here, at least for the present. I will run back and save what I can in the house."
"No, no," demurred the old woman quickly. "There is nothing worth saving. The furniture is old and insured. So is the house. Oh, I am so thankful to you!" she cried fervently.
"That is all right," said Ralph. "I am sorry to see you homeless."
"How did the fire come?" questioned the woman. "From Gasper Farrington's new railroad?"
"Yes," said Ralph, "some oil cars on the switch spur took fire, and exploded."
"Then he is responsible!" cried the woman eagerly. "And his factory is burning up, isn't it? It's a retribution on him, that's what it is," she declared hoarsely. "He ran his tracks over our land without permission. He spoiled our peaceful home. Won't I get damages from him, as well as my insurance money?"
"I think your chances are very good," answered Ralph.
The old woman looked somewhat comforted. She sat mumbling to herself. Ralph wished to hurry over to the factory. He offered to wheel her to a shelter nearer the town, but she insisted she must wait in sight of the house until her son arrived.
Ralph did not like to leave her alone. The grass might catch fire and the flames spread, even to the place where they were now. He stood surveying the fire interestedly, when his companion uttered a sudden scream.
"Oh, my! oh, my!" she wailed, wringing her hands. "How could I forget!"
Ralph pressed closer to her side.
"Is something distressing you?" he asked quickly.
"Oh, yes! yes!" said the woman. "Is the house all on fire? No, there may be time yet. Boy, will you—will you do something for me?"
"Surely, if I can."
"In the house—something I must save."
"What is it? In what part of the house?"
"Not mine. It is a sacred trust. It is something I promised faithfully to look after. Oh, dear! dear! if it should be burned up!"
"Try and be calm, and tell me about it," advised Ralph.
"It is upstairs—in the rear garret room."
Ralph looked up rather hopelessly at the little window fully twenty feet from the ground.
"How do the stairs run?" he asked.
"Only from the front. You can't go that way, though," panted the woman. "It's all ablaze. But there is a ladder."
"Where—quick."
"Behind that old grape trellis."
"How long is it?" asked Ralph.
"It reaches the roof. My son used it in shingling. Take a hatchet or a club with you. The window is nailed down on the inside, very tightly. You will have to smash the window in. Is it too late?"
"Not at all," declared Ralph briskly.
"The roof is all on fire!"
"Never mind that, only be quick and tell me: what is it you want me to get?"
"There's only one thing in the room. An old trunk."
"An old trunk?" repeated Ralph rapidly.
"It's all tied up with rope. Smash it open, too. Inside is a tin case, a small flat tin case. That's what I want. Oh! you will get it, won't you?" pleaded the old woman, in a fever of suspense and excitement.
"I shall certainly try," declared Ralph.
"Don't risk your precious life by any delay, dear, dear boy!" cried the old woman hysterically. "I believe I should die of worry if that box was burned up. I promised so sincerely to take care of it. What would Mrs. Davis say if it was lost!"
"Who?" cried Ralph sharply, with a great start.
"Mrs. Davis."
"The woman who lived next door?"
"Yes, yes. She left it with me, about a month ago. She was afraid to keep it with herself. I promised"
But Ralph was listening no longer. A great conviction filled his mind that at this critical moment, amid fire and peril, a crisis in his life faced him.