“Hi! There’s someone at a window around there!”
The small junior dashed excitedly into the group at the front of the burning house, his voice shrill above the noise of the conflagration. A dozen questions met him. The crowd thronged in his wake.
“He’s up there!” shrilled the boy. “Where the ladder is. Look! See him?”
“There’s two of them!” someone shouted. “Help!”
“I’ve got a fellow here to be carried down,” came a voice from the window. “He’s unconscious. Send a fireman, will you? It’s getting thick up here.” The voice sounded faint and hoarse. Those below could now make out two forms at the open casement, one leaning out over the sill and the other lying across it, his head hanging limply. Reassurance came from a dozen throats and several fellows dashed at top speed in search of assistance. Then a boy pushed his way to the foot of the ladder.
“Is that you, Monty?” he called anxiously.
“Yes. Don’t come up, Leon. It’s a job for a fireman.”
“Who is he?”
“Standart,” croaked Monty. “I found him—in the hall.”
“Standart!” echoed Leon wonderingly.
Two firemen brushed past him and began the ascent, while the throng grew. “Easy, Jack! This ladder’s weak from the feelin’. All right, feller! We’ll take him in a sec! Ready, Jack? Here he comes! Got him? Lower away. Good work, kid! How’d you happen to be up here? Easy now, Jack!”
They brought the unconscious form of Alvin Standart cautiously down the ladder. Willing hands accepted the burden as an anxious silence fell over the crowd and bore it away. Then one of the firemen sprang up the ladder again.
“Wait till I give you a hand, lad!” he called to Monty.
“I’m all right, thanks,” was the answer. Monty crawled across the sill, found the ladder with his foot and began the descent. But he came very slowly, pausing between each step, and after watching a moment the fireman, who had paused halfway up, hurried to meet him. “Give me your feet,” he said. “Hold to the rungs with your hands and lower yourself slow. Jack, give us a hand up here. This feller’s all in!”
“I can manage,” said Monty faintly. But the fireman paid no heed to him. Instead, he was plucked bodily in arms and handed from one to the other and finally set on his feet on the turf.
“Thanks, partner,” he said. “The smoke got in my——”
Then his legs crumpled up and he fell into Leon’s arms.
Monty awoke some six hours later amidst strange surroundings. A boy whom he knew only by sight was standing across the room in front of a chiffonier. There was a second bed near by. The pictures on the gray paper were utterly unfamiliar.
Monty, conscious of being very tired and very sore as to throat and lungs, tried to puzzle things out. Before he had succeeded, however, the boy at the chiffonier caught his bewildered look in the mirror and turned.
“Hello!” he greeted. “Awake, Crail?”
“Yes, I—guess so.” Monty’s voice was hoarse and croaky and it hurt him to speak. “Where am I? Whose room is this?”
“Mine and Sawyer’s. I bunked with Sawyer after the fire. How are you feeling?”
But Monty forgot to reply, for the word “fire” had supplied the missing clue to memory. For a minute he was silent, going over the events of early morning. At last: “What time is it?” he asked.
“Ten of nine.”
“Oh! What—where—how’s Standart?”
“He’s over in Manning, in the infirmary. He’s all right, I guess. Swallowed a lot of smoke, I heard, and will be laid up for a few days, but I guess he will back out all right. Lucky you found him, Crail! It was a close squeak for him!”
“Yes.” Monty closed his eyes a moment, opened them again and asked: “Have I had any breakfast?” But there was no answer and he discovered that the boy whose bed he was occupying had meanly taken advantage of his momentary lapse from consciousness to sneak out. Monty reflected that a cup of coffee would be pretty fine, and he considered getting up and finding one. But somehow, while he was making up his mind to the necessary exertion, he fell asleep again.
When he awoke the next time the breakfast was there and a maid was summoning his attention to the fact. It wasn’t a very hearty meal, but it did him a lot of good. Still later the doctor came in and asked him a number of questions and felt his pulse and told him to stay in bed until the next day. He left some tablets which Monty was instructed to dissolve in his mouth and went his way. At various times other persons put their heads in at the door or entered for awhile; Mrs. Fair, and Brill, the owner of the bed, and Joe Mullins and four or five of the Morris House fellows. And finally Leon came and perched himself on the edge of the bed and talked in whispers until Monty begged him to “cut out the bedside manner.”
“What happened, anyway?” demanded Monty. “Did the house burn up entirely?”
“No, they saved about half of it. Your room and the rooms on that side are all right, except that they’re horribly messy and smelly. By the way, we found your suitcase and a lot of things you threw out and they’re downstairs. They say they’re going to pull Morris down entirely and put up a brick dormitory there big enough to hold fifty fellows. They had a wild time finding places to put the crowd. Some of them slept in the gym. Standart’s in the infirmary with his insides scorched and feeling pretty mean, I reckon. I dare say you know that you’re a sort of hero today, Monty.”
“Am I? No, I didn’t know it. I don’t feel heroic,” he added croakingly. “Didn’t do anything heroic, either. I went back up there to get some of my things out and only came across Standart by accident. Guess he’d fiddled around too long and then had a fright when he tried to get out. Or else the smoke was too much for him. Anyway, he wasn’t saying anything when I found him. What are you grinning at?”
“I was just thinking that it was sort of funny,” laughed Leon. “You were going to knock him into a cocked hat, and instead of that you saved his silly life.”
“Couldn’t do anything else, could I?” growled Monty. “Couldn’t leave him there, naturally. Is he bad?”
“N-no, he will be all right in a few days, they say. Has a bit of fever now. Reckon he was scared more than he was hurt. Say, you’re coming in with Seymour and me tomorrow. I saw Rumford about it. Lots of the fellows are doubling up.”
“Well, I don’t know,” said Monty vaguely. “I’m kind of confused. I was going to back-trail, today, wasn’t I?”
“No, you just thought you were,” replied Leon carelessly. “Fate had a different plan, you see.”
“Fate, eh?” Monty considered that. “Well, I don’t know. I suppose I might as well stick it out now, though. My things are all sprinkled around the landscape, I guess. Did the other fellows save anything?”
“Some of them. Ordway told me to tell you he was sorry and that you were to buck up, whatever he meant. They say Manson’s going back on the team, by the way.”
“He is? I wish he wouldn’t.”
“Why?”
“Because—oh, just because. He’s not fit to play. I suppose every one knows about me?”
“Sure! And everyone’s talking about it. Didn’t I tell you you were a hero?”
“Oh, that! I meant about being on probation.”
Leon shook his head slowly. “I don’t think anyone knows it unless you’ve told.”
“Oh, well—” Monty stared thoughtfully at the window. “I suppose a fellow can be on pro. and still survive, eh? Say, I’ve been thinking of something, Leon.”
“Honest? Did the doctor say you might?”
“I’ve been thinking that it would be—well, sort of fun to give the school a new dormitory. I can afford to, you know. Of course, I wouldn’t do it myself. I mean it would be my money, but I’d have Jasper attend to it. I suppose it would look silly if I did it myself.”
“Why would it? I think it would be great, Monty! You could have them call it Crail Hall. Do you really mean it?”
“Crail Hall nothing! It would be Morris, of course. I guess if they got busy they could have it ready for next fall, eh? Sure, I mean it, if they’ll let me.”
“Oh, they’ll let you, all right,” laughed Leon. “I reckon if you put it up to Charley he would fall on your neck. Maybe he’d let you off probation, too!”
“Then I won’t say anything about it,” said Monty, with a scowl. “I don’t want to buy myself off, you silly ass.”
“Well, don’t get mad about it. Say, Mr. Rumford’s going to come over to see you this afternoon. If I were you I’d be nice and polite to him, Monty. He’s not a bad sort——”
“He needn’t,” said Monty grumpily. “Going?”
“Got to. Jimmy and Dud will be around some time. I’ll drop in again after last hour, too. They say you’ve got to stay here until tomorrow. Then you’re coming over to Trow. I’m awfully glad, Monty.”
“It’s decent of you and Granger,” Monty grinned. “I won’t call him a spider again.”
“He wouldn’t mind,” replied Leon. “Besides, he’s caught his fly now.”
“Fly?” questioned Monty.
“You,” laughed Leon from the door. “So long!”
After a meager dinner Monty secured reading matter, propped the pillows behind him and strove to make the best of his incarceration. In the middle of the first story, however, Mr. Rumford was announced. Monty never would tell what transpired at that interview and so it would hardly be fair for me to tell, but the results of it were no secret. When Leon arrived about four Monty triumphantly informed him that he was not on probation, after all, that “Old Whiskers” was “a good Indian,” and no one need say otherwise in his, Monty’s, hearing, and that everything was fine and dandy. “And,” added Monty, “it’s all right about the dormitory. You mustn’t say anything about it to anyone, though, because it’s a secret. It’s to be called Morris Hall and no one is to know that I had anything to do with it. Mr. Rumford is going to talk to Charley about it right away, but he says he is sure the Whatyoucallthems—trustees—will be tickled to death.”
“Did ‘Jimmy’ say that?” asked Leon innocently.
“Well, that was the idea of it. Say, Leon, do you suppose Bonner will let me play Saturday? I’m all right, you know.”
“I don’t see why not. You don’t have to give the signals.”
“What has that got to do with it?”
“Nothing, only if you did no one could hear them,” chuckled Leon. “You talk like a rusty windmill.”
“So would you if all the skin was off your throat. Where are those tablet things? Don’t you think I talk better than I did this morning?”
“No, I don’t,” replied Leon flatly. “And if you take my advice you’ll do less of it.”
“I don’t have to take your advice, though, partner. I didn’t do much talking when Jimmy and Dud were here, anyway. Jimmy did it all. He had a fool story about the fellows finding my underwear all around the shop and keeping it as souvenirs. I wish I could see Mr. Bonner.”
“Why don’t you write him a note?” suggested Leon.
“Guess I will. Find me a piece of paper and a pen, will you? Isn’t there some on the table? Thanks.” Monty propped himself higher and set to work. It took some time to compose the four lines that were finally evolved, and when he folded the sheet and put it in an envelope he heaved a sigh of relief. “There,” he said, “that ought to fetch him. Will you post it for me, Leon? I haven’t a stamp, but there’s some money somewhere if you can find it.”
“I’ll do better than post it,” said Leon. “I’ll hand it to him at supper. Now stop talking and rest up. Better try to sleep about twelve hours tonight, old chap.”
“I’m all right. You won’t forget the note, will you? Manson oughtn’t to play Saturday, you know.”
“But Monty Crail ought?” laughed Leon. “All right. Don’t worry. I’ll see that the precious note gets to Bonner by six o’clock.”
And Leon must have kept his promise, for at a little before seven the coach was talking to Monty across a devastated supper tray.