Contact by contact Joe shoved over his electrical switch until he was using full power in the motors, and the big wings were flapping and fanning the air, carrying him up to the hotel roof.

The fire in the middle of the building was fiercer now, and the flames, having crept up two more stories, were almost as high as the roof itself. On two sides there was a wall of smoke, through which it would be difficult to pass. On the other, tips of flame occasionally shot up, leaving but one side over which the rope could be passed so there might be a chance for life.

“One chance out of four,” mused Joe, as he looked up at the roof, “and that chance may go any second. It’s a slim outlook.”

The rope was paying out freely, and he realized that he had capable helpers on the ground below.

Though the youth was steering his craft some distance away from the hotel, intending to come closer as he got beyond the fire zone, he could feel the heat of the flames as they belched out of the windows. It was a fierce conflagration.

Higher and higher he went, until finally he was ready to sail in and land on the roof, being well above the burning hotel. The imperilled ones saw him, and raised their hands in mute appeal. Joe could see them shouting to him, but the crackle of the flames was so great he could not distinguish the words.

“There’s the woman,” he murmured, as he saw a huddled female form lying on the roof. “She isn’t burned. Only fainted, I guess. But how will they get her down the rope, unless one of the men carries her? And that’ll be no easy work.”

But Joe had too many things to think of just then to allow himself to dwell on that detail. That could be taken up when it was reached. Squarely over the middle of the roof the lad guided his wings of steel. He saw the open scuttle by which the men and the woman had reached their positions. The roof had not burned through in any place yet, but it was smoking over in one corner, and it was only a question of a few minutes before it would break into flames.

Joe glided down in the Bat and, as the men on the roof rushed toward him, he quickly got out of the frame.

“Can you save us?” one young fellow asked frantically.

“I’m going to make a big try!” cried Joe. “Is that woman dead?”

“No, only fainted,” some one answered.

“Lower her down first!” cried a big man, whose clothing was scorched, showing how narrow had been his escape from the flames. “I see you brought up a rope,” he added. “Lower the woman first!”

“That’s what!” came the general cry. “The woman first!”

“We can’t lower her!” said Joe.

“Why not?”

“Because flames are shooting out of the windows on all four sides of the hotel below us. We might pick out a spot where for the moment there would be no fire, but it might burst out any second and burn the rope through. It can’t be done. If I had a steel rope it would be all right, but I haven’t.”

“How you going to save us then?” demanded a man.

“By a slanting rope. We’ll fasten this to the roof here. Down below there they’ll carry it out some distance and make it fast. Thus the rope will be held away from the flames for a time, and you men can go down it hand over hand. It’s the only way. Quick now, the roof may soon fall!”

“But what about the woman?” persisted the big man. “We’ve got to save her. I won’t go down to face that crowd and have it said I left a woman back here to die!”

“I won’t either!” cried the others. “We’ve got to save her.”

Joe did some rapid thinking. For a moment he thought he might take her down in the Bat. It would not lift double, but it might safely soar down with his weight and that of the woman. But then, as he saw the parapet, or raised wall of masonry, around the edge of the roof, put there as a sort of guard rail, he knew his plan would not work. He would have to make the Bat lift him and the woman over that parapet and it could not be done. There must another way be found.

“Can one of you men carry her?” he asked, nodding toward the unconscious form.

“It would be pretty hard to do it and go down the rope,” said one man. The others nodded their agreement. Then the big man had an inspiration.

“Will the rope hold double?” he asked.

“Yes, and more too,” said Joe, who knew something about ropes from his circus experience.

“Then cut off an end of it, tie the woman to my shoulders, and I’ll go down the rope with her on my back,” cried the big man.

“Are you sure you can do it?” asked Joe.

“I used to be a sailor,” was the quiet answer.

“Then go ahead,” advised Joe. “Make the rope fast while I fix some holding loops with the piece we cut off.”

It was the work of but a few seconds for the sailor to make a tight knot around a projection on the roof. Meanwhile Joe, using the extra piece of rope, made loops around the woman’s shoulders and waist. She could thus be held on the big man’s back in an upright position.

Once the main cable was made fast, Joe signalled to those on the ground to carry out their end and make that fast.

“All ready now!” called the young acrobat.

The fire was raging more hotly now. In one corner of the roof there was a little tongue of flame showing. The roof had burned through and puffs of smoke were coming up. It was a question of minutes—nay, seconds—now.

The rope passed from the roof to the ground on a long slant, and thus, instead of dangling straight down the side of the building, where it would have been burned by the flames spouting from the windows, it was at a safe distance above the fire.

“Come on! Come on!” cried Joe. “Who’s to go first?”

“Let him,” spoke a young man, pointing to the one who had offered to carry the woman.

They fastened her to his back. She was now slowly regaining the consciousness she had lost through excessive fear, but she was in no condition to help herself.

“Well, here I go,” said the big man. He climbed over the parapet and then, using care and caution, he began to descend the rope, hand over hand.

A great cry arose from the crowd below as they saw the first of the saved ones coming from the place of peril.

“Wait until he gets down a way, and then one of the rest of you try it,” advised Joe.

“I’m very light, I might go now. I wouldn’t add much to the rope,” spoke a voice close to Joe. He started at the sound of it—for it was decidedly English in accent.

“Perkins!” he exclaimed, recognizing now the man who had made him the strange offer about his estate.

“Mr. Strong!” cried the Englishman. “I didn’t know you before—I’m that excited!”

And Joe had not recognized the fellow whose face was covered with smoke and dirt. It was the voice that brought recognition. If the man had spoken before Joe had been too excited to notice it. But it was Perkins surely enough.

“Yes, go on,” said Joe. “You are a light weight.”

“You—you’ve saved my life!” was the comment. “I won’t forget it, Mr. Strong.”

“Hurry!” was all Joe answered.

One after another the men followed down the rope. It bore their weight safely, and only in that way could they have been saved.

Joe’s idea had worked out well.

Cheer after cheer came from the crowd, as those who were anxiously waiting below saw the men leaving their place of danger. Joe looked down and noted that the big man, who had carried the woman on his back, was safe on the ground now. Willing hands were caring for the waitress, for Joe afterward learned she was one of the hotel servants.

And then, when he saw the last man start down the hempen way to safety, the lad got in his wings of steel and turned on the power. The wings vibrated, and up he rose.

Only just in time, too; for as he passed over the parapet and began to soar away from the hotel, one corner of the roof caved in, and up shot a burst of sparks, flames and smoke.

“A close call!” exclaimed Joe, as he increased his rate of sailing in order to get away from the crater of the volcano he feared might soon represent what had been a hotel.

Joe was received with wild acclaim when he reached the ground. It seemed that every man, woman and child in the crowd wanted to clasp his hand—to touch him somewhere—as he came out of the Bat. Cheers were given for him, though few knew his name even, except as they had seen it on the circus posters.

“It was the greatest rescue I ever saw!” cried a man, and others echoed his words.

By this time firemen from a neighboring municipality had come up, and with their help the other handicapped fire-fighters, who were short-numbered, were better able to cope with the flames. Though the roof had burned through there was now a chance of getting the fire under control, though the upper half of the hotel was a mass of ruins. Only the fact that the conflagration had started in the middle, whence it burned up instead of down, saved any portion of it.

“Well, I guess I’d better get back to the circus parade,” Joe thought, as soon as he could get out of the crowd. He again rose in the air until he was high enough to see the procession wending its way back to the lots. The parade had been given up when half over. The fire was too big an attraction with which to compete.

“You covered yourself with glory again, Joe,” cried Jim Tracy a little later. “It was great!”

“Oh, it wasn’t much,” said Joe modestly.

“Yes, it was—I saw it,” declared the ring-master. “And if we don’t play to the biggest day and night since you won the aviation prize, I’m no prophet.”

Jim Tracy was a good prophet, and throngs had to be turned away from the show, even though straw was spread around the ring to allow hundreds to sit on the ground. And Joe Strong was cheered again and again as he sailed around the tent in the Bat which the crowd knew at once as the life-saving machine.

At night it was the same. And so many had to be turned away that the management decided to stay another day in the place as business, thanks to the young aeronaut’s advertising, was so good.

Joe was interviewed by several newspaper reporters, and his picture was in more than one journal as one of the heroes of the day.

“It was all because of the wings of steel,” said the boy. “In them any one could have gone up.”

“I guess we’ll have to equip the fire department with a set,” said a deputy chief who called to thank Joe. “They’d come in very useful in another case like that.”

“I hope you don’t have any more cases like that,” observed the young hero.

“So do I,” echoed the fireman.

It was the day after the rescue that Joe, in his tent, received word that some one wanted to see him. Not wishing to admit any more cranks or madmen, he went out to see who it was. He saw Perkins.

“I—I’ve come to thank you, Mr. Strong,” said the Englishman. “And I want to beg your pardon for trying to make a deal with you. I’m done now. I’m ready to blow the whole game. It was a put-up job to get your money away from you.”

“On whose part?” asked the young acrobat.

“On the part of your lawyer, Mr. Bolling. He’s a crook, and I was crooked with him. But I’m through now, and I’ll help you get your money.”