The Savannah morning news., 1903-08-16


bers to move until they had donned
their new uniforms; for the uniforms
had arrived from Philadelphia two
months ago, and tonight offered the
first opportunity to display them In
public.
Hall Vdnrevel!" painted Tappingham
Marsh to Eugene Madrillon, as the two
running in the van of the Hose COM
pany." splattered through a mud
puddle You'd think he was Carewe's
only son and heir instead of his worst
enemy. Hark to the mani"
I'D let it burn, if 1 were he" return
ed the other.
TT was all Crailey's fault" said
Tappingham, swinging an arm free to
wipe the spattered mud from his face.
He swore he wouldn't bulge without
his uniform, and the rest only backed
him up; that was all. (Iailey said
Carewe could better afford to lose his
shanties than the overworked depart
ment is first chance to look beautiful
and earnest. Tom asked him why he
didn't senI for a fiddle" Marsh finished
with a chuckle.
'Carewe might afford to lose a little,
even a warehouse or two, if only out
of what he's taken from Crailey and
the rest OF us, these three years."
Taken from Vanrevel, you mean.
Who doesn't know where Crailey's-
Here's Main street; look out for the
turn"
They swung out of the timex shad-
ows of Carewe street into full view of
the fire, and their faces ware illumin-
ated as oy sunrise.
The warehouses stood on the river
bank, st the foot of the street, just
south of the new covered bridge"
There were four of them, huge, bare
sided building; the two nearer the
hid Of saI~ al IF
and all of them rich with stores of
every kind of river merchandise and
costly freight; furniture that had voy-
aged from New England down the long
coast across the Mexican Gulf, through
the fiat delta, and had made the wind
ing journey up the great river a thou
sand miles, and almost = thousand
more, following the greater and lesser
tributaries cloth from Connecticut
that had been sold in Philadelphia,
then carried over mountains and
through forests by steam, by canal, by
stage, and siX-mule freight wagons, to
Pittsburg, down the Ohio and thence
up to Rouen on the packet; Tennessee
cotton, on it's way to Massachusetts
and Rhode Island spindles, lay there
beside huge mounds of raw wool from
Illinois, ready to be fed to the Rouen
mill; dates and nuts from the Carib-
bean sea; lemons from groves of the
far-aw+ay tropics; cigars from the An
TILES; tobacco from Virginia and
Kentucky; most precious of all, the
great granary of the farmers wheat
from the level fields at home; and all
the rich stores and the houses that
held them as we'll as the wharves upon
which they had been landed, and the
steamers that brought them up the
Rouen river, belonged to Robert Car
eve.
That it was her fathers property
which was imperilled attested to the
justification of Miss Betty in running
to a fire; and, as she followed the
crowd into Main street, she felt "a not
unpleasant proprietary interest in the
spectacle. Very opposite sensations
animated the breast of the man with
the trumpet, who was more acutely
conscious than any other that these
were Robert Carewe's possessions
which were burning SO handsomely.
Nor was he the only one among the
firemen who ground his teeth over the
folly of the uniforms; for now they
could plainly see the ruin being
wrought, the devastation threatened.
The two upper stories of the southern
most warehouse had swather them
selves in one great flame; the building
next on the north, also of frame, was
smoking heavily; and there was wind
with the fire unchecked, threatened the
town itself. There was work for the
volunteer brigade that night
They came down Main street with a
rush, the figure of the chief swaying
over them on his high perch, while
their shouting was drowned in the
louder roar of greeting from the crowd
into which they plunged as a diver into
the water, swirls and eddies of people
marking the wake. A moment later
a section of the roof of the burning
warehouse fell in, with a sonorous and
reverberating crash.
The "engine company" ran the
force pump out to the end of one of
the lower wharves; two lines of pipe
were attached; two rows of men
mounted the planks for the bumpers,
and, at the word of command, began
the up-and-down of the hand machine
with admirable vim. Nothing happen
ed the water did not come; something
appeared to be strong with the mechan-
ism. AS every one felt the crucial
need of haste, nothing could have been
more natural than that all the mem
bers of the engine company" should
simultaneously endeavor to repair the
defect; therefore ensued upon the spot
a species of riot which put the engine
out of the sphere of usefulness.
In the meantime, fifty or sixty men
and boys who ran with the machines,
but who had no place in their OPERA
ton, being the bucket brigade, had
formed a line and were throwing large
pals of water in the general direction
of the southernmost warehouse, which
it was now impossible to save; while
the gentlemen of the hook and ladder
company" abandoning their wagons,
and armed with axes, heroically as
saulted the big door of the granary,
the second building, whence they were
driven by the exasperated chief, who
informed them that the only way to
save the wheat was to save the build
ing. Crailey Gray, one of the berated
axmen, remained by the shattered door
after the others had gone, and, struck
by a sudden thought, set his hand up
on the iron latch and opened the door
by this simple process. 1t was not
locked. Crailey leaned against the
easement and laughed with his whole
soul and body.
Meanwhile, by dint of shouting in
mems ears when near them through
the trumpet when distant tearing axes
from their hands, imperiously gesticu-
lating to subordinate commanders, and
lingering in no one spot for more than
second, Mr.. Vanrevel reduced his
forces to a semblance of order in a re-
markedly short time, considering the
confusion into which they had fallen.
The space between the burning ware
house and that next 1t was not more
than fifty feet in width, but fifty feet
so hot no one took thought of entering
there; and area as discomfting in APP
pearance as 1T was beautiful with the
thick rain of sparks and firebrands
that fell upon it. But the chief had