“Open up, there!” shouted Bartlett, pounding on its door with a stick he had picked up.
A light soon showed through the cracks of the board shutters.
“Who is there?” demanded a voice from the inside.
“Bartlett.”
“All right—come in.”
“Gasper Farrington,” murmured Ralph, as he recognized the occupant of the hut.
It was the magnate of Stanley Junction, still disguised, just as he had been the last night Ralph had seen him at the home of Jim Evans. The three men disappeared within the house. Ralph approached and went cautiously about the place. 155 He could not find a single point where he could look into the hut.
The young fireman felt that it was very important that he should learn what was going on within the house. He at length discovered a way of gaining access to at least one part of it. This was at the rear where a high stack of old hay stood. It almost touched the hut, and its top was very near to a sashless aperture in the attic.
Ralph scaled the stack with some difficulty and reached its top. In another moment he was inside the attic. It was low, the rafters were few and far between, and, as he crept over these, they began to sway and creak in an alarming way.
“This won’t do at all,” murmured the youth in some dismay, for it seemed that one more movement would carry down the entire ceiling below. He tried to retreat. There was a great cracking sound, and before he could help himself the young fireman went sprawling into the room below in the midst of a shower of plaster and laths.