Miss Jenny Ann was growing more nervous every minute. "Hurry!" she cried every few seconds. "I am sure those men will return before you ever get the wretched place afire. What is taking you so long?"
"We have no paper to make the fire burn, Miss Jenny Ann," cried Phyllis in desperation.
"Paper!" returned their chaperon in disgust. "Have you children lived for two weeks on a desert island without learning to make what you have serve for what you desire?"
Miss Jenny Ann slipped out of her white cotton petticoat and ran to the house to present it to Phil. "Here, use this for paper," she insisted. "I have on a heavy serge skirt and shall not miss it."
Cotton is almost as inflammable as paper. Carefully, Madge, Phil and the deaf and dumb boy made another pile of little and big sticks just outside the door they desired to burn down. Miss Jenny Ann's petticoat lay, as a sacrifice, underneath the pyre. The skirt started a splendid blaze. Madge and Phil fanned the flames gently toward the front door. The chips caught, then the larger sticks, at last one of the logs of the door smouldered and flamed.
It took only a short time to get a fair fire started. But it seemed a long time to the workers—and a century to the man who waited inside.
He said nothing, gave no directions. He only walked up and down the small room that held him fast like a caged lion.
Half of the lower log of the door burned away. Phyllis seized the ax. It was easy to cut through the half burnt log. She made a hole large enough to crawl through. The flame was only flickering about its outside edges when she crept inside the house with her lap full of sticks, and Madge's box of matches in her hand.
Madge saw her chum disappear into the house with horror. There was no danger at the time. The front of the wooden house was burning slowly. But if the entire front should blaze up, Phil, as well as Lieutenant Lawton, might be imprisoned inside.
Phil was not in the least alarmed. Once inside the dark house she found herself in a square room. A hall led out of it with a room on each side. There was no question about which room was Jimmy Lawton's prison. Heavy logs were braced against this door and a big, iron chain fastened it on the outside. It was indeed a prison cell.