The sight which met his eyes, did not for the moment seem sufficient to account for the degree of emotion expressed by the other. To be sure, the lofty tenement-house which towered above them from the other side of the narrow yard upon which the window looked, was oozing with smoke, but there were no flames visible, and as yet no special manifestations of alarm on the part of its occupants. But in an instant, even while they stood there, arose the sudden and awful cry of “Fire!” and at the same moment they beheld the roof and casements before them, swarm with pallid faces, as men, women and children rushed to the first outlet that offered escape, only to shrink back in renewed terror from the deadly gulf that yawned beneath them.
It was horrible, all the more that the fire seem to be somewhere in the basement story, possibly at the foot of the stairs, for none of the poor shrieking wretches before them seemed to make any effort to escape downwards, but rather surged up towards the top of the building, waving their arms as they fled, and filling the dusk with cries that drowned the sound of the coming engines.
The scene appeared to madden Holt. “My boy! my boy! my boy!” rose from his lips in an agonized shriek; then as Mr. Sylvester gave a sudden start, cried out with indiscribable anguish, “He is there, my boy, my own little chap! A woman in that house has bewitched him, and when he is not with me, he is always at her side. O God, curses on my head for ever letting him out of my sight! Do you see him, sir? Look for him, I beseech you; he is lame and small; his head would barely reach to the top of the window-sill.”
“And that was your boy!” cried Mr. Sylvester. And struck by an appeal which in spite of his abhorrence of the man at his side, woke every instinct of fatherhood within him, he searched with his glance the long row of windows before them. But before his eye had travelled half way across the building, he felt the man at his side quiver with sudden agony, and following the direction of his glance, saw a wan, little countenance looking down upon them from a window almost opposite to where they stood.
“It is my boy!” shrieked the man, and in his madness would have leaped from the casement, if Mr. Sylvester had not prevented him.
“You will not help him so,” cried the latter. “See, he is only a few feet above a bridge that appears to communicate with the roof of the next house. If he could be let down—”
But the man had already precipitated himself towards the door of the room in which they were. “Tell him not to jump,” he called back. “I am going next door and will reach him in a moment. Tell him to hold on till I come.”
Mr. Sylvester at once raised his voice. “Don’t jump, little boy Holt. If there is no one there to drop you down, wait for your father. He is going on the bridge and will catch you.”
The little fellow seemed to hear, for he immediately held out his arms, but if he spoke, his voice was drowned in the frightful hubbub. Meanwhile the smoke thickened around him, and a dull ominous glare broke out from the midst of the building, against which his weazen little face looked pallid as death.
“His father will be too late,” groaned Mr. Sylvester, feeling himself somehow to blame for the child’s horrible situation; then observing that the other occupants of the building had all disappeared towards the front, realized that whatever fire-escapes may have been provided, were doubtless in that direction, and raising his voice once more, called out across the yard, “Don’t wait any longer, little fellow; follow the rest to the front; you will be burned if you stay there.”