She sprang to the middle of the room and seized the broken chair. With all her might she crashed it against the door. It fell in pieces at her feet.
She picked up a leg of the chair and, running to the window, pounded upon the shutters. She screamed, and beat upon the shutters. It was the rattle and crash upon the shutters that made Harry rein in his horse before the old Grigsby house.
He saw smoke burst from the lower windows, and, battering on the locked door, he heard her screams.
"Harry! Harry!"
It was to him she called again in her peril, as she had called before —in the wreck of the yacht, in the den of Baskinelli, and even this day from the rim of the runaway balloon. Always, inspired by that call, he had found their way to safety.
He thrust the full weight of his mighty body against the door which held like solid rock.
"Harry! Harry!" came the cries again.
"I'm coming, Polly; I'm here!"
He dashed to where a heavy tree limb had fallen, carried it to the door, raised it and charged with it as a battering ram. He might as well have slapped the door with his flat palm.
He looked at the windows whence the smoke poured—smoke mingled with flame. Half crazed by the cries from above, he raised the limb to try to break the shutters. He stopped and let it fall. The toot of an automobile horn and the excited voice of young Bassett stopped him.