"Ah, merciful Gott! take care of dem," she sighed, and the prayer and the spirit that breathed it went up to heaven together.
CHAPTER XLII
BARON LUDOLPH LEARNS THE TRUTH
With eyes ablaze with excitement, Dennis plunged into the region just before the main line of fire, knowing that there the danger would be greatest. None realized the rapidity of its advance. At the door of a tenement-house he found a pale, thin, half-clad woman tugging at a sewing-machine.
"Madam," cried Dennis, "you have no time to waste over that burden if you wish to escape."
"What is the use of escaping without it?" she answered, sullenly. "It is the only way I have of making a living."
"Give it to me then, and follow as fast as you can." Shouldering what meant to the poor creature shelter, clothing, and bread, he led the way to the southeast, out of the line of fire. It was a long, hard struggle, but they got through safely.
"How can I ever pay you?" cried the grateful woman.
But he did not stay to answer, and now determined to make his way to the west and windward of the fire, as he could then judge better of the chances of its spreading. He thought it safer to go around and back of the flames, as they now seemed much wider, and nearer the south branch of the Chicago River.
He found that he could cross the burned district a little to the southwest, for the small wooden houses were swept so utterly away that there were no heated, blazing ruins to contend with. He also saw that he could do better by making quite a wide circuit, as he thus avoided streets choked by fugitives. Beaching a point near the river on the west side of the fire, he climbed a high pile of lumber, and then discovered to his horror that the fire had caught in several places on the south side, and that the nearest bridges were burning.