[ CHAPTER XVI]
THE LAST OF BOB
One o’clock in a morning of the last of May, and the Miller household, all unconscious of disaster, was soundly slumbering. Then in amidst Ned’s dreams crept a dull series of noises, which became a persistent pounding. Ned imagined that he had dived under his scull-boat, and that the other boys were hammering upon the hull, outside, to bother him. He struggled to escape, but somehow he seemed unable to get to the top again. This is the way with dreams.
Mr. Miller, too, heard a pounding; only, he awakened enough to know that it was a real pounding, upon the front door, and was no dream.
He sprang from bed, and sticking his head out of the window over the porch called:
“What’s the matter down there?”
“Are you folks all dead?” called back a man. “Get up! Your barn’s afire!”
And Mr. Miller suddenly saw that the night around-about was strangely lighted.