“I!” cried astonished Inna. She try what she could do with a big boy like Oscar!
“But hark! that’s the fire-bell; there must be a fire somewhere,” said Mrs. Grant, and out she went, with her apron over her head, to listen at the back gates.
Inna, with no apron over her head, stole out to keep her company.
“Oh my!” said Mrs. Grant to shivering Inna. “I wish Master Oscar was at home. I’m thinking he’s a finger in the pie.”
Ah! there was the fire, sure enough; it was a flare and a flame against the darkening sky.
“What’s alight?” inquired Mrs. Grant of a man who went hurrying by.
[p46]
“Poor Jackson’s little farm; they say ’tis going like tinder, and he’s half crazed,” came back to them as the man ran on.
“Oh dear! that boy, what he’ll have to answer for!” cried the housekeeper.
“But we’re not sure ’tis his work,” said sensible Inna.
“No, dear; but there’s seldom any mischief going that he don’t help in the brewing of.”