Even as he spoke, the electric fire-alarm rang through the silent station. The men sprang toward the stables, glancing at the bell-tablet as they ran.
The tablet revealed the name of the street whence the alarm had been sounded; and at the clang the horses tossed their heads and pawed the ground, mad to be off. They knew the sound of the alarm as well as the men themselves.
"Will it be a life-saving job, d'ye think, mate?"
"May be," was Jack's sententious reply; "you never know."
The horses were standing ready harnessed, and were unloosed at once. They were led to the engine, the traces hooked on, the crew, as the staff of firemen is called, took their places, and the doors in front of them were opened smartly by rope and pulley.
"Ready?"
"Aye, aye, sir!"
"Right away!"
In less than two minutes from the ringing of the alarm, the engine was rushing out of the station, and tearing along London streets with exciting clatter, the firemen shouting their warning cry, and sparks flying from the funnel. Soon the engine fire was roaring below, and the steam was hissing for its work.
How had the firemen obtained a blazing fire and hot steam so soon? When the engine was waiting in the station, a lighted gas-jet, kept near the boiler, maintained the water at a high temperature; and while the horses were being hooked on, a large fusee, called a "steam-match," had been promptly ignited, and dropped flaming down the funnel. The match fell through the water-tube boiler to the fuel in the fire-box below; the draught caused by the rush of the engine through the air helped the fire; and the water being already so hot, steam pressure soon arose.