“Mr. Richard! Mr. Richard!” she cried, in tones of agony. “Save him, save him—if he is there!”
As she uttered these words, prompted thereto by a sudden suspicion that it was Stelfox himself whom she had seen carrying the lifeless body, and that the body was that of the unhappy Dick, she saw a look exchanged between the man-servant and Mr. Bradfield, who had come up to hear what she was saying. Chris put her hands up to her head, covered her eyes and shrank back with a great sob. The horror of the situation, and the fears of her heart, were too much for her. She let her mother lead her to a seat, where she sat shivering and weeping silently during the tumult which followed. But unnerved and disorganised as she was, Chris had sense enough left to notice that Stelfox did not rush forward and attempt to force an entrance into the burning wing. He tried the handle of the door indeed, but finding it locked, he did not even produce his own key. He turned instead towards his master, and looked at him for a moment steadfastly before suggesting that the fire-extinguishers, which were kept ready in cupboards all over the house, should be brought and used at once.
Mr. Bradfield at once gave an order to that effect, and as in the meantime the stablemen had been at work on the outside with ladders and with apparatus which was kept in the stable-yard for the purpose, before very long the fire was got under, and it was possible to enter the rooms of the east wing.
In the meanwhile Mr. Richard had not been forgotten. The outer door leading to his apartments had been burst open; but the rush of black, blinding smoke which followed, made it absolutely impossible to penetrate further than the passage within. The stablemen, who tried from outside to rescue the unfortunate man, fared no better. By the time they had forced the windows the rooms were all alight and they found it impossible to enter.
Exclamations of pity and distress on account of the unlucky young fellow passed from lip to lip among the women of the household, whose sobs and cries added to the tumult. The one woman whom a mixed assembly generally produces who is the equal of any man, was duly forthcoming in the person of a young housemaid, who, at the risk of her life, penetrated as far as Mr. Richard’s sleeping apartment, which was by that time all in flames. She was rescued herself just in time, being dragged out in an insensible condition. But as soon as she revived, she declared that she had been in time to discover that Mr. Richard was not in the bed at all. This statement, which she made in presence of most of the household, was little regarded except by Chris, on whose ears this piece of intelligence fell with sinister import. She fell back again into her mother’s arms, her eyes closed, in a state bordering on insensibility. It having been by this time ascertained that the fire would not spread beyond the wing in which it had originated, Mr. Bradfield had leisure to think of the girl. He drew near to where she sat leaning against her mother’s shoulder, and asked if she was better. But at the first sound of his voice, Chris started up, her eyes wide open, her face lined with horror.
“I shall never be better, never,” she said, tremulously, “until I am out of this dreadful house.”
And she would not look at him, she would not listen to him; but nestling against her mother like a pert and frightened child, she turned her head away with a shudder.
“Don’t speak to her now,” said Mrs. Abercarne, anxiously. “I am afraid the poor child is going to be ill.”
She led her daughter back to her room, but, even as they went along the corridor, there came to their ears a rumour, a cry which had passed from one to the other of the servants until it reached them.