"Come back, Trix!" Ruth added her cry to her sister's.
The electric lights began to quiver. The whole mass of the roof must be sagging down. Ketchell kicked off his skates and picked them up, preparatory to getting out of the way.
And perhaps it was just as well that he had showed no heroism. Had he skated in for the girl, he could not have aided her in any way.
Trix started for the front of the snow castle. They saw her stoop forward and put on speed, and then—in a flash—the middle of the roof settled and crashed to the floor—and the sound of the wreck almost deafened the onlookers!
CHAPTER XXI
A BACKYARD CIRCUS
They said afterward that the wreck of the snow castle was heard clear to the outskirts of the town. The Morning Post said that it was disgraceful that the school authorities had allowed it to be built. Parents and guardians were inclined to rail against what they had previously praised the boys for doing.
The fact remained, and the calmer people of the community admitted it, that as soon as there was any danger the boys had warned everybody out. That one headstrong girl—and she, only—was caught in the wreckage, did not change the fact that the boys had been very careful.
At the moment the roof of the snow castle crashed in, the only thought of those in sight of the catastrophe was of Trix Severn.