"Salt will do the trick. Show me the way to that window. Salt will put out a fire in a chimney better than anything else."
"Let him have his way, Janice," said her father quickly.
She thought she heard the gong of some of the fire apparatus approaching; but she was not sure. She gave Gummy a hand, and they ran upstairs with the sack of salt between them.
Here was the small room. She flung open the door and Gummy flung up the lower sash of the window. He almost dived out upon the tinned roof of the kitchen ell.
"Quick! Give me that salt I" he cried reaching in for it.
Janice helped him lift the bag out of the window. He dragged it along the roof toward the chimney that now vomited black smoke and flames in a very threatening volume. Fortunately the light wind drifted it away from the main part of the house.
"Oh, Gummy, you'll be burned to death—and then what will your mother say?" cried Janice.
Gummy was so much in earnest that he did not even laugh at this. He dragged the sack of salt as close to the burning chimney as he dared. Then he got out his pocketknife and cut the string.
Everybody in the street below was yelling to him by this time, telling him what to do and how to do it. Gummy gave them little attention.
The smoke choked him and occasionally a tongue of flame seemed to reach for him. But Gummy Carringford possessed a good deal of pluck, and he was strong and wary for so young a boy. Shielding his face as best he could from the heat and smoke, he began to cast double handfuls of salt into the chimney.