An alarm. The garden-house on fire.
So saying, Hiram ran down the garden, and on his way he was surprised to see a smoke rising from the direction of Ralph’s garden-house. He did not, however, pay any very particular attention to this circumstance, as it was very common for Ralph to have fires in the garden, to burn the dried weeds and the old straw which often collect in such places. He hastened on in the direction of Bruno’s barking, quite confident that the dog had found his lost fox, and was barking for him to come and get him.
Just at this moment he saw Bruno come running to the gate at the bottom of the garden. He was barking violently, and he seemed very much excited. As soon as he saw Hiram coming, he ran back again and disappeared. Hiram hastened on, and, as soon as he got through the gate into the field, he saw that Bruno was standing at the gate which led into Ralph’s garden, and running in and out alternately, and looking eagerly at Hiram, as if he wished him to come. Hiram ran to the place, and, on looking in, he saw, to his utter consternation, that the garden-house was on fire. Dense volumes of smoke were pouring out of the doors and windows, with now and then great flashes of flame breaking out among them. Bruno, having brought Hiram to the spot, seemed now desirous of giving the alarm to Ralph; so he ran up toward the house in which Ralph lived, barking violently all the way.
His effort was successful. In a minute or two he returned, barking as before, and followed by Ralph. Ralph was greatly terrified when he saw that the garden-house was on fire. He ran back to the house to call his mother. She came down to the place in great haste, though she seemed quite calm and composed. She was a woman of a very quiet disposition, and was almost always composed and self-possessed. She saw at a glance that the fire could not be put out. There was no sufficient supply of water at hand, and besides, if there had been water, she and the two boys could not have put it on fast enough to extinguish the flames.
“What shall we do?”
“Oh dear me! oh dear me!” exclaimed Ralph, in great distress, “what shall we do? Mother! mother! what shall we do?”
“Nothing at all,” said his mother, quietly. “There is nothing for us to do but to stand still and see it burn.”
“And there’s my poor robin all burning up!” said Ralph, as he ran to and fro in great distress. “Oh, I wish there was somebody here to save my robin!”
The robin in danger.
The cage containing the robin was hanging in its place, under the shelf by the side of the window. The smoke and flame, which came out from the window and from a door below, passed just over it, and so near as to envelop and conceal the top of the cage, and it was plain that the poor bird would soon be suffocated and burned to death, unless some plan for rescuing it could be devised. When Hiram knew the danger that the bird was in, his first thought was that he was glad of it. He pitied the bird very much, but he said to himself that it was good enough for Ralph to lose it. “He deserves to lose his bird,” thought he, “for having let my Foxy go.”