“Let me see,” continued the visitor, “that makes five minutes and a half so far. If you get out in six minutes, you ought to do well. But there’s one thing I don’t understand and that is how you can be sure of arriving at the fire with the full strength of your company if you don’t call the roll or have some other means of assuring yourself that they’re all there when you started. Now in my country the men all stand up in a row and are inspected by their commanding officer before they leave their quarters, and each one must have his boots blacked and his clothing all properly arranged before he gets up on the engine.”
“If we were to stop here to inspect our men we’d never get to the fire at all,” replied the Chief. “If a man doesn’t take interest enough in his work to turn out the instant the alarm comes, why there’s no room for him in the department. Why, the rivalry between the different companies is so strong that every fireman feels that the reputation of his own machine rests on his shoulders, and, as I told you before, when that alarm comes in he gives a jump, no matter whether he is asleep or in the middle of a game of checkers——”
“Would he jump if he were in the middle of a game of pinochle,” interrupted the Baron with a look of inquiring gravity that almost upset Mr. Dewsnap again.
“He’d jump no matter what he was doing,” the chief went on “and as for six minutes—well come down stairs with me, and I’ll turn the men out for your especial benefit, then you can take your watch out and time them so as to see just how long it does take.”
Followed by the two foreigners and their American friend, Chief Trask proceeded down the stairs while Bruce descended by the more convenient and speedy pole. “You’d better come out here on the sidewalk where you won’t be in the way of the horses,” he remarked, and then, just as Baron Bernstoff had taken his watch from his pocket, the quick sharp notes of the gong fell upon their ears. It was a real alarm that had come in this time and the astounded foreigners saw the horses spring to their places and the driver climb to the seat, while the chief bounded into his wagon. Then the harness was fastened on both vehicles with a succession of sharp clicks. Charley Weyman, whose practiced eye had already told him that everything was securely fastened, detached the reins from the ceiling with a sudden pull and the next moment the big truck with Brophy at the wheel swept out of the quarters, just as the chief’s wagon dashed through the other door, turned sharply to the right, knocking the Honorable Rupert Doubter over on his back as it went by, and was nearly at the corner of the street when the Englishman picked himself up from the gutter and said to his friend.
“Did you get the beggars’ time?”
“I forgot all about it,” rejoined the other with a sheepish glance at his watch, “but it’s just ten seconds now so they must have got off in about six.”
“Ten seconds!” cried Mr. Doubter, true to his convictions to the very last, “Why your watch must have stopped, man. I’ve been lying on my back in the road there nearly five minutes I am sure. But what’s become of our friend Dewsnap?”
“He’s gone to the fire,” replied the Baron. “I saw him waving his hand to us as he went by.”
It was indeed true, Mr. Dewsnap, the most confirmed fire crank in New York, had mounted the truck along with the men and dashed off to the scene of action, leaving his two friends to shift for themselves.