Ned Burford leaped up. His startled voice echoed Sally Lou's cry.
"Hallowell! It's the big dredge, the giant Garrison! Wake up and pitch in. Hurry!"
Days afterward Marian would try to recall just what happened during those wild moments; but the whole scene would flicker before her memory, a dizzy blur. She remembered Roderick's shout of alarm; the rush of the day-shift men from their tents; the clatter of the racing engine as Rod pushed them into the launch, then sent the little boat flying away up the canal. Then, directly ahead, she could see that dense black pillar of smoke rising straight up from the dredge deck, shot through with spurts of flame.
Burford's half-strangled voice came back to them as he groped his way across the deck.
"It's a pile of burning waste, right here by the capstan. Bring the chemical-extinguishers ... no time to wait for the hose.... Wet your coats, boys, and let's pound her out.... Whe-ew! I'm 'most strangled.... Sally Lou Burford! You clear out! You and Marian, too. Go away, I tell you. This is no place for you!"
Sally Lou and Marian stood doggedly in line passing the buckets of water which one of the laborers was dipping up from over the side. Roderick, stolid as a rock, stood close by that choking column of smoke and flame and dashed on the water. Burford rushed about, everywhere at once, half mad with excitement, yet giving orders with unswerving judgment.
"Can't you start the pumping engine, boys? Swing out that emergency hose, quick. There you are! Now turn that stream on those oil barrels yonder—and keep it there. Start the big force-pump and train a stream on the deck near the engines. The fire mustn't spread to the hoisting-gear. Mind that. Mulcahy, give me that chemical-tank. Wet my handkerchief and tie it over my mouth, Sally Lou. No, give me your scarf. That's better. I'm going to wade right in. Aha! See that?"
The smoke column wavered, thinned. A shower of water, soot, and chemicals drenched everybody on deck. Nobody noticed the downpour, for the smoke column was sinking with every moment.
Burford staggered back, half smothered. The extinguisher fell from his hand. But the force-pumps were working now at full blast. Stream after stream of water poured on the fire, then flooded across the deck. Two minutes more of frantic, gasping work and not a spark remained—nothing save the heap of quenched, still smoking waste.
Dazed, Marian found herself once more on the house-boat deck. Ashore the laborers were flocking back to their tents, laughing and shouting. For them it had been a frolic rather than a danger. But the four on the house-boat deck looked at each other without a word. They were too shaky with relief to move or to speak. Sally Lou, the steady-willed, dependable Sally Lou, clung trembling to Marian, who in her turn leaned rather weakly against the rail. Roderick, ashen white, confronted Burford, who stood absently mopping his wet, smarting eyes with Sally Lou's singed and dripping crêpe scarf. Suddenly Burford broke the tension with a strangled whoop.