"I'm big enough," declared Joel, strutting around and pulling at the things that Polly said were dampers--though why they should be damp, when there was a fire in the stove every day, he never could see. "And when Polly sees that I can make it as good's she can, she'll let me do it every day. Yes, sir-ree!" With that he drew the match, and held it to an end of the paper, sticking up. And forgetting to put back the cover, he raced off to the wood, shed again for another armful of kindling.
"Joel!" screamed David, left behind in the kitchen. "Come! Oh, we're afire! We're afire!"
Joel dropped his kindlings and the heavier pieces of wood he had gathered up, and went like a shot back to the stove again. Great tongues of flame were shooting up toward the dingy ceiling.
"Why didn't you put the cover on?" cried he, terribly frightened, for he began to think, after all, perhaps it would be quite as well to let Polly make the fire. "It'll be all right, I'll have it on in a minute," suiting the action to the word, as he stuck the lifter into the cover and advanced to the stove.
"Oh, Joe, you'll be burnt up," cried David, in a dreadful voice, and wringing his hands.
Joel made a dash, but the flames swirled out at him, so he backed off.
"You can't do it," screamed Davie; "don't try it, Joe, you'll be all burnt up."
When Davie said that he couldn't do it, Joel made up his mind that he would. Besides, the very thought of the little brown house taking fire turned him desperate with fright; so he made a second dash, and somehow, he never could tell what made it, the cover slid on, and the flames muttered away to themselves inside, in a smothered kind of way, and there they were, shut up as tight as could be.
"'Twas just as easy as nothing," said Joel, drawing a long breath, and beginning to strut up and down, still carrying the cover-lifter. "You're such a 'fraid-cat, Dave," he added scornfully.
