“Norah’s gone over!”
“Norah—she mustn’t!” the boy gasped. He flung himself past Jean, shouting to her to warn the rest of the house, and raced across to the burning stables. At the gate of the yard Monarch and Bosun almost were upon him—they swerved in their maddened gallop, missing him by a hair’s breadth as he ran. But there was no sign of the little sister.
He peered through the smoke wildly, calling to her. For all that he knew, his own horse was already out, safe in some dark corner of the yard; that Norah had gone into the burning building did not enter his head. He searched for her, shouting her name more and more loudly. A sudden terror came upon him lest the horses should have knocked her down as they rushed out—he sprang to the open doors, in sick fear of finding her hurt—senseless. But nothing was visible—nothing but the rolling clouds of flame-shot smoke. He paused, irresolute.
Then he heard Norah’s voice at Garryowen’s box, and even as he leapt forward, amazed and despairing, came a clatter of hoofs on the wooden pavement, as the bay horse bolted out in his last wild dash for safety. His shoulder just brushed Jim as he plunged through the doorway, but the touch was enough to send the boy staggering back, almost falling. He recovered himself with an effort, dashing into the stable.
Beyond him, above Garryowen’s loose box, the roof split gradually, and the roar of inrushing flames filled his ears. They lit up the dark interior, for a moment even stronger than the cruel smoke. Then he saw Norah at his feet. He picked her up, holding her with her face pressed against him to save her from the burning fragments that filled the air—staggering out, grim and determined, with his breath coming in choking gasps. Then his father’s voice rang in his ears, and he saw Wally’s face dimly and felt their hands as they drew him and his burden to safety.
He put Norah down on the grass gently, a limp, unconscious figure. A voice he did not recognize as belonging to him was gasping something about water, and he heard Wally’s swift feet, that seemed to go and come all at once——. They were splashing water on Norah’s face, but she did not move; and suddenly he heard a dry sob break from his father, more terrible in its agony than any sound could ever be again. Perhaps it was in answer to it that Norah’s eyes flickered a little and presently they opened more widely—red-rimmed eyes, half blind—and she smiled at them faintly. Her smoke-grimed lips moved in words that sounded like “all right.”
Jim got to his feet and moved over to the fence, his shoulders shaking as he gripped the pickets.
“I thought she was dead,” he said; “I was jolly well sure she was dead.”
Voices and shouting were coming from the men’s hut. Behind him a long, thundering crash echoed to the sky as the stable roof fell in. Then his father’s hand was on his shoulder.
“Steady, old chap,” said David Linton, “she’s all right. Get to the hose in the garden quickly, Jim. The house has caught.”