Westy Martin in the Rockies

by Percy Keese Fitzhugh

“Just give me a boost from the railing, that’s all!”

“You’re not⸺” Artie and Uncle Jeb both spoke simultaneously.

Before they finished what they had started to say, Westy had hopped on the porch railing and was making ready to climb the pillar supporting it.

CHAPTER XXXVII—EVIDENCE

Artie realized in a flash the seriousness of Westy’s intention, and without any further comment gave him a boost up the pillar and onto the shed.

Westy pulled himself up gradually until he was sure that he could stand on his feet with safety. He went around to the side-windows first, trying each only to find they were all barred. With only one more to attempt, he approached it half-fearfully lest it should prove inaccessible too. With trembling fingers he tugged at it and, to his great joy, it yielded.

Artie and Uncle Jeb watched him from below with anxious eyes, beseeching him to be careful and to hurry.

The window was tight shut; locked! But Westy was not to be deterred from his purpose at this time. Raising his knee with determination he struck the glass with a force that sent it crashing into fragments inside. Still there came no sound whatever from within that silent interior.

Stepping through the broken pane into the room he called, but all he could hear was the roar of the flames. The heat in the room was unbearable and he couldn’t see very well in the darkness.

He stumbled over one chair and then another. With hands outstretched, he felt something cold. He laughed at the start it gave him for, on examining it closer, he found it to be one of those old-fashioned marble-topped bureaus. It was one of those huge affairs, ample enough to hold the wardrobe of one’s entire lifetime. Reaching out into the space around him again, his hand now came in contact with something else; a bed. He could feel the soft covers and knew by its very smoothness that it had been unoccupied that night. Where, he thought, was the door? What room did Ol’ Pop use? These and a hundred other thoughts were flashing constantly in his active brain, while he was groping there in the darkness.