At the Post of Duty.
Fire! There is something appalling in the cry to most ears; something deadly in the sound; something that tells of imminent danger and urgent haste. After David Boone’s first alarm was given, other voices took it up; passers-by became suddenly wild, darted about spasmodically and shouted it; late sitters-up flung open their windows and proclaimed it; sleepers awoke crying, “What! where?” and, huddling on their clothes, rushed out to look at it; little boys yelled it; frantic females screamed it, and in a few minutes the hubbub in Poorthing Lane swelled into a steady roar.
Among the sound sleepers in that region was Miss Deemas. The fair head of that lady reposed on its soft pillow all unconscious of the fact that she was even then being gently smoked before being roasted alive.
Miss Tippet, on the very first note of alarm, bounced out of bed with an emphatic “There!” which was meant to announce the triumphant fulfilment of an old prophecy which she had been in the habit of making for some time past; namely, that Matty Merryon would certainly set the house on fire if she did not take care!
The energy with which Miss Tippet sprang to the floor and exclaimed “There!” caused Emma Ward to open her eyes to the utmost possible extent, and exclaim, “Where?”
Without waiting for a reply she too bounded out of bed like an indiarubber ball, and seeing (for there was always a night-light in the room) that Miss Tippet’s face was as white as her night-dress, she attempted to shriek, but failed, owing to a lump of some kind that had got somehow into her throat, and which refused to be swallowed on any terms.
The repetition of the cry, “Fire! fire!” outside, induced both ladies at once to become insane. Miss Tippet, with a touch of method even in her madness, seized the counterpane, wrapped it round her, and rushed out of the room and downstairs. Emma followed her example with a blanket, and also fled, just as Matty Merryon, who slept in an attic room above, tumbled down her wooden staircase and burst into the room by another door, uttering a wild exclamation that was choked in the bud partly by terror, partly by smoke. Attempting in vain to wrap herself in a bolster, Matty followed her mistress. All three had utterly forgotten the existence of Miss Deemas. That strong-minded lady being, as we have hinted, a sound sleeper, was not awakened by the commotion in the street. In fact, she was above such weaknesses. Becoming aware of a crackling sound and a sensation of smoke, she smiled sweetly in her slumbers, and, turning gently on her other side, with a sigh, dreamed ardently of fried ham and eggs—her usual breakfast.
While these events were occurring the cry of fire had reached the ears of one of London’s guardians; our friend Samuel Forest. That stout-hearted man was seated at the time rapping the sides of his sentry-box with his head, in a useless struggle with sleep. He had just succumbed, and was snoring out his allegiance to the great conqueror, when the policeman on the beat dashed open his door and shouted “Fire!”
Sam was a calm, self-possessed man. He was no more flurried by this sudden, unexpected, and fierce shout of “Fire,” than he would have been if the policeman had in a mild voice made a statement of water. But, although self-possessed and cool, Sam was not slow. With one energetic effort he tripped up and floored the conqueror with one hand, as it were, while he put on his black helmet with the other, and in three minutes more the fire-escape was seen coming up the lane like a rampant monster of the antediluvian period.
It was received by the crowd with frantic cheers, because they had just become aware that a lady was asleep in one of the upper rooms, which were by that time unapproachable, owing to the lower part of the staircase having caught fire.