The Bishop stood quiet a moment.
Then Jerry looked up. The face looking 152 calmly through the window was the face of one who had once tapped him on the cheek as a reminder of certain things.
Jerry fell off his high stool, landing, miraculously, on his feet. He grabbed at his front lock of curly red hair and gasped:
“I––I’m sorry, Bishop! I––I––didn’t hear what you said.”
The Bishop––if one might say it––grinned. Then he said quickly:
“I thought I saw signs of fire in the hills. Have you heard anything on the wire?”
Jerry had seen the wrinkles around the Bishop’s mouth. The beet red colour of his face had gone down several degrees. The freckles were coming back. He was now coherent.
No he had not heard anything. He was sure nothing had come down the wire. Just then the rapid-fire, steady clicking of the key changed abruptly to the sharp, staccato insistence of a “call.”
Jerry held up his hand. “Lowville calling Utica,” he said. They waited a little and then: “Call State Warden. Fire Beaver Run country. Call everything,” Jerry repeated from the sounder, punctuating for the benefit of the Bishop.
“It must be big, Bishop,” he said, turning, “or they wouldn’t call––”