"But they are all so kind," said Walter simply, but in such a way that his mother and Emily might each take half of the compliment. The bright slum boy was already losing all trace of his plebeian associations, as the innate aristocracy of his nature asserted itself. How luckily he was placed, if he could have foreseen. To begin at the lower-most round of the ladder, but with the unconquerable instinct in him to climb; and so at last, on the topmost round, to have the whole of life for a retrospect.
Mrs. Riley bade them a proud good-by and watched them from her window boarding the car. The down-town ride on a Sunday is always curious, for the desertion of the usually crowded streets gives them a foreign appearance. Emily was commenting on this when Walter called her attention to something in the sky.
"Look, it's a man," he said, pointing almost vertically upward.
"Where?" she asked, leaning forward.
"On the top of the Amory building. He is calling for help."
The Amory building was the tallest structure in the city, the tenants in the sixteenth story enjoying a view that swept in the entire harbor and flattened the men walking in the avenues below to the dimensions of crawling flies.
"We can change cars here, Walter. Let us get off and see."
From the sidewalk Emily could distinguish the minute figure of a man leaning over the parapet around the roof, and shouting through his hands to attract attention.
"Perhaps it is on fire," she said in alarm, framing the thought that lay uppermost in her mind.
"I think he wants to get down," suggested Walter, although not a word of the man's vociferations could be heard.