"Number six," interrupted McCausland. "What shall it be? Cotton waste taking fire spontaneously? Benzine? Naphtha varnish? Celluloid? None of them about, according to Bertha. I'm at my rope's end. Where are you?"
"Do you suppose they have been as careful since the professor died?" asked the marshal.
"That was only four days ago and the study has been locked ever since. Only opened fifteen minutes before the fire."
"Aren't you done guzzling yet?" broke in a strident tone of command from the open door. Chief Federhen's face was haggard and sooty, and his voice, naturally harsh, had a ragged edge from shouting that grated on the ear like the squawking of a peacock. But the firemen leaped immediately to attention. They did not resent their gray chief's reprimand, for they knew that he himself had gone without any supper at all and that he stood ready at that moment to lead wherever he ordered them to follow. In personal courage, as well as generalship, he was believed to be the foremost chief in the country, and, though not exactly popular personally, he was professionally adored. Only the insurance companies had ever ventured to criticise his bold methods, and they, as everybody knows, are simple-minded idealists, who expect an immunity from fire such as even the arctic regions can hardly enjoy.
"Take your machine alongside of fourteen, Tyrrell, and keep two lines on the Harmon building all night."
"All right, chief," answered Capt. Tyrrell, and his men followed him out through the curious crowd that stood peeking in on their collation.
"Impossible!" exclaimed the marshal, raising his voice, now that they were nearly alone.
"Impossible, that's what I say," smiled McCausland; "we're not living in fairyland. This is earth, where effects have causes."
"But who would have the heart to set it?"
McCausland shrugged his shoulders.