lating wildly and hurling French at me in seething masses. I
caught "_le feu!_" "_le feu!_" many times repeated; then "_le theatre!_"
and with a cry I seized his arm and shook him.

"What is it?" I cried, "do you mean fire?"

He nodded, and again came the words: "_le theatre!_"

"Good heaven and earth! you don't mean _my_ theatre, do you?" and then
two great horses, hurling a fire-engine around the corner into our street
made swift and terrifying answer. With a piercing cry I caught up my
cloak, and throwing off somebody's restraining hands I dashed down-stairs
and into the street, racing like mad, giving sobbing cries, and utterly
unconscious for over two blocks' space that my waist was unclosed and my
naked throat and chest were bare to the wintry wind.

At the corner of the street at Sixth Avenue I wrung my hands in anguish,
crying, "Oh, dear God! I knew it! I knew it!" for there, stalled in the
snow, was the engine, so desperately needed a little further on! And as I
resumed my run I said to myself: "What is it that has tried so hard to
tell me--to warn me? Tried all the day--and I would not understand--and
now it's too late!"

Why I ran I do not know--it was not curiosity. I felt, somehow, that if I
could get there in time I might do something--God knows what! As I neared
the theatre the crowd grew more dense, yet to my gasping: "Please, oh,
please!" an answer came in a quick moving aside to let pass the woman
with the white, tear-wet face. I broke through the cordon and was making
for the stage-door, when a rough hand caught me by the shoulder. There
was an oath, and I was fairly hurled back toward the safety line.

"Oh, let me alone!" I cried, "I want to go to my room! It will take me
but a moment!"

Again the rough hand reached out for me, when a strange man threw his arm
in front of me protectingly: "Take care what you're about!" he said. "Be
a little gentle--she has a right close to the line, she's one of the
company! Can't you see?"

"Oh," grunted the policeman, "well, I didn't know, and I couldn't let her
kill herself!"

"No," said the stranger, "but you had no call to pitch her about as you
did!" And just then a long, thin hand caught mine, and Mr. Daly's voice
said: "Come here, child!" and he led me across the street and up some
steps, and there, opposite the burning building, I could realize the
madness of my act in trying to enter. The front of the building stood
firm, but beyond it, within, al