rs!"

"It can't be possible!" said another voice. "Something must be done!
Help! Help! Take us out of here!"

"Foolish cowards!" murmured Mr. Keith, and then the door of his office
was violently opened and two men rushed in. They were strangers to Mary
and her uncle.

"Isn't there any way out of this fire trap?" cried one of the men. "Are
there any fire escapes at your windows?"

"None," said Mr. Keith.

"This is all your fault, Melling!" cried the smaller of the two men,
whose voice, in loudness and depth of pitch, was out of all proportion
to his size. "All your fault! I told you we should have those new fire
escapes!"

"And you were the one, Field, who objected to the cost of fire escapes
when you found what the charge would be," retorted the other. "You said
we didn't need to waste that money, if the building was fire-proof."

"But it isn't, Melling! It isn't!" yelled the other.

"We're finding that out too late!" came the retort. "But I'm not going
to die here like a rat in a trap!" And he raised the window and leaned
out and yelled, "Help! Help! Help!"

"Don't do that," said Mr. Keith, coming over to close the casement.
"They can't hear you down below, and opening the window will only fill
this place with smoke. Are you Field and Melling?"

"Yes, of the Consolidated Dye Company," was the answer from the big
man. "We are also part owners of this building, but I wish we weren't."

"It is a pretty poor specimen of a modern building," said Mr. Keith.
"You have offices here, haven't you?" he went on. "I remember to have
seen your names on the directory."

"We're on the floor above," was the answer from Field. "We were in a
rear room, going over some accounts, and we didn't know anything was
wrong until we smelled smoke. We tried to get down, and managed to
come, by way of the stairs, as far as this floor," he explained quickly.

"You can't go any farther," said Mr. Keith. "All there is to do is to
wait for the firemen."

"Suppose they never come?" whined Melling. "Oh, they'll come!" asserted
Mary's uncle, but he spoke more to quiet her alarm than because he
really believed it, for the Landmark Building was a seething furnace of
flame centering in and about the elevator shafts and stairs.

Meanwhile Tom and his companions in the airship had seen the red glow
in the evening sky, and in another minute the young inventor had turned
his craft more directly toward it.

"It surely is in Newmarket," said Mr