and she leaped up in
utter amazement when she saw Ruth.

"For the good land's sake, Ruthie Fielding!" she ejaculated. "Whatever is
the matter with you?"

"Fire!" cried Ruth. "One of the rooms on the next floor--front--is all
afire! I saw it from the dining hall! Mrs. Tellingham has telephoned for
the department at Lumberton----"

With a shriek of alarm, Miss Scrimp picked up the little old "brown Betty"
teapot off the hearth of her small stove, and started out of the room
with it--whether with the expectation of putting out the fire with the
contents of the pot, or not, Ruth never learned.

But when the lady was half way up the first flight of stairs the flames
suddenly burst through the doorframe, and Miss Scrimp stopped.

"That candle!" she shrieked. "I knew I had no business to give that girl
that candle."

"Who?" asked Ruth.

"That infant--Amy Gregg her name is. I'll tell Mrs. Tellingham----"

"But please don't tell anybody else, Miss Scrimp," begged Ruth. "It will
be awful for Amy if it becomes generally known that she is at fault."

"Well, now," said the matron more calmly, coming down the stairs again.
"You are right, Ruthie--you thoughtful child. We can't do a thing up
there," she added, as she reached the lower floor again. "All we can do is
to take such things out as we can off this floor," and she promptly
marched out with the little tea-pot and deposited it carefully on the
grassplot right where somebody would be sure to step on it when the
firemen arrived.

Miss Scrimp prided herself upon having great presence of mind in an
emergency like this. A little later Ruth saw the good woman open her
window and toss out her best mirror upon the cement walk.

Miss Picolet came flying toward the burning building, chattering about her
treasures she had brought from France. "Le Bon Dieu will not let to burn
up my mothair's picture--my harp--my confirmation veil--all, all I have of
my youth left!" chattered the excited little Frenchwoman, and because of
her distress and her weakness, Ruth helped remove the harp and likewise
the featherbed on which the French teacher always slept and which had come
with her from France years before.

By the time these treasures were out of the house a crowd came running
from the main building--Mrs. Foyle, some of the kitchen girls and
waitresses, Tony dragging the hose cart, and last of all Dr. Tellingham
himself.

The good old doctor was the most absent minded man in the