ey kept at their work.

The play was almost over, when from a far corner of the room came a
startled cry.

"Someone else hurt with a needle, I wonder?" queried Paul, as he stood
near Alice's machine.

"I hope not," she answered.

And then the whole room was thrown into panic as the cry broke out:

"Fire! Fire! The building is on fire!"

Shrill screams drowned out the rest of the alarm, but as Ruth, Alice and
the others of the moving picture company looked around they saw a cloud
of smoke at the rear of the big room.

CHAPTER V

A MIX-UP

"Stand still! Don't rush! Form in line!"

Sharp and crisp came the words of the forewoman. The screaming of the
girls ceased almost instantly.

Clang! sounded a big gong through the room. Clang! Clang!

"Fire drill!" called the efficient forewoman, and afterward Ruth and
Alice felt what a blessing it was she kept her wits about her. "Fire
drill! Form in line and march to the fire escapes!"

"Oh! Oh, I know I'm going to faint!" cried Miss Pennington. "This is a
regular fire trap! All shirt waist factories are. I am going to faint!"

"Miss Dixon, just--slap her!" called Alice.

"Oh, Alice!" remonstrated Ruth, looking about with frightened eyes.

"It's the only way to bring her to her senses!" retorted the younger
girl. And to the eternal credit of Miss Dixon be it said that she did
slap her friend Miss Pennington, and she slapped her with sufficient
energy to prevent the fainting fit, even as a sip of aromatic spirits of
ammonia might have done.

"Fire drill! Form lines! March!" again called the forewoman, with the
coolness a veteran fireman might have envied.

"Can't we get our wraps?" asked one of the workers.

"No! You can come back for them," was the answer.

"But it--it's a real fire!" someone cried. "Our things will be burned
up!"

"It isn't a fire at all--it's only a drill!" insisted the forewoman.
"And, even if it were real, and your things were burned, the company
would replace them for you.

"To the fire escapes! March!"

In spite of the forewoman's assertion that it was only a fire drill the
pall of smoke in the corner of the room spread apace, and there was the
smell of fire, as well as the crackle of flames.

"This way, girls," called Mr. Pertell to his four actresses. "Here's a
fire escape over here."

"Excuse me," said the forewoman, firmly. "But please have your company
follow my girls. They know just which way to go, and if your ac