h the desperate nature of its duty. Here came the brigade,
in time to do something at any rate, and the engine soon began to play
briskly upon the western wing.

Ellen Whitelaw was in the wood-yard, watching the work going on there
with intense anxiety. The removal of the wood pile seemed a slow
business, well as the three men performed their work, flinging down great
crushing piles of wood one after another without a moment's pause. They
were now joined by the Malsham fire-escape men, who had got wind of some
one to be rescued from this part of the house, and were eager to exhibit
the capabilities of a new fire-escape, started with much hubbub and
glorification, after an awful fire had ravaged Malsham High-street, and
half-a-dozen lives had been wasted because the old fire-escape was out of
order and useless.

"We don't want the fire-escape," cried Mr. Carley as the tall machine was
wheeled into the yard. "The room we want to get at isn't ten feet from
the ground. You can give us a hand with this wood if you like. That's all
we want."

The men clambered on to the wood-pile. It was getting visibly lower by
this time, and the top of the window was to be seen. Ellen watched with
breathless anxiety, forgetting that her husband might be dying under the
poplars. He was not alone there; she had sent Mrs. Tadman to watch him.

Only a few minutes more and the window was cleared. A pale face could be
dimly seen peering out through the dusty glass. William Carley tried to
open the lattice, but it was secured tightly within. One of the firemen
leapt forward upon his failure, and shattered every pane of glass and
every inch of the leaden frame with a couple of blows from his axe, and
then the bailiff clambered into the room.

He was hidden from those below about five minutes, and then emerged from
the window, somehow or other, carrying a burden, and came struggling
across the wood to the ladder by which he and the rest had mounted. The
burden which he carried was a woman's figure, with the face hidden by his
large woollen neckerchief. Ellen gave a cry of horror. The woman must
surely be dead, or why should he have taken such pains to cover her face?

He brought his burden down the ladder very carefully, and gave the
lifeless figure into Ellen's arms.

"Help me to carry her away yonder, while Robert gets the cart ready," he
said to his daughter; "she's fainted." And then he added in a whisper,
"For God's sake, don't let any o