they had been shot at, and pushed back
into the retreating and startled crowd. A furnace or something of the
kind had given way in the basement with a thunderous report. A great gap
showed in one of the walls, and the wall itself seemed on the point of
toppling down.

"Sounded like a siege-gun!" chirped a well-known voice. "Fellows, I'm
glad I wasn't in there then! Had the greatest time you ever saw--narrow
escape and all that; but here I am again, with my stomach filled with
cake and my head intoxicated with tea. All right side up, you see!"

The speaker was Jack Ready!

"Where is Merriwell?" Bart asked.

"Merriwell?" and Ready looked round. "Refuse me, but I supposed he was
the center of this intellectual group! Yes, where is Merriwell?"

"He went up there after you--to get you out of the fire!" exclaimed
Bink, in great excitement.

"You haven't sus-sus-seen him?" demanded Gamp.

Some firemen planted a ladder against the swaying wall, as if to brace
it, and a group came round the corner dragging a huge muddy hose, which
they intended to train on another part of the hotel. But, so far, the
fire had baffled all their efforts.

"Did he go up there?" Ready gasped.

"Sure!" said Danny. "He is up there now."

Ready's round, red-apple cheeks grew white.

"If he is up there now, he'll never come out!"

Bart stared at the shaking wall and the flaming windows--at the smoke
clouds rolling from the doorways. The hotel had become a furnace. Then
he stepped out, with a determined look on his dark face. Ready
understood the meaning of that look.

"You'll go to your death if you try it!" he declared. "It is hotter than
ten ovens, and some timbers fell from the second floor as I came out. If
I hadn't rolled under the stairway when I fell, and thus had protection,
I should have been cooked alive."

But if Hodge heard the warning, he did not heed it. He pushed aside
Ready's detaining hand and ran quickly across the street. They saw him
reach the first smoke-filled doorway, and then he was swallowed up in
the smoke. The other members of Merriwell's flock stood still, with
shaking limbs and anxiously beating hearts.

"They will both be killed!" gasped Rattleton.

"Sure!" groaned Dismal.

"I don't believe we shall ever see Hodge again!" Ready declared, and his
cheeks grew even whiter.

Bruce moved as if he, too, thought of rushing into the flames. Diamond's
hand was laid on his shoulder.

"Wait a minute. No use ri