PERSONALLY CONDUCTED
JAMES pulled off his cap as the girls bowed to him.
"Did you know this was the Bishop's house you're in front of?" he whispered, glancing up at the veranda to make sure that he was not overheard.
"Which is the house, the wooden part or the tent?" asked Ethel Brown.
"When he first came here forty years ago there were only one or two houses and for a summer or two everybody lived in tents."
"What fun!" cried Ethel Blue.
"The seasons weren't very long then, only two weeks, so nobody minded if things weren't very comfortable. The Bishop and Mr. Miller had these combination arrangements built because they had lots of guests and needed larger places."
"I wonder if there are any people here now who came that first summer?"
"Yes, indeed, my father was here then. He was a little kid in skirts."
"Naturally he doesn't remember anything about it."
"No, but my grandmother brought him and she often tells me about it. You just wait till Old First Night. There are often twenty people who standup when they ask how many present were here at the first session. The Chancellor, that's Bishop Vincent, was here, of course, and his son, he's the president now, and the Executive Secretary of the C.L.S.C.—"
"That's Miss Kimball. We know her. We just met her," and they told their new friend all about it.
"You're sure in luck," was his comment.
"Old First Night is the anniversary of the very first meeting, I suppose."
"Just you wait and see," hinted James promisingly. "Grandmother thinks it's the most interesting thing that happens all summer."
"How long have we got to wait?" asked Ethel Blue who liked to have things happen right off.
"Till the first Tuesday in August."
"That won't be for a long time. Isn't anything interesting going to happen before then?"
"Oodles of things. Next week all the clubs begin and a little later there'll be a pageant, and the Spelling Match is great."
"Why?" questioned Ethel Blue in a doubtful tone that made the others smile.
"You can see what Ethel Blue thinks about spelling," laughed Helen. "Why is it such good fun?"
"Oh, it's fun to see the grown-up people trying it just as if they were kids. They don't let anybody under fifteen go in. Mr. Vincent, the president, says young people are 'such uncomfortably good spellers.'"
"Ethel Blue wouldn't agree with him."
"It's true, though, because when you're in school you're getting practice every day, and the grown-up people don't get so much practice. They look up words in the dictionary instead of remembering the right way to spell them."
"It must be funny to see grown-up people fail, but I suppose they give them the hardest words there are."
"They take the words out of the Home Reading Course books for the next year. Miss Kimball told you about the Home Reading Course, didn't she?"
"Oh, we knew before," the girls all cried in chorus. "Our grandmother is a graduate."
"And Aunt Marion is in this year's class."
"And so is Grandfather."
"My father is, too," said James. "He's a doctor, you know, and he says that if he didn't read that he wouldn't know anything but bones and fevers."
"What does he mean?" asked Ethel Brown, who liked to have everything perfectly clear.
"He means he wouldn't read anything but his medical journals and he'd 'go stale.'"
"Is your father coming on Recognition Day?"
"He's coming if nobody has a smashed head or smallpox just at the wrong time. He says he wouldn't miss it for anything. The Recognition Day procession marches along this path we're on."
"When will Recognition Day be?" asked Ethel Brown.
"The middle of August."
Ethel Blue groaned.
"Everything is so far off!" she exclaimed.
"Here's the hotel—the Hotel Athenæum," and James nodded toward a large building with a tower and with a veranda on which guests were sitting looking out upon the lake.
"The band concerts are right here all summer. The band plays up on the hotel piazza and the people walk around below here and sit on the grass. It looks pretty when the girls have on pretty dresses."
"Are there lots of girls here?" asked Helen.
"About five million," returned James cheerfully. "I've got a sister who's going over to call on you as soon as she sees you on your porch. That's the only way people can make calls here. Everybody's out all the time going to lectures and classes so you have to catch them when you see them."
"You're neighbors so we'll see her right off," said Helen hopefully. "What's this building?"
"This is the Arcade. There are some shops in it and doctors and things. The women all learn to embroider here—see, round this corner on the piazza is where the teacher stays. Mother goes there all the time, and my married sister. You know they joke at Chautauqua women for embroidering right through lectures and concerts. Somebody wrote some rhymes about it once."
"Let's have them."
"I never fail to oblige when I'm asked for them. Listen. It's dedicated 'To the Wool-Gatherers.'
"I don't go out on SundaysAt Chautauqua, for you seeTo just set still and listen,Are the hardest things that be."At 'Devotional' 'tis different,There my crochet-work I take,The one-two-three, skip-two, do-one,Just keeps me wide awake."I haint heard much the preacher saidTo-day,—I dropped a stitch—But 'twas splendid, and I think'Twas on the duties of the rich."With lectures, sermons, concerts,And all such things as that,'Tis nice to think they culture meWhile I set there and tat."All hail to old Chautauqua,I'll carry off this year,Some thirty yards of edging,To prove that I was here."
"Right here on this open space is where they used to have the lectures forty years ago," James went on, somewhat abashed by the applause he received. "It's called Miller Park now."
"What became of the hall?"
"There never was any hall. There was a raised platform and the people sat in front of it and when it rained they had to put up their umbrellas."
"The trees have grown since, I suppose."
"There were trees there then, but they thinned them out to make room. The first houses were built around the edge of the open place. Those over there are some of the original articles."
The girls saw a row of small cottages rising side by side, their porches almost touching.
"They aren't bad looking," said James patronizingly, "but the Institution doesn't allow houses to be built so close together now."
"Why not?"
"They say that there's no reason why a cottage shouldn't be as good looking on a small scale as a big house and no house can look its best if it's jammed up into another one's lap, so now they require people to leave some land around them."
They had crossed Miller Park and passed between two houses to a walk that ran along the lakeside.
"Here's our house, right here," said James, "and there's Margaret on the porch now."
"And Dorothy," cried the Ethels together.
Margaret Hancock ran down the steps at her brother's call and asked her new friends to stay a while.
"If you don't mind making the first call," she laughed.
She was a clear-eyed girl, not as pretty as Helen, but with a frank expression that was pleasant to see. "Nobody stands on ceremony at Chautauqua," she went on, "and if you want to see anybody you've got to seize her right where you find her."
They all laughed, for she had used almost the same words as her brother.
"You see how the Hancock family holds together," said James.
"This is Dorothy Smith."
Margaret introduced the young girl on the porchto Helen, for she was already speaking to the Ethels.
"Helen, Helen," they cried, "this is our friend Dorothy we told you about."
Helen looked with interest at the girl who had seemed to know all about Chautauqua as her new acquaintances reported her conversation. She saw a girl about the age of the Ethels but not so tall and lacking in their appearance of vigor. Otherwise she was not unlike them, for she had curly brown hair and her nose was just the least bit "puggy," to use Roger's descriptive word. Her eyes, however, were unlike either Ethels', for they were gray. She had easy manners with a pretty touch of shyness that seemed to Helen quite remarkable since she had travelled all over the United States.
"I wouldn't miss the Girls' Club for anything," she was saying. "I learned how to make lots of things there last summer, and at Christmas time I sold enough to pay my club fee this year, and more too."
Helenlookedat her with renewed interest. Here was a girl two years younger than she and she was earning money to pay for her pleasures this summer. It gave her something to think about.
"You and I must join the Young Women's Vacation Club," said Margaret to Helen. "They say they are going to have picnics and plays and great fun. It's a new club."
"I certainly shall. What kinds of things did you learn to make?" Helen asked Dorothy.
"I put almost all my time on baskets. Mother said she thought it was better to learn how to doone thing very well than to do a lot of things just middling well; so I learned how to make ten different kinds of baskets and trays."
"All different shapes?"
"Different materials, too; wicker and splints and rushes and some pretty grasses that I found across the lake one afternoon when Mother and I went over to Maple Springs on the steamer."
"I know they were beauties," said Helen heartily.
"They were," confirmed Margaret. "I saw some of them. I thought the prettiest of all was that small tray made of pine needles."
"Pine needles!" exclaimed James. "How could you work with them? I should think they'd come bristling out all the time."
"They were needles from the long-leaved pine that grows in the South. I got them in North Carolina when Mother and I were there the winter before."
"And you sold a lot of them?" ventured Helen, who was not quite sure that it was polite to ask such a question but who was eager to know just how Dorothy had managed.
"It was easy," explained Dorothy simply. "Mother and I were in a town in Illinois last winter. Mother was teaching embroidery in an art store, so she got acquainted with the ladies who were getting up a bazar at Christmas time and they let me sell my things there on commission."
"On commission? What's that?" asked Ethel Blue to Helen's relief, for she did not like to acknowledge that she did not know.
"On commission? Why, I made a table full of baskets and when they sold them they kept one-tenth of the price for their commission. It was like paying rent for the table you see and a salary to a clerk to sell it. That's the way Mother explained it to me," ended Dorothy rather shyly, for James was staring at her with astonishment that a girl and not a very old girl either should know as much as that about business.
"Hullo, here comes Roger," he exclaimed. "Let's hear what he's been up to," and he left the porch by his usual method—over the rail—and joined his new friend before he reached the house. As they strolled off the girls heard scraps of conversation about "baseball," "first and second crew" and "sailing match."
"Are you all going to the Amphitheatre this evening?" asked Margaret as the Mortons prepared to leave.
"I think Mother will let us go to-night because it's our first night and we're crazy to see everything," replied Ethel Brown, "but she says we've got to go to bed early here just as we do at home or else we'll get thin instead of fat this summer."
"Mother lets me go whenever there are pictures," said Margaret. "Often there are splendid travel lectures that are illustrated. I love those. And once in a while I go to a concert in the evening, but usually I go to the afternoon concerts instead."
"Do you suppose we'll ever be big enough to go to bed just as late as we want to?" Ethel Blue asked Helen as they went up the steps of their own house.
"Even Roger doesn't do that. I remember Father's telling me once that he used to growl about going to bed early when he was a boy and that when the time finally came when he could go to bed as late as he liked he didn't care anything about it and used to go early half the time."
"I don't believe I shall be that way," sighed Ethel. "How queer grown people are!"
But since they had these curious and insistent ideas about the need of repose she eagerly took advantage of any break in the routine such as was offered by the chance to go to the Amphitheatre that evening. It was a wonderful sight, the immense open building, the glittering organ, the brilliant electric lights, and, facing the thousands of people that made up the audience, a slender woman with a marvellously rich voice, who sang negro melodies and told negro stories that brought laughter and tears.
After the recital was over the whole audience went to the lakeside, and there watched the lighting of the signal fires that for years have flashed to the country around the news that another Assembly has opened. Higher and higher the flames roared at different points along the shore. Point Chautauqua, across the water, saw the beacon and flashed on the news down the lake until fires far beyond the sight of the people on the Assembly grounds told their story to the dwellers near-by and the glare of the sky passed it farther afield.
"Isn't it just too wonderful," whispered Ethel Blue to Ethel Brown, and Ethel Brown answered, "I can't believe we're really here."
LEARNING TO SWIM
BY the middle of the next week the Ethels were established in the Girls' Club and the Club was well under way. Dorothy went with them on the opening morning and introduced them to the director of the Club so that they felt no embarrassment in beginning their new activities. Miss Roberts was a fresh-faced, wholesome young woman whose cordial manner made the girls think of their teacher at home. They liked her at once, and so they were eager to follow any suggestions that she made.
The very first was that which Dorothy's mother had urged upon her the summer before, the suggestion which had made so good a basket-maker of her that she had been able to sell her work during the winter.
"It's a great deal better for you to work hard at one thing," said Miss Roberts in a little speech she made at the opening of the club, "than to learn a little bit about several things. Don't be a 'jack of all trades and good at none' girl; be a thorough work-woman at whatever craft you select. Pick out the thing you think is going to interest you most and put your whole strength on it."
"Stenciling for me," whispered Dorothy, "and invalids' cooking."
"Me, too," said Ethel Brown, who admired her new friend so much that she wanted to have the pleasure of being in the same class with her. Ethel Blue looked disturbed when she heard what the others were saying, for she had made up her mind to learn basketry, but it seemed rather forlorn to be in a class with girls she did not know at all. She thought she would ask Miss Roberts what she thought about it.
"Another thing I want every girl here to do," went on Miss Roberts, "is to take some physical exercise every day. You'll never have a better chance to learn to swim, for instance, and it is one of our customs to have light gymnastic movements every morning. In about a week the School of Physical Education will have an exhibition in the Amphitheatre and we must send a squad of girls to represent the Club, so the harder you work to become exact and uniform in your exercises the better showing we shall make."
When it came to enrolling in the classes both Ethels registered as wanting to swim.
"I must learn," said Ethel Blue, "because I've got an uncle in the Navy."
"And I've got to," laughed Ethel Brown, "because her uncle is my father."
Ethel Brown and Dorothy gave their names for the class in stenciling, but Ethel Blue crossed to Miss Roberts's side before she enlisted.
"I know I'd like stenciling," she said, "only I made up my mind that I wanted to make baskets and I really want to do that more than to do stenciling."
"But you think you'll be lonesome? Is that it?" asked the Director with her kind eyes on Ethel's face.
"You see I don't know anybody here but Ethel Brown and Dorothy."
"Come here a minute, Della," called Miss Roberts to a short, rosy-faced girl whose crisp red hair was flying behind her as she skipped across the room.
"Della, this is Ethel Morton," she said. "And Ethel, this is Della Watkins. Now you know at least one other member of the Girls' Club, and it happens that Della is going to take basketry, unless she has changed her mind about it since yesterday."
"I haven't, Miss Roberts," declared Della; "I'm going to work at baskets until I can make a tray like one I saw at the Arts and Crafts Studios last summer. Mamma says it would take a grown person two summers to learn how to do it, but I'm going to try even if it takes me three."
"Della never gives up anything she once takes hold of," smiled Miss Roberts. "She's like her dog. He's a bull dog, and I should hate to have him take a fancy to anything I didn't want him to have!"
Both girls laughed and Della slipped her arm around Ethel Blue's waist and ran with her to the basketry teacher who was recording the names of her fast growing class.
For an hour the girls worked at their new tasks and then they did some easy arm and leg exercisesand ended the morning with a swift march around the big room.
"We must hand in our names for the camping trip," directed Dorothy.
"What is that?" asked both Ethels in chorus.
"Across the lake is a camp that both the Boys' and Girls' Clubs use in turn. There's a great rush to go so we'd better be on the list early."
"How long do we stay?"
"Just one night and plenty of grown people go, too, so the mothers never object. It's the grandest thing."
"I've never slept in a tent," said Ethel Blue, "and I'dloveto do it because my father has to do it so much. I think he'd like to have me."
But when they told Mrs. Morton of the plan she was not quite so eager as the girls would have liked to have her.
"How do you go there?" she asked.
"In a motor boat, Dorothy says."
"We shall be on the water a good deal this summer," said Mrs. Morton after thinking a minute, "and you girls can't learn to swim too quickly. I think I will say that you may go to the camp when you can both swim at least twenty strokes."
"If my bathing dress is all ready I'll begin to-morrow, Aunt Marion."
"May we go in every day, Mother?"
"Every suitable day."
"I'll bet on Ethel Blue," pronounced Roger solemnly. "She's a landsman's daughter so she'llwork harder to learn than Ethel Brown will. Ethel Brown will think she'll take to it like a duck because her father is a duck, so to speak."
"You just wait," cried Ethel Brown defiantly.
"I believe they'll both be swimming in ten days," declared Grandfather Emerson.
At least they tried hard. They went regularly to the bathing beach, listened attentively to their instructor's directions, practiced carefully in the water, and were caught by the family a dozen times a day taking turns lying on benches and working each other's legs, and making gestures expressive of their desire to imitate the fishes that they could see slipping through the water when they looked down into it from the dock.
"They just flip a fin and off they go," sighed Ethel Blue. "I flip two fins and wag my feet into the bargain and I go down instead of forward."
"I'm not scared any longer, anyway. Teacher says that's a big gain."
"'Keep air in your lungs and you needn't be afraid,' she's told me over and over. 'Poke your nose out of water and you're all right.' It was kind of goo-ey at first, though, wasn't it, ducking your head and opening your eyes?"
"I got used to that pretty quick because I knew the water wasn't up to my neck and all I had to do to be all right was to stand up. The three arm movements I learned quickly; make ready, put your palms right together in front of your chest—then—"
"One,—push them straight forward as far as you can—"
Make ReadyMake Ready"Put your palms right together in front of your chest."She pushed Ethel Blue's legs forward as close to her body as they would go.
Number OneNumber One"Push the arms straight forward as far as you can."She pulled the legs as far apart as she could and as far back as possible.
Number TwoNumber Two"Turn the palms flat and swing them as far back as the shoulder."She brought the legs together again, the heels touching.
"Two,—turn the palms flat and swing them as far back as the shoulder—"
"Make ready again—bring your palms together in front of your chest again and repeat."
"What in the name of sense are you two kids chanting," ejaculated Roger, poking his head inside.
"Go away, Roger. We can breathe and we can work our arms and that means we can keep afloat. If only we can get the leg motions right!"
"Let me give you a pointer," said Roger, who was a fine swimmer; "while you're learning try hard not to make any useless movements. They tire you and they don't get you anywhere."
"That's just what our teacher says. 'Lost motion is bad anywhere, but in swimming it's fatal.'"
"She's all right," commended Roger. "You just keep up that bench system of yours and you'll come out O.K."
So Ethel Blue stretched herself again face down on the bench and Ethel Brown put her cousin's heels together and her toes out and pulled her legs straight back.
"Ready," she cried.
Then she pushed Ethel Blue's legs forward as close to her body as they would go, and a muffled groan came from the pupil, head down over the bench.
"Hold your head up. Can't you make your arms go at the same time? Now leg Number One goes with the arm Number One."
"I can't do it yet," gurgled Ethel Blue; "I want to learn these leg movements by themselves first."
"Here's Number One, then," said Ethel Brown, and she pulled the legs as far apart as she could and as far back as possible, the feet still being horizontal; "and here's Number Two," and she brought the legs together again, the heels touching.
"I forgot to wag my feet when you did that last one," panted Ethel Blue. "If you wag them it gives you an extra push forward you know."
"I know; it really does; I did it accidentally yesterday and I popped right ahead some distance. Now let me try," and she took her turn on the bench while Ethel Blue counted and pulled laboriously, "Number One, Number Two, Make Ready."
"I floated for two minutes to-day."
"You did!" There was envy in Ethel Brown's voice as she resumed her upright position and helped her cousin move the bench back against the wall.
"I thought I'd try, so I turned over on my backand put my nose and mouth as high out of water as I could and tried to forget that my forehead was being swashed. Then I filled my lungs up full and there I was, just like a cork."
"Or a barrel," substituted Roger, poking his head in again. "Grandfather sends you his compliments—or he would if he happened to think of it—and says that when he was a boy they used to ask him 'What does a duck go down for?' Do you know the answer?"
"Grandfather told me that when I was Dicky's age—'for divers' reasons'; and he comes up again 'for sun—dry reasons.'"
"You're altogether too knowing, you kids. Where's Helen?"
"Gone on a tramp with the Vacation Club. Mother and Grandfather have gone to the five o'clock reading hour, Grandmother is taking her embroidery lesson at the Arcade, and Mary is down on the lake front. There isn't a soul in the house except Dicky and he's taking a nap."
"Then here's the best time I know to teach you young ladies how to resuscitate a drowned person. If one of you will oblige me by playing drowned—thank you, ma'am."
With solemnity Roger removed his coat and proceeded to his self-imposed task as Ethel Blue dropped limply on the floor.
"If you happen to have your wits about you still in about the usual amount, all I have to do is to start up your circulation by rubbing you like the mischief and then rolling you up in hot blankets to staveoff a chill. But if the few senses that you possess—"
"Thank you!"
"—have left you then I have two things to do instead of one; first, I must start up your breathing once more, and second I must stir up your circulation."
"Yes, sir," agreed both girls meekly.
"You keep his nose out of the sand by putting his arm under his own forehead.""You keep his nose out of the sand by putting his arm under his own forehead."
"When a person is unconscious his tongue is apt to fall back and stop up his throat. To prevent that you turn your victim over on his face."
"Ow! My nose!" cried Ethel Blue as Roger suited the action to the word.
"You keep his nose out of the sand by putting his own arm under his own forehead, thus making him useful. Fixed this way his tongue slips forward and the water in his mouth will run out. Sometimes this is enough. If it isn't, then turn the patient on his side—" he rolled Ethel Blue on edge—"and try to arouse breathing by putting ammonia under his nose or tickling his nose and throat with afeather. Somebody ought to be rubbing his face and chest all the time and throwing dashes of cold water on them."
"Poor lamb!"
"If he doesn't begin to breathe promptly under these kind attentions then you must try artificial breathing."
"Artificial breathing—make-believe breathing! How do you do that?"
"Don't let people crowd around and cut off the air. Turn him on his face again,"—and over went Ethel Blue—"putting something thick like this rolled up coat under his chest to keep it off the ground."
"Umph—that's a relief!" grunted Ethel Blue.
"Then roll him gently on to his side and then forward on to his face once more. Move him once in every four slow counts. Every time he goes on to his face give him a vigorous rub between the shoulder blades."
"Ow, ow," ejaculated Ethel Blue ungratefully.
"It must take a lot of people to do all these things," commented Ethel Brown.
"Three if you can get them; one to turn him and rub his back, one to keep his head off the ground as he is rolled over, and the third to dry his feet and try to warm them."
"The one who does the rolling is the most important if there don't happen to be many around."
"Put your strongest in that position. If you don't bring your patient to in five minutes of this, try putting him on his back with a coat or something underhis shoulder-blades, and keeping his tongue out of his throat by tying it with a tape or rubber band."
"One person kneels back of the patient's head and takes hold of his arms between the elbow and the wrist and pulls them back along the ground until the hands touch above his head. This draws the air out of the lungs.""One person kneels back of the patient's head and takes hold of his arms between the elbow and the wrist and pulls them back along the ground until the hands touch above his head. This draws the air out of the lungs."
"It's Ethel Brown's turn now," remonstrated Ethel Blue, but she was silenced by a rubber band from Roger's pocket.
"When you move them to the side of the body again the air is pressed out of the lungs.""When you move them to the side of the body again the air is pressed out of the lungs."
"Then one person kneels back of his head and takes hold of his arms between the elbow and the wrist and pulls them back along the ground untilthe hands touch above his head. This draws the air into the lungs, and when you move them to the sides of the body again the air is pressed out of the lungs just as in natural breathing."
"How long do you keep it up?" asked Ethel Brown interestedly while Ethel Blue made silent demonstrations of disapproval.
"For hours—two at least. Many a man has been resuscitated after a longer time. Make the movements about fifteen times a minute—that's pretty nearly what Nature does—and have relays of helpers. There you have the idea," and Roger slipped off Ethel Blue's gag, and helped her up.
"When he really does breathe—my, he must be glad when you do get through with him!"—she panted; "then you begin to work on his circulation, I suppose."
"Correct, ma'am. Rub him from his feet upward so as to drive the blood toward the heart and pack him around with hot water bottles and hot cloths. Give him some coffee to drink and put him to bed in a room with plenty of fresh air."
"He would be tired out, I should think, after having his arms waved around for hours."
"He is," agreed Ethel Blue.
"They generally go right to sleep from exhaustion."
"I'm not surprised. Personally I think I'd rather be rescued before these vigorous measures had to be applied to me."
"The best way to rescue a person who gets over his depth is to grab him from behind."
"So he won't grab you."
"Throw yourself on your back. Put your arms above your head with the backs of the hands together.""Throw yourself on your back. Put your arms above your head with the backs of the hands together."
"Push your legs down and as far apart as they will go. Bring the arms in a steady sweep down to the sides.""Push your legs down and as far apart as they will go. Bring the arms in a steady sweep down to the sides."
"Exactly. A person who thinks he's drowning loses his head and struggles with his rescuer and perhaps they both drown. The best way is to grasp his arms from behind above the elbows and put your knees in the small of his back. That will throw him into a position where he will float. Then hold hisarm with your left hand and swim on your back using your right arm and your legs."
"But I haven't learned to swim on my back."
"Bring the legs together and forward you'll shoot." End of arm stroke."Bring the legs together and forward you'll shoot."End of arm stroke.
"Learn how as soon as you can get on pretty well the other way. Throw yourself on your back and push your legs down and as far apart as they will go; then bring them together and forward you'll shoot. Draw them up to the body again, spread out, clap your heels—there you are. It's just like swimming on your face—"
"Except that you're upside down."
"You can help on by putting your arms above your head with the backs of the hands together and then bringing them in a steady sweep down to the sides. You'd better learn this; it's the thing to do when you have the cramp yourself as well as when the other fellow has it."
"Now let us practice on you," suggested Ethel Blue.
"No, you don't," replied Roger emphatically, and seizing his coat he made a run for liberty, escaping through the front door and slamming it after him.
ETHEL BROWN A HEROINE
DICKY was no longer asleep. Roger's slamming of the front door had roused him and after drowsily rubbing his eyes he had rolled off his cot and stared out of the window to see in what direction Roger was going, for he recognized the footsteps of the brother he admired extravagantly.
Not seeing him from the front window he turned the latch of the door that opened on the upper porch and looked out toward Mayville.
Again there was no Roger and the youngster, still only half awake, wandered about the room hunting for amusement. The house was perfectly quiet, for the Ethels, tired after their strenuous afternoon, were lying in the hammocks behind the house, Ethel Blue working on a new basket and Ethel Brown drawing a design that she hoped to develop into a stencil.
Dicky's cot was in Helen's room and she had accumulated on her bureau a variety of souvenirs, most of which were pinned to the muslin that framed her dressing glass. Dicky climbed on a chair and examined them attentively. Most of them seemed to him quite valueless and he wondered that a person as grown up as Helen should want to keep them.
Wandering into his mother's room his eye was attractedby a shining tray on which stood an alcohol lamp. A box of matches lay beside it ready for instant use if hot water should be needed in the night. Dicky had not seen the lamp in action many times and never had he had the privilege of lighting it. It seemed an unparalleled opportunity.
Its present situation was not convenient, however. The shelf it was on was far too high. Still, that was easily remedied. Dragging forward a chair he mounted upon it, secured his prize, and then laboriously clambered down, breathing heavily from his exertions. Helen's bureau was not so high and on it he placed his treasure, kneeling in front of it on the chair which was still where he had left it.
Careful scrutiny resolved the apparatus into its parts. On top was a cup. He took it off its tripod and laid it on the tray. The tripod underneath held in its embrace a metal container—the thing out of which the pretty blue flame had shot up when Mother set a match on top. Dicky separated these two parts and pushed one to one side of the bureau and one to the other.
Where had the matches gone to? There they were, on the floor, and their rescue necessitated a scramble down and up again. They were safety matches and the production of a light from their unresponsive heads was only accomplished by accident after many attempts which strewed the floor with broken bits of wood.
At last, Oh, joy! a flame flashed up and Dick in ecstasy slipped off the cover of the lamp and dropped the match into the inside. It was a rapturous sight.The light leaped tall and slender, and bent as a breath of air from the window touched it.
Dicky leaned back in his seat and watched it as from an orchestra stall. It was the prettiest thing he had ever personally produced and he was proud of his handiwork.
A stronger puff made a fairy dance of flame. Another puff came in from the door and crossed it and together they raced through the door into mother's room and disappeared. But they seemed to have started a small tempest of breezes. One after another dashed in from door and window and played tag and jostled the flickering light. It bent this way and that way and crouched back into its holder and then leaped out just in time to meet a slap from a bold wind that drew heavily across the room and in passing, sent the flame, Zip! against Helen's muslin draperies.
In a second they were ablaze, shooting upward toward the ceiling. Dicky watched the fire, fascinated with its speed and its faint crackle as if it were chuckling with amusement at its own pranks.
But fun never lasts very long; Dicky had found that out before. In a minute pieces of muslin, all turned black now, began to float down on him. The mirror was not so pretty as it had been, even with Helen's silly souvenirs on it; indeed it had a queer look now as if it was cross at what was going on. In fact, it cracked on one side with a noise like a cat spitting with rage.
Dicky found himself too warm now that one of the muslin curtains from the window had blown overand caught a piece of the flame on its corner. It was nice to watch, but it was rather hot in this room and he was tired of it anyway. He thought he would go down stairs and see if the Ethels were at home.
But when he turned toward the entry door it was closed and another prank of the wind had shut the door into Mother's room. He could not get out anywhere except on to the roof of the porch and that had no stairs. The room roared in his ears and a bit of the hot black stuff fell on his hand. He rushed on to the porch and screamed a strong, piercing shriek that sent all the blood in her body into Ethel Brown's heart when it reached the back of the house and her ears.
With a leap she left the hammock and her drawing behind her and dashed into the house.
"Dicky! Dicky!" she called frantically as she plunged upstairs. "Dicky! Dicky!"
Into Mrs. Morton's room she ran and then pushed open the door into Helen's. A rush of smoke and flame filled her mouth and made her eyes smart.
"Dicky!" she screamed. "Dicky! Where are you?"
Chiming with the crackle of the fire she heard sobbing.
"Dicky!" she cried again. "Ethel's coming. Call me again."
She dropped to the floor where the smoke seemed lighter and under it she saw a gleam of blue—Dicky's rompers—on the porch. Creeping on her hands and knees she reached through the door andseized him by the abundant fulness of his garments. He yelled remonstrance as she tried to draw him back into the smoke-filled room.
"It's all right," she choked. "Shut your eyes and hold your nose. Don't be afraid; Sister's got you," and with talk and wheedling she pulled him through the porch door and across the floor to the entry door. As she opened it the fresh draught caused a new outburst of flame. She managed to shut it in. She and Dicky were safe on the outside.
"Run down stairs quick," she ordered Dicky; "run to James Hancock's and tell him the house is on fire."
As she spoke a whimpering caught her ear. It came from Ethel Blue who was crouching on the stairs.
"The house is on fire, don't you hear it?" shrieked Ethel Brown. "What's the matter? Can't you help? Run and call 'Fire.' Run, I say."
Ethel Blue, stirred to life, disappeared, and Ethel Brown seized one of the hand fire extinguishers which are in every Chautauqua cottage, and attempted to open the door into Helen's room again. A scorching blast drove her back and she gave up the attempt. Thrusting her head out of the window she screamed "Fire," and at the same time saw Dicky running safely toward the Hancocks'. Even in her terror she noticed that in pulling him out of the burning room she had torn his ample bloomers. A hanging rag streamed from them as he ran.
A new thought struck Ethel and she flung herself on the banisters and slid to the foot. When shelooked from the window she had seen the red gleam of a fire alarm box on a tree almost in front of the house. She rushed to it and beat on the glass with her fists.
Almost immediately the wild shriek of a siren tore the air. Footsteps came running from all sides. She had been glad that it happened that no one was at home, but she was equally glad when she saw Mary running from the direction of the Pier. Margaret Hancock called to her that Dicky was safe. Ethel waved her understanding, and seizing the hand of Ethel Blue who appeared from somewhere and clung timidly to her skirt she ran back into the house to get the silver from the dining-room.
"Take this and this and this," she whispered breathlessly, piling Dicky's mug and a handful of forks and another of spoons into Ethel Blue's upheld skirt. "Here's the butter dish. It's lucky we left the tea set at home. Now then, take those to the Hancocks' and I'll go upstairs and see if I can save any of our clothes."
"Oh, Ethel, I ought to go with you," whimpered Ethel Blue.
"Run, I tell you," commanded Ethel Brown who found herself growing cooler every minute.
People were coming into the house now and rushing about with chairs in their hands, uncertain where to set them down. A woman from the boarding house next door began to carry out the china and lay it on the grass, and Mary tossed pans out of the kitchen window and piled the wash tubs full of groceries for the men to move.
From the lake front rose shouting and along the road came one of the chemical engines hauled by the bellboys of the hotel. Another rolled down the steep hill from the Post Office, these men struggling as hard to hold it back as those from the hotel were pulling. Down the same hill came the water hose, and yet other chemicals from the business block, the Book Store, wherever they were kept ready for emergencies. For a few minutes every man was a fire chief and every volunteer shouted commands which he himself was the first to disobey.
But order developed in an amazingly short time. The boarding house between the Mortons and the Hancocks caught fire in spite of the efforts of a bucket brigade which tried to wet down the roof. Consternation reigned when a shout drew the attention of the firemen to the flaming of the sun-dried shingles in one corner and almost at the same moment to the flash of a curtain fired by a mass of cinders whirled from the Mortons' cottage right through an open window.
It was a shout of apprehension, for if this large building went it would be increasingly difficult to save the houses closely crowded beyond. At this critical instant the honk of an automobile horn drew the crowd's attention. The unusual will do that even in times of stress and automobiles are not allowed inside the Assembly grounds.
"It's Mayville! It's the Mayville hose," cried some one, and a hoarse cry of satisfaction went through the onlookers. Just in the nick of time they came, two hose wagons usually drawn by man powerbut now attached to the automobiles of two public-spirited citizens who heard the telephone summons and offered their cars which happened to be standing at the sidewalk.
The salvage crew was working hard in both houses now, and the Hancocks thought it best to remove some of their goods and chattels in case the flames spread beyond the boarding house. The helpers were increased by the audience from the organ recital in the Amphitheatre who left the program unfinished at the first note of the siren. An unceasing procession marched from the burning and the threatened cottages to Miller Park bearing china and glass and furniture. Some one threw Grandmother Emerson's trunk out of the window. It proved not to be locked and its contents spurted all over the walk before the house. Ethel Brown saw it and stuffed clothes and books back into it and called to two men to take it away. Some excited person in the boarding house began to toss bureau drawers down from the top of the front porch. Most of them broke when they struck the ground but the people below gathered up the collars and cravats and underwear and ran with them to the Park. A young girl who was found wandering about the lower floor carefully carrying half an apple pie which she had rescued from the pantry was led in the same direction.
Mrs. Emerson, rushing across the green from her embroidery lesson on the veranda of the Arcade, met Margaret Hancock tugging Dicky along in the direction of the lawn. He was sobbing wildly and hisgrandmother took him in her arms and sat down on a chair amid the piles of furniture to comfort him. From the direction of the Hall of Philosophy where they had been awaiting the coming of the Reading Hour came Mrs. Morton and Mr. Emerson, breaking into a run as they approached near enough to see that the fire was in the direction of their cottage. As they rushed across Miller Park they almost stumbled over Ethel Blue, curled up miserably on top of the old stump that is said to have supported many eloquent orators in the olden days.
"Are you hurt, dear child? Quick, tell me," demanded Mrs. Morton, while her father ran on to the scene of action.
"I'm not hurt. It's our house. I didn't help Ethel," cried the child.
"Where is Ethel? Is Dicky safe?"
The questions seemed to increase the child's agony.
"Can't you tell me? Oh, there's Grandmother with Dicky. Stay with her. And—listen to me—"
Her aunt seized Ethel by the arm and looked her squarely in the eyes.
"You're perfectly safe here. Try to control yourself. Do whatever Grandmother says."
But the child was too wretched to be of any assistance until Mrs. Emerson gave her a specified task.
"Take Dicky over to the Arcade," she directed, "and keep him there. Then I can go and help."
Ethel Blue obeyed miserably, for her very soul was ashamed of her fear. Her father a soldier andshe this weeping, curled-up bunch of cowardice! She burst into tears again as she crossed the green. Dicky, whom Mrs. Emerson had only partially succeeded in quieting, broke into renewed cries and the two soon became the center of a group of women whose sympathy served to increase the children's demonstrations.
"Poor lambs, they're frightened to death," said a cool, sweet voice, and a pink-cheeked, white-haired woman made her way through the throng and spoke to Ethel Blue.
"Come in where it is quiet," she said. "Now drink this water and bathe your eyes and sit down here quietly. Show the little boy these pictures," she directed, and Ethel, having something definite to do, obeyed her.
"I shall be just outside here if you need me. There's nothing to be afraid of."
Back at the fire the helpers were increased by the arrival of the onlookers at the baseball game. They had come on the run from the lower end of the grounds, the two teams, the umpire, and the scorer bringing up the rear. Roger and James and Helen were with this crowd, and they dashed frantically into action when they found out what houses were involved. James helped the men who were recharging the chemical engines. Helen joined the procession carrying household goods to the Park.
"Where are the children?" Roger screamed into his grandfather's ear above the throb of the water from the hose wagons.
"There's Ethel Brown carrying those clothes.Your mother's in Miller Park. I don't know where the others are. I'm going in to find your grandmother," and while Roger rushed after Ethel to question her the old gentleman dashed into the burning cottage and straight up the stairs to his wife's room.
It was only a few minutes before he was brought out again by two of the firemen and stretched on the beach by the lake, with a doctor from the crowd working over him and a nurse who had left her rest hour at the hospital to run to the fire, helping him give first-aid. When he recovered consciousness they summoned help and carried him to Miller Park and laid him on a mattress while the physician went back to see if his services were required by any other sufferers.
Fortunately for Mr. Emerson's peace of mind his wife soon discovered him and told him of the safety of all the other members of the family.
It was almost dark when the "All out" signal sounded from the fire-house, and the Mortons began to think of where they should spend the night. Offers of shelter were plentiful both to them and to the boarders, but Mrs. Morton and Mrs. Emerson accepted Mrs. Hancock's offer. The Hancocks owned the cottage on the other side of the one the Mortons had been occupying. By good luck, it seemed now, it had not been let for the summer, and by greater good luck it had come out of the fire unscathed, thanks to the direction of the wind. It was furnished and ready for use, and Mrs. Hancock and Margaret and James busied themselvescarrying over bedding and towels and table linen. Roger and several neighbors bore Mr. Emerson from the Park on his mattress and established him in a comfortable lower bedroom. Ethel Blue and Dicky were found by Mrs. Morton in the art store and brought home. Helen was sent to the Indiana Cottage to order supper sent in, for Mary's department would not be in order until the next day.
Every member of the family was accounted for when the Director of the Institution stopped at the porch to see if he could do anything for their comfort.
"This young woman is a heroine," he said, patting Ethel Brown's shoulder. "I watched her all through and she behaved like a grown woman."
Ethel Brown, her skirt torn, her blouse smoke-begrimed and her face dirty, smiled at him shyly, and murmured "Thank you."