The Circular Staircase - Page 100/154

It was with a comfortable feeling of security that I went to bed that

night. The door between Gertrude's rooms and mine had been opened,

and, with the doors into the hall bolted, we were safe enough.

Although Liddy persisted in her belief that doors would prove no

obstacles to our disturbers.

As before, Halsey watched the east entry from ten until two. He had an

eye to comfort, and he kept vigil in a heavy oak chair, very large and

deep. We went up-stairs rather early, and through the open door

Gertrude and I kept up a running fire of conversation. Liddy was

brushing my hair, and Gertrude was doing her own, with a long free

sweep of her strong round arms.

"Did you know Mrs. Armstrong and Louise are in the village?" she called.

"No," I replied, startled. "How did you hear it?"

"I met the oldest Stewart girl to-day, the doctor's daughter, and she

told me they had not gone back to town after the funeral. They went

directly to that little yellow house next to Doctor Walker's, and are

apparently settled there. They took the house furnished for the

summer."

"Why, it's a bandbox," I said. "I can't imagine Fanny Armstrong in

such a place."

"It's true, nevertheless. Ella Stewart says Mrs. Armstrong has aged

terribly, and looks as if she is hardly able to walk."

I lay and thought over some of these things until midnight. The

electric lights went out then, fading slowly until there was only a

red-hot loop to be seen in the bulb, and then even that died away and

we were embarked on the darkness of another night.

Apparently only a few minutes elapsed, during which my eyes were

becoming accustomed to the darkness. Then I noticed that the windows

were reflecting a faint pinkish light, Liddy noticed it at the same

time, and I heard her jump up. At that moment Sam's deep voice boomed

from somewhere just below.

"Fire!" he yelled. "The stable's on fire!"

I could see him in the glare dancing up and down on the drive, and a

moment later Halsey joined him. Alex was awake and running down the

stairs, and in five minutes from the time the fire was discovered,

three of the maids were sitting on their trunks in the drive, although,

excepting a few sparks, there was no fire nearer than a hundred yards.

Gertrude seldom loses her presence of mind, and she ran to the

telephone. But by the time the Casanova volunteer fire department came

toiling up the hill the stable was a furnace, with the Dragon Fly safe

but blistered, in the road. Some gasolene exploded just as the

volunteer department got to work, which shook their nerves as well as

the burning building. The stable, being on a hill, was a torch to

attract the population from every direction. Rumor had it that

Sunnyside was burning, and it was amazing how many people threw

something over their night-clothes and flew to the conflagration.