Barriers Burned Away Part 59

"Fleet, is that all you have saved from the fire?" asked the doctor, with a humorous twinkle, pointing to Christine.

"I am well satisfied," said Dennis, quietly, but with rising color.

"I should have perished, had not Mr. Fleet come to my rescue," continued Christine, warmly, glad of an opportunity to express a little of her grat.i.tude.

The doctor turned his genial, humorous eye on her and said: "Don't be too grateful, Miss Ludolph; he is a young man, and only did his duty.

Now if I had been so fortunate you might have been as grateful as you pleased."

It was Christine's turn to grow rather rosier than even the red fire warranted, but she said, "You would have your joke, doctor, if the world were burning up."

"Yes, and after it burned up," he replied. "What do you think of that, Miss Ludolph, with your German scepticism?"

Tears came in Christine's eyes, and she said, in a low tone, "I am glad to say that I have lost my German scepticism in the fire also."

"What!" cried the doctor, seizing both her hands in his hearty way.

"Will you accept of our Christian superst.i.tion?"

"I think I have accepted your glorious Christian truth, and the thought makes me very happy."

"Well, now I can almost say, Praise G.o.d for the fire, though old Dr.

Arten must commence again where the youngsters are who kick up their heels in their office all day."

With professional instinct he slipped his finger on Christine's pulse, then rummaged in his pocket and soon drew out some powders, and in his brusque way made her take one.

"Oh, how bitter!" she exclaimed.

"That is the way the ladies treat me," began the merry bachelor: "not an ounce of grat.i.tude when I save their lives. But let a young fellow like Fleet come along and get them out of danger by mere brute strength, instead of my delicate, skilful way, and language breaks down with their thanks. Very well, I shall have compensation--I shall present my bill before long. And now, young man, since you have set out to rescue my little friend here, you had better carry the matter through, for several reasons which I need not urge. Your best chance is to make your way northward, and then continue around the west, where you can find food and shelter;" and with a hearty grasp of the hand, the brave, genial old man wished them "G.o.d speed!"

Dennis told him of the poor German woman, and then pushed on in the direction indicated. But Christine was growing weak and exhausted. At last they reached the Catholic cemetery. It was crowded with fugitives and the fire to the northwest still cut off all escape, even if Christine's strength had permitted further exertion. It was now approaching midnight, and she said, wearily: "Mr. Fleet, I am very sorry, but I fear I cannot take another step. The powder Dr. Arten gave me strengthened me for a time, but its effect is pa.s.sing away, and I feel almost paralyzed with fatigue. I am not afraid to stay here, or indeed anywhere now."

"It seems a very hard necessity that you should have to remain in such a place, Miss Ludolph, but I see no help for it. We are certainly as well off as thousands of others, and so I suppose ought not to complain."

"I feel as if I could never complain again, Mr. Fleet. I only hope my father is as safe and as well as we are. I cannot tell you how my heart goes out toward him now that I see everything in a different light.

I have not been a true daughter, and I do long to make amends. He surely has escaped, don't you think?"

"Mr. Ludolph was possessed of unusual sagacity and prudence," said Dennis, evasively. "What any man could do, he could. And now, Miss Ludolph, I will try to find you a resting-place. There are such crowds here that I think we had better go nearer that side, where early in the evening the fire drove people away."

The cemetery had not been used of late years, and many of the bodies had been removed. This caused excavations here and there, and one of these from which the gathered leaves and gra.s.s had been burned, Dennis thought might answer for Christine's couch, as in the hollow of this vacant and nearly filled grave she would be quite sheltered from the wind, and the sand was still warm from the effects of the fire. To his surprise she made no objection.

"I am so weary that I can rest anywhere," she said, "and a grave is not to me what it was once."

He arranged her shawl so that it might be mattress, pillow, and covering, and wrapped her up.

"And how will you endure the long, cold hours, my friend?" she asked, looking up most sympathetically.

"Thanks to your kindness, I had such a good sleep this afternoon that I feel strong and rested," he replied, with a smile.

"I fear you say so to put my mind at rest;" but even as she spoke her eyes closed and she went to sleep like a tired and trusting child. As with Dennis a few hours before, the limit of nature's endurance had been reached, and the wealthy, high-born Miss Ludolph, who on Sabbath night had slept in the midst of artistic elegance and luxury, now, on Monday night, rested in a vacant grave under the open and storm-gathering sky. Soon--to be accurate, at two o'clock on the morning of Tuesday--rain began to fall. But, with all the discomfort it brought, never had rain been more welcome.

Christine s.h.i.+vered in her sleep, and Dennis looked around vainly for some additional covering. The thronging fugitives were all in a similar plight, and their only course was simply to endure till some path of escape opened.

The night was indeed a long one to him. At first excitement and happiness kept him awake and unconscious of time and discomfort. But he soon felt how weary and hungry he was, for he had eaten nothing since his slight supper on Sabbath evening. The heat of the fire perceptibly lessened as the rain began falling, and without his coat Dennis was soon chilled to the bone. On every side he heard moans of discomfort, and he knew that he had far more reason to endure patiently than many near him. He tried to keep himself warm by walking around, but at last he grew too weary for that, and sat, a patient, cowering watcher, at the head of Christine's weird couch, listening sadly at times to the pitiful crying of little children and the sighs and groans of older sufferers.

At last the light of welcome day streaked the eastern horizon, and Christine opened her eyes in a bewildered way, but, on seeing him swaying backward and forward with half-closed eyes, sprang up and said, "And have you sat and watched there all the long night?"

"I hope you feel rested and better, Miss Ludolph," he replied, startled from drowsiness by her voice.

"It has been raining, too. I fear you are wet through. Oh, how much you must have suffered on my account!"

"I imagine you are as wet as I am, Miss Ludolph. This has been a very democratic experience for you. We are all about alike in this strange camping-ground."

"No; your kindness made me quite comfortable. Indeed, I never slept better. And you, without any coat or shelter, have watched patiently hour after hour."

"Well, you did as much for me yesterday afternoon, so we are quits."

"I think there is a great difference," she said. "And remember what a watcher I made; I let those drunken creatures run over you."

"I don't see how you could have helped it," said he, laughing. "That you should have cared for me as you did was a favor that I never expected," he added, blus.h.i.+ng.

She blushed too, but made no reply; at the same time she was vexed with herself that she did not. Dennis, with a lover's blindness, misunderstood her silence, and thought that, as a friend, she was more grateful than he could wish, but he must speak in no other character.

Then he remembered that it would be dishonorable to urge his suit under the circ.u.mstances; it would be a source of inexpressible pain to her, with her strong sense of obligation, to put aside expressions of his deeper regard, and he resolved to avoid if possible any manifestations of his feelings. While she was dependent upon him he would act the part of a brother toward her, and if his human love could never find its consummation, he would bear his loss as patiently as possible. But in spite of himself a tinge of sadness and restraint came into his manner, and Christine sighed to herself, "If _he_ only knew, and _I_ only knew, just the truth, how much happier we might be!" There was a general movement now in the strangely a.s.sorted mult.i.tude. The fire had swept everything away so completely on the north side that there were not hot blazing ruins to prevent crossing. Accordingly men came pouring over, looking for their families. On every side were cries of joy on recognition of those whom fear and terrible forebodings had buried under the blackened remains of once happy homes. But mingled with exclamations of joy were sobs and wails of anguish, as some now realized in the lapsing hours that absent members of the household were lost.

Christine looked in vain for her father; at last Dennis said: "Miss Ludolph, do you feel equal to the effort of crossing to the west side?

You must be faint with hunger, and there only can we hope for help."

"Oh, yes! let us go at once, for your sake as well as mine;" for she saw that his long fasting and great fatigue had made him very haggard.

They urged their way across the burned district as fast as their exhausted state would permit, carefully avoiding burning brands that still lay in the street.

"I hope you will have patience with me in my slow progress," said Christine, "for I feel as I imagine Rip Van Winkle must have done, after his twenty years' nap."

"I think you have borne up heroically, Miss Ludolph," said Dennis, warmly.

"Oh, no! I am not in the least heroic, but I confess that I am very hungry. I never knew what hunger was before. Well, I can now appreciate what must often be the condition of the poor, and hope not to be so forgetful of them hereafter."

"I am glad to hear you say that you are hungry, Miss Ludolph, for it proves that with care you will rally after this dreadful exposure, and be your former self."

"Ah! Mr. Fleet, I hope I shall never be my old self again. I shudder when I think what I was when you awakened me that dreadful night."

"But I have feared," said he, ever avoiding any reference to his own services, "that, though you might escape the fire, the exposure would be greater than you could endure. I trembled for you last night when it began to rain, but could find no additional covering."

"No brother could be kinder or more thoughtful of me," she said, turning upon him a glad, grateful face.

"That is it," thought Dennis. "She hints to me what must be our relations.h.i.+p. She is the Baroness Ludolph, and is pledged to a future that I cannot share."

But as he saw her grat.i.tude, he resolved all the more resolutely not to put it to the hard test of refusing his love. A little later he unconsciously sighed wearily, and she looked at him wistfully.

"Oh, that I _knew_ if he felt toward me as he once did!" she said to herself.