CHAPTER X

SAVING THE FLAGS

"Telephone for the town fire department!" cried Dr. Mead, who had been apprised of the fire. He, like all the others, was out in the storm, with a few clothes he had hastily donned.

"They can't get in the boiler-room to fight the fire!" cried Socker.

"Why not?"

"Because the boiler will blow up. Something is wrong with the safety valve, and there are two hundred pounds of steam on. The boiler is only meant for one hundred."

"How did the fire start? What made the safety valve get out of order?" asked the principal.

The group of students and teachers, standing in the storm, could now see the bright flicker of flames in the boiler-room. "I don't know," replied Socker. "I was asleep in front of the boiler, waiting to put some more coal on, when all of a sudden I smelled smoke."

"How long before the boiler will go up?" asked Dr. Mead anxiously. "I have some valuable books I must save."

He started to re-enter the school.

"Don't go back!" cried Socker. "It's liable to go up any minute!"

Dr. Mead returned to the waiting group, his face betraying intense excitement.

"We must get the fire out!" he cried. "Can't some one send word to the village?"

"There's a telephone in Mr. Raspen's house, about half a mile away," volunteered Sam. "I'll run there."

He started off, and just as he did so a series of alarming cries broke out at one of the upper corridor windows of the school.

"Fire! Fire!" cried a voice. "Der school ist being gonsumed by der fierce elements! Safe me, somebodies! I must get out my German flag! I must out get quvick, alretty yet!"

The anxious face of Professor Garlach appeared at one of the windows.

"Don't jump!" cried Jack, as the teacher seemed about to do so. "You've got time enough to come down the stairs."

"B-r-r-r-r! It's cold!" cried Nat Anderson, as some snow got inside the slippers he had put on, and some flakes sifted down his back.

"It will soon be warm enough," observed Jack. "The fire is gaining. Poor Washington Hall! It deserved a better fate than being burned down."

"Look!" cried Sam, who had paused in his run to go to the telephone. "There's Socrat."

The French professor had joined his German colleague at the window, and both were struggling to climb out of it.

"Stand aside, German brute zat you aire!" exclaimed the Frenchman. "I must save ze glorious flag of la belle France! Let me toss it out of ze window!"

"I vill nottings of der kind do alretty yet!" responded Professor Garlach. "I vos here firstest!"

"Zen you are no gentlemans!" was Professor Socrat's reply. "Bah! Sacre! Let me out, I demand of you! I am insult zat you should flout zat rag in my eyes!"

The wind had blown the German flag, which Professor Garlach held, into the face of the Frenchman.

"Rag! Hein! You call dot glorious flag a rag! Himmel! I vill of der mincemeat you make now!"

Professor Garlach made a grab for his enemy. To do so he lost his hold on his precious flag. It fluttered out of the window and to the ground.

"Save it! Save it!" he cried, leaning out. "My flag!"

"I'll get it," shouted Jack.

With a quick movement the German snatched the French colors from the hand of Professor Socrat. An instant later that, too, was fluttering to the snow.

"Oh! la belle tri-color! It is insult! I moost have blood to satisfy my honaire!" shouted the Frenchman.

He made a lunge, and clasped Professor Garlach about the neck. The two struggled at the window. With a quick wit Jack grabbed the two flags, and, waving them, intertwined, above his head, he shouted:

"See, professors! A German-French alliance at last. Both flags are saved. They have not touched the ground. Now come on down and get them. Quick! The fire is gaining!"

"Ach! Dot is goot! Der flag is not sullied!" called Professor Garlach.

"And mine also--my beautiful tri-color, eet is safe!" added Professor Socrat. "Ranger, you are ze one grand gentleman. I salute you!" and the enthusiastic Frenchman blew Jack a kiss.

The two enemies, reconciled by the flag incident, embraced each other, and as Jack called to them to make haste down the stairway, they disappeared from the window.

Meanwhile, the smoke was pouring from the boiler-room, and the flames were brighter. Sam had raced off through the storm to the telephone to summon the fire department.

"Say, I don't believe that boiler's going to blow up," announced Jack. "If it was going to, it would have done so long ago. I'm going to take a look."

"No, no," begged Socker. "You'll all risk your life!"

"Don't be rash, Ranger," cautioned Dr. Mead.

"I think Socker exaggerated the danger," replied our hero. "I'm going to take a look."

He ran back to the engine-room and looked in. He could see the boiler plainly, as the place was brightly illuminated by the flames. His eyes sought the steam gage.

"Why!" he cried. "There are only twenty pounds of steam on! Socker took it for two hundred. There's no danger. That's a low pressure."

Then he raised his voice in a shout:

"Come on, fellows! Help put out the fire! There's no danger! The boiler's all right!"

There was an immediate rush. Jack still held his extinguisher, and Nat Anderson had secured one. Several other students, hearing Jack's reassuring news, rushed into the school, and came back with pieces of hand apparatus.

"Now to douse the fire!" yelled Jack, again turning on the chemical stream.

"Use snow!" cried Bob Movel. "That will help!"

He scooped up some in a water pail that he had emptied, and tossed the mass of white crystals on the edge of the flames, which were in one corner of the boiler-room. There was a hissing sound, a cloud of steam arose, and the fire at that particular point died out.

"That's the stuff!" cried Jack, and other students and some of the teachers followed Bob's example. The fire was fast being gotten under control, and Socker, returning to the boiler-room, had attached a small hose to a faucet, and was playing water on the flames.

Suddenly, above the noise made by the shouting lads, the hiss of snow and water, and the snapping of the flames, there sounded a cry of distress.

"Help! Help! Help!"

"Some one is caught by the flames! They must have eaten their way up to the upper floors!" cried Dr. Mead.

"It iss dot boy Snaith--he und two odders!" announced Professor Garlach, rushing into the boiler-room, his beloved German flag clasped in his arms, where Jack had placed it.

"Quick! Sacre! We must not let zem perish!" added Professor Socrat, as he caught up a big fire shovel and dashed from the basement. "I will rescue zem!"

"Und me also," added Professor Garlach as he grabbed up a long poker.

"There can't be much danger," said Jack. "The fire is almost out. Here, Nat, you keep things moving here, and I'll take a look."

He ran out into the storm. Looking up at the side of the school, he saw, framed in a window, behind which a light burned, the figures of Dock Snaith, Pud Armstrong and Glen Forker.

"Save us! Save us!" cried Dock. "We can't get out."

"Catch me! I'm going to jump!" yelled Pud.

"No! no! Don't!" Jack called. "There's no danger. I'll come and get you!" and he dashed into the main entrance of the school.