CHAPTER XII. IN PERIL OF HIS LIFE.
In the meantime, outside the building suspense had reached almost thebreaking point. The Scouts still stood steady and staunch, but theirfaces were white and drawn. When the crash that announced the fallingfloor came, a man, wrought beyond the bearing point, cried out:
"There goes his last chance, poor kid!"
"Shut up, can't you," breathed a fierce, tense voice in his ear the nextinstant. "Don't you see his father and mother back there?"
It was only too true. Attracted by the excitement, Rob's father andmother had driven to the scene in their car. They reached it just in timeto hear of Rob's heroic act. Now, white-faced and trembling, they sathand in hand wretchedly waiting for news. As time passed and the flamesrose higher without a sign of the daring lad, their hearts almost ceasedto beat. Seconds seemed hours, minutes eternity.
Then suddenly came a fearful cry. On the roof there had appeared thefigure of Rob with a bundle which the crowd readily guessed to be thejanitor's child clasped tightly in his arms. The flames, leaping from thecupola, illumined his form brightly and showed his pale, tense face.Thwarted in his effort to descend by the stairway, Rob had managed toreach the roof through a scuttle.
"He's done it! Hurrah! The boy's saved the baby!" went up anear-splitting cry from the unthinking in the crowd.
The others knew only too well that the reason that Rob had appeared onthe roof betokened the terrible fact that his escape had been cut off. Hewas making a last desperate stand, with the flames drawing closer, andthreatening to burst through the roof at any moment.
Every eye in that crowd was fixed on the solitary figure on the roof.
"Ladders! Get ladders," yelled the foreman, hoping against hope that onecould be found tall enough to reach to that height.
Rob came forward to the cornice, and looked over as if gauging theheight. They saw him shake his head. Then he looked behind him. Alas,there, too, all hope of escape was cut off. Between himself and an ironfire-escape at the back of the building, tongues of flame were nowshooting through the roof.
"He's shouting something. Keep still, for heaven's sake!" came Merritt'svoice suddenly.
A death-like silence followed. Then above the roar and crackle came afaint sound. It was Rob calling out some commands.
"A rope!--shoot it up here," was all they could distinguish.
Merritt darted forward and stood below the walls.
"Louder, Rob! Louder!" he besought.
"A rope! Bow--arrow--shoot it up!" came Rob's voice, audible to few, buthis chum Merritt was the only one that understood. He was back among theScouts in a flash. He seized Paul Perkins by the shoulder.
"Paul, your house is nearest. Run! Run as you never ran before and getyour archery bow and lots of arrows."
Paul didn't stop to ask the meaning of this strange command, but dartedoff at top speed, the crowd opening for him.
"Ropes! Ropes and lots of string!" shouted Merritt next, appealing to thethrong. Those who were closest realized that a plan to save Rob--althoughwhat it was they couldn't imagine--was to be tried. Neighbors of theAcademy ran off at once and in a few minutes the Scouts were busy, underMerritt's directions, knotting ropes together to form one long line.
When this had been done, Merritt measured with his eye the height of theAcademy walls. Then he set them to work knotting light twine together inas long a line as they could make. By this time Paul was back with thebow and arrow that the Scouts used at archery practice.
"Give it here," ordered Merritt tersely if ungrammatically.
What he was going to try was a repetition of the trick that had rescuedsome of the Eagle Patrol when they were imprisoned on the top of RubyGlow in the Adirondacks on their memorable treasure hunt.
With a hand that was far from steady, Merritt knotted the end of thelight string to an arrow. Then, placing the arrow in position, he drewthe bow. It was plain enough to the dullest-witted now what he meant todo. His plan was to shoot the arrow, with the string attached, up on theroof where Rob could seize it. This done, it would be possible for thelatter--if he had time--to haul up the rope, knot it to a chimney andslide down. It was a daring, desperate plan, but none other offered, andthe fact that Rob had suggested it showed that his nerve was not likelyto fail him in what might be aptly described as a supreme test.
Amid a dead silence Merritt let the arrow fly. It shot through the air,but instead of reaching the roof it struck the wall and rebounded. A crywent up from the watching crowd as it fell, having failed to accomplishits purpose. If Rob's face changed as he stood up there on the edge ofthe fire-illumined roof, it was not visible to those below him, keen ashis disappointment must have been.
But Merritt was almost sobbing as he picked up the arrow and fitted itafresh for another trial. As he drew the bow with every ounce of strengthhe possessed, his lips moved in prayer that his next effort might besuccessful. At any moment now, the foreman of the fire-fighters told him,the roof might collapse, carrying with it the brave boy and his childishburden.
On the outskirts of the crowd, too, a white-faced man and woman wereimploring Divine Providence to nerve Merritt's arm and aim. For oneinstant the bowstring was drawn taut till it seemed that the bow mustsnap under the terrific pressure.
Then suddenly the string fell slack, the arrow whizzed through the airand a mighty cheer split the sky as it winged true and swift to the rooftop, falling almost at Rob's feet. Hand over hand he drew in the string,and at last he had hauled up enough rope to knot one end fast about someornamental stone work at a corner of the building.
While doing this he had laid the child down. Now he was seen to pick herup again, and holding her in his arms for an instant he appeared toconsider. To slide down that rope he must have at least one arm free. Howwas he going to do it? The crowd almost forebore to breathe as theysensed what the boy on the roof was puzzling over.
It was Rob's scout training that solved the problem--one of life anddeath for him--as this same training is doing all over the world for ladsin every grade of life to-day. He was seen to give the child someemphatic instructions and then throw her over his left shoulder much ashe might have done with a bag of meal. In this position the child's headhung down between his shoulders. Her legs were across his chest.
Seizing the baby's left arm so that it came over his right shoulder, Robextended his left hand between its knees and grasped the little one'swrist firmly. In this position she was held perfectly securely in whatall Boy Scouts know as "The Fireman's Lift," one of the most usefulaccomplishments a Boy Scout can master.
This done, the most difficult, dangerous part of Rob's task came. He hadto slide down that rope with his burden on his shoulder with only hisright arm and his legs to depend on for a grip. But it had to be done.Without hesitation he swung himself from the coping and gripped the rope.
For one terrible instant he shot down for a foot or so before hesucceeded in checking his downward plunge. But his knees gripped the ropeand his right arm stood the strain, although he felt as if it must snap.
How he reached the ground Rob never knew. Those last terrible moments onthe roof had come very near to breaking his nerve. He was conscious of asudden flare of light and a crash as his feet touched the ground. Itcrossed his mind hazily that part of the roof must have fallenin--perhaps the part on which he had been standing. Then came a rush offeet, shouts, cries, and arms flung about him, and through it all Robcould hear his mother's glad cry of relief after the awful tension shehad endured. He tried to say something and failed, and then everythingraced round and round him at breakneck speed.
"He's fainting!" he was conscious that somebody was shouting, and hecould hear himself, only it seemed like somebody else, saying:
"No, I'm all right," and then everything grew blank to the Boy Scout whohad won, through "Being Prepared" for a great emergency.