Then, as suddenly as before, the direction of the fall was changed. The chimney, that had been seemingly in one solid piece, broke in the center. Down on top of the shack crashed the bricks and mortar. The corner of the shanty crumpled up like paper, just after most of the reporters had fled. Larry, however, was not so fortunate. When the crash came he was in the far corner of the hut. The breaking and rending of timbers had formed a sort of archway above his head, and the blows from the bricks had been somewhat warded off. Larry had a most narrow escape from sudden death. “Come on out!” called the other reporters to him, as the dust settled. “I can’t!” cried Larry, faintly. CHAPTER XXVII JIMMY IS MISSED “What’s the matter, are you hurt?” asked one of the newspaper men. “My foot is pinned down under a plank!” Larry exclaimed. “I don’t believe I’m hurt much, unless it’s a sprained ankle.” By this time several men engaged by the contractor to help raze the big stack came running up. “We’ll get you out!” the foreman cried. “Heave away, boys!” The laborers heaved away with right good will, and soon had tossed aside the planks that held Larry fast. “Come on out now!” the foreman cried. Larry endeavored to, but failed. He tried to take a few steps, but sank back with a groan. “My ankle’s broken!” he exclaimed. “Let me look at it,” the foreman said, with rough sympathy in his tones. “I’m a sort of doctor. Have to be, with a lot of men getting hurt all the while.” Entering the ruined shack he picked Larry up as easily as if the young reporter was a child, and carried him outside. Then he looked at the right foot, which was the one that pained the lad. The ankle was swollen, and the shoelaces were stretched tight across the instep. The foreman whipped out his knife, and cut the strings. “That’s better,” said Larry, with a sigh of relief. “It’s only sprained, not broken,” the foreman announced, after gently feeling of the injury. “You’ll be laid up a week or so.” “Can’t I walk now; I mean in a little while?” asked Larry. “Not unless you want to lame yourself permanently.” “But I’ve got to!” the lad exclaimed. “I’ve got to send the story of this thing in.” “Say, don’t you worry about the story,” exclaimed one of the other reporters. “We’ll look out for you, all right. Stanley will telephone it in for you, and tell how you got laid up. We’re not after a beat on this. Don’t worry.” “But I’m afraid Mr. Emberg will want to hear from me,” said Larry, who, if he had developed any faults yet as a newspaper man, was blessed with that of being too conscientious. “I’ll drive you to the telephone station in my rig,” volunteered the foreman. “I guess your sprained ankle won’t prevent you from talking, provided you feel you have to do it.”