She looked about her, and carrying Shirley, who was slender and as light of weight as a much younger child, soon discovered the little girl’s room. She caught up the pile of clothes on a chair, and attempted to dress her charge. But Shirley only cried and clung. Jane pulled a silken blanket from the little brass bed, and wrapping the child in it, and rolling her clothes into a bundle, which she tucked under one arm, carried her downstairs and into a small reception-room near the front entrance. Peter, dashing through the silent house toward the rear, hoping to come upon a man-servant somewhere, was met at last by a startled maid. "A room upstairs is on fire," he said. "Any men here to help me put it out? If there are n’t I must send in an alarm. Any fire-extinguishers about?" The girl’s wits scattered at the news, but she managed to recall the fact that the coachman must be at the stable again by this time, and flew to call him. Peter ran back to keep track of events. He saw that the walls were heavy, that the fire was thus far confined to the one room, and that if help came speedily it would not be necessary to call out the fire department, an expedient to be avoided, he felt sure, unless the danger to the house was greater than he thought. But the frightened maid forestalled him in this plan. She ran to the telephone and sent in the alarm herself, although in the confusion of her fright she lost some minutes in getting the message properly reported. Meanwhile, the coachman having arrived to aid Peter, bringing with him the apparatus kept in the stables for the purpose of extinguishing fire, the two were soon successfully fighting the flames without further aid. Shirley, downstairs, was still trembling in Jane’s arms, and incoherently crying for her brother Murray, who, she insisted, had not gone out with the others that evening, but had been reading in the room which was now on fire. At that moment Murray himself came limping in at the open door. The maid met him at the threshold. "O Mr. Murray," she began--and Jane, in the reception-room, heard her--"the house is on fire, and----" "What? Where? Where’s Shirley? Who’s----" Jane, with the child in her arms, appeared at the door of the reception-room. "She ’s here--quite safe," she said; and with an exclamation, Murray came anxiously toward the two. Then he paused and looked up the staircase, for through the distant closed door upstairs could be heard the sounds of voices, shouting directions. The maid was beginning an excited explanation when Jane interrupted her: "My brother is here, and he and your coachman are putting it out, I ’m sure." "Has anybody sent in an alarm?" "I did," said the maid. "The young man told me not to, but how did he know he could put it out? And the master ’d be blamin’ me----"