"Isn't it just fine?" she said. "I wish mother could see this crowd." "I imagine you would like to have her see lots of things," returned Laura. "Our friend at the hospital, for instance." "Who--who do you mean?" gasped Janet, evidently disturbed. "The man who was hurt, I mean." "Oh! He is quite interesting," said the other girl and slipped away. Laura's suggestion had seemingly startled her. The band played, and then the mayor stepped forward to make his speech. At just this moment a motor car moved quietly in beside the curb near which Laura Belding stood guarding her red pot. Somebody called her name in a low tone, and Laura turned to greet Prettyman Sweet's mother with a smile. Mrs. Sweet was alone in the tonneau of her car, which Purt himself was driving. The school exquisite, who was so often the butt of the boys' jokes, but was just now an object of suspicion, admired Laura Belding immensely. He got out of the car to come and stand with her on the corner. "Got your nonskid-chains on, Purt?" asked Laura. "On the rear wheels? Surely," said Sweet, eyeing the girl in some surprise, because of her question. "My dear Laura!" cried Mrs. Sweet "Won't you come and talk to me while we are waiting?" "Can't now, Mrs. Sweet. I am on duty," laughed Laura. They could not hear what the mayor said, for they were two blocks away. But they had an excellent view of the stand and the Red Cross booth, and the crowd that pressed close to the police ropes. Suddenly the mayor threw up his hand in command, and almost instantly--as though he had himself switched off the light--all the street lamps in the business section of Centerport went out The arc light over the spot where Laura stood blinked, glowed for a moment, and then subsided. Mrs. Sweet cried out in alarm. "This is all right," Laura called to her. "Now watch." The mayor, in the half-darkness, stepped down from the platform and threw into the heart of the big bonfire the combustibles that set it off. The flames leaped up, spreading rapidly. The crowd cheered as eight boys, dressed in the knee-length dominos they had worn on the night of the ice carnival, dashed into the ring with resinous torches. They thrust the torches into the flames and the instant the torches were alight, they wheeled and dashed away through the lanes the police had kept open. The red flames dancing before the Red Cross booth, and the sparking, flaming torches which the boys swung above their heads as they ran through the crowd to the various corners where the red pots hung, made an inspiring picture in the unwonted gloom of the streets. "See how the Red Cross spreads!" cried Laura. "There's Nellie's fire going." They could see the spark of new fire under the pot a block away. A short figure with flaming torch was approaching Laura's corner at high speed. "Here comes Short and Long, I do believe," drawled Prettyman Sweet.