Thanks to them, not a life was lost, although there were several narrow escapes. Once when the guests had assembled and a count was taken to see that no one was missing, some one exclaimed: “Well, where’s Mrs. Newcome? Has any one seen her?” Then there was a rush and a scurrying for the second floor, but the guests were met on the stairs by Joe Warren and Tom Harris, carrying the little old lady in their arms. They had knocked at her door and had received no response, and so, hurling themselves at the flimsy door, had burst it in, and found her on the floor in a dead faint. “Perhaps this will kind of square accounts with the poor old lady,” said Joe Warren, as they laid her gently down at a safe distance from the fire. “She used to complain that we made more noise than a band of wild Indians, and were always disturbing her afternoon naps, but I guess she won’t complain of our disturbing this nap.” Then the boys left her in the care of the guests, and hurried back to the fire. The fire had gained rapid headway, and there was no hope of saving the new part of the hotel, at least. The old-fashioned town fire-engine came rattling up in charge of Captain Sam, but, though the guests and villagers and the boys all took turns at the pumps, the machine could do little more than throw a feeble stream up as high as the base of the second-story windows. The water-supply of the hotel, which was pumped by a windmill at a distance, was of more avail, but it was helpless against the headway that the flames had gained. Soon the whole front end of the hotel collapsed, sending up a fierce cloud of smoke, ashes, and sparks. “Lucky we’re not in there now,” exclaimed one of the guests. “By the way, has anybody stopped to think that we should all probably have been burned to death if it hadn’t been for these boys that we’ve been complaining of all summer? Guess we’ll owe them a vote of thanks, at least, when this is over.” “We can’t be too thankful that everybody’s saved,” said another. “That all may be,” growled Colonel Witham, “but I can’t see so much to be thankful for in watching a twenty-five thousand dollar hotel burn to pieces, and I’ve got the lease of it—” But his sentence was interrupted by a piercing wail that came from the scene of the fire, and, following the sound of the noise, one and all looked up in time to see a large, handsome tiger cat leap from a window from which smoke was pouring to a narrow ledge which was as yet untouched by the flames. There it crouched, crying with fear. “Oh, it’s poor Jerry! It’s my poor Jerry!” cried a thin, piping voice, and old Mrs. Newcome, roused from her faint, came forward, trembling and waving her hands helplessly. “Oh, can’t somebody save him?” she cried. “He knows more than lots of these boys. Why don’t somebody do something?”