for
Miriam wasn't what you'd call a pastel. She was built a good deal on the
lines of an L-road pillar, but that didn't bar her from wearin' one of
these short-sleeved square-necked, girly-girly dresses that didn't leave
you much in doubt as to her framework.

Yes, Miriam could have stood a few well-placed pads. She'd lived long
enough to have found that out, too, but they was missin'. I should guess
that Miriam had begun exhibitin' her collar-bones to society about the
time poor old John L. fought the battle of New Orleans. Yet when she
snuggled the butt end of that violin down under her chin and squinted at
you across the bridge, she had all the motions of a high-school girl.

'Course, I didn't dope all this out to myself at the time; for, as I was
sayin', I didn't size her up special. But it all came to me
afterwards--yes, yes!

The excitement broke loose along about the middle of that first night.
I'd turned in about an hour before, and I was poundin' my ear like a
circus hand on a Sunday lay-over, when I hears the trouble cry. First
off I wasn't goin' to do any more than turn over and get a fresh hold on
the mattress, for I ain't much on routin' out for fires unless I feel
the head-board gettin' hot. But then I wakes up enough to remember that
Rockywold is a long ways outside the metropolitan fire district, and I
begins to throw clothes onto myself.

Inside of two minutes I was outdoors lookin' for a chance to win a
Carnegie medal. There wasn't any show at all, though. The fire, what
there was of it, was in the kitchen, in the basement of the wing where
the help stays. Half a dozen stablemen had put it out with the garden
hose, and were finishin' the job by soakin' one of the cooks, when I
showed up.

I watched 'em for a while, and then started back to my room. Somehow I
got twisted up in the shrubbery, and instead of goin' back the way I
came, I gets around on the other corner. Just about then a ground-floor
window is shoved up, and a female in white floats out on a little stone
balcony. She waves her arms and begins to call for help.

"You're late," says I. "It's all over."

That didn't satisfy her at all, though. Some smoke and steam was still
comin' from the far side of the buildin', and it was blowin' in through
another window.

"Help, help!" she squeals. "Help, before I jump!"

"I wouldn't," says I, "they've gone home with the life net."

"The smoke, the smoke!" says she. "Oh, I must jump!"

"W