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Young Lord Desborough was the speaker. He had risen in some excitement from the table where he had been seated at breakfast, for James Harmer had just come in with the news that the fire was still burning with the same fierceness as of old; that it had spread beyond the city walls, Ludgate and Newgate having both been reduced to a heap of smoking ruins; that it was spreading northward and westward as fiercely as ever; whilst even in an easterly direction it was creeping slowly and insidiously along, so that men began to whisper that the Tower itself would eventually fall a prey.
James Harmer went frequently into the city to see after certain things, and to ascertain that his own and his neighbour's houses were safe.
Then from the kitchen window she saw the auto, still standing before their door. "Oh, my gracious!" she gasped. "We forgot that driver." She got her purse and hurried outside, but the driver was gone, and only the car remained. Carol was too ignorant of motor-cars to observe that it was a Harmer Six, she only wondered how on earth he could go off and forget his car.
It was no wonder, in the hearing of such stories as these of which there were many that Mary Harmer rejoiced to have her brother's household safely housed and out of danger, and that she earnestly begged them to remain with her at least until the merry Christmastide should be overpast.
We must see what can be done. It will not do to let the flames get a hold. This strong dry wind will spread them west and north with terrible speed, if something be not done to check them!" James Harmer spoke with the air of a man who is used to offices of authority. He had exercised one so long during the crisis of the plague, that the habit of thinking for his fellow citizens still clung to him.
"A good thought, in truth," answered Harmer thoughtfully. "But surely his Majesty knows?" "Ay, after a fashion doubtless; but it takes some little time to rouse the lion spirit in him. He is wont to laugh and jest somewhat too much, and dally with news, whilst he throws the dice with his courtiers, or passes a compliment to some fair lady.
Harmer had always been a careful and cautious man, laying by against a rainy day, and not striving after a rapid increase of wealth. But the Master Builder had worked on different lines.
It could not but rankle in the father's heart that, for the time being, he had no home to offer to his child. He had been staying with his good friend James Harmer all this while, who had left his wife and family at Islington to regain their full health and strength, while he spent his time between the Bridge house and the cottage.
But who can tell how many other victims such a miserable creature may not have infected first?" "Ay, that is the terror of it," said Harmer. "All are saying that nurses must be found to care for the sick, and many are very resolved that the houses where the distemper is found should be straitly shut up and guarded by watchmen, that none go forth.
Out of her own modest abundance, Mary Harmer supplied food and clothing to numbers of poor creatures, who might otherwise be in danger of perishing; and she bid the boys be ready to help her in her labour of love, because she had ofttimes more to do than one pair of hands could accomplish, and her little serving girl had run off in alarm the very first time she opened her door to a poor sick lady with an infant in her arms, who had escaped from the city only to die out in the country.
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