Historical Newspapers of South Carolina

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CHAPTER VII. * i ♦li- - HE ladders went up quiekly, but. to the breathless crowd .hat now blackened every housetop and choked Bowen street with a mass of ui> turned white faces touched with the glow of tire It seemed as if the com pany was unusually slow. Before the ladders had reached a perpendicular, before they had trembled, swaying over toward the building, a dozen faces appeared at the upper windows beside tbj Cl4id .with her charge, beckoning frantically for help. “See! See ther<'!" Barton cried again .with the same nervous tension which he had shown since leaving his rooms. ^ A figure leaped out of the upper win dow, whirled over twice, striking the upper extension of the ladders, and fell Into the street. The crowd groaned. A second ligure stood out on a window sill and, throwing up its arms, with a ehrill cry more beastly than human, flung itself ut toward the ladders now leaning over toward the building. It was a woman. She actually touched one of the iadder rounds with her An gers and for a second the crowd thought she had grasped it, but for only a second. The body shot down ward, and Barton and Gordon closed their eyes and involuntarily put their hands up o*/er their ears to shut out the horrible. sound. Again the crowd groaned, and a wild beast yell arose. “The life blanket!” some one shriek ed, and it was only after the whole thing was history that Bowen street learned that owing to the narrow courts and the broken pavements the department was fatally hindered in all Its movements and the wagon carrying the life blanket had overturned at a corner, killing the driver and maiming one of the horses so that it had to be shot. Make out another indictment for murder against a municipality which deliberately robs the people of its rights in order to keep the wheels of the political machine moving. What are human lives compared with the spoils of office and the plunder that is a part of political service to the powers that be? ■r 7 The ladder fell over and touched the window sill where the child of the tenements was standing with her bur den. and then a scene occurred that will never leave John Gordon as long as he toils on bearing human woes on his brave and bleeding heart. The child suddenly disappeared, and In her place could he seen two men and a woman lighting like wild beasts for the first ennneo at the ladder which rested on the sill. A llreinan was climb ing up and had almost reached the maddened lighters. At the other win dows wild, imploring faces begged in agony for life. Two more forms were seen to Jump from the windows at the corner farthest from the ladder. The fin* was now bursting through the roof, and one group from the window next the lighters above the ladder fell back as if a floor had given way—all this in tbj few seconds it took to be burned Into Gordon with awful detail- -when he saw the ladder rise to a perpendicular as if some giant hand had pushed it back. It rose until it stood stnught, the solitary figure of the fireman silhouet ted against the blazing wall, and then the entire front of the house, with a roar that gathered volume in u sicken ing rush of death, fell over Into the street, burying in one mingled mass the fireman who had been standing on the ladder, his companion at the foot and the crowd In the street that, caught In a trap, could not escape even if there hud been time to give warning of the danger. For one awful second Gordon and Barton, who hud been standing just outside the reach of the falling wall, looked Into the blazing Interior of the tenement. Figures within that roaring furnace leaped down into U from floors and window ledges. Others Jumped In to the street. They looked like great Insects leaping into Jets of flame. Then with a deafening crash the remaining side walls fell Inward. The rear wall remained standing for a minute, then swayed and crashed backward upon the lo ver buildings behind, whore at once ! re broke out in a dozen places. To the friends it seemed as if the air suddenly hind with groans, with ap peal.-'., wiih cries that were like curses, like wails of sjarits that had been de nied ail »arilily happiness and by the greed of s"l!ish man had now been con sign, d to endless torments in the other world, there to be subject to the f .firs' rage, to .he ceaseless suffering that < 'H't.li had begun and hell existed to p.rpeuiate. And oh. for you, little child of the ten incuts; Nameless heroine, crushed int> shapeless form of horror, still faithful to your charge, both going down together into that grave of tire, who shall deliver your eulogy, who shall rear your monument? For one among those who leaped into the street lived long enough to tell your story and to say that you ran back into the burring building t > warn sleeping in mates and then was snatched away from the window, from the only place of possible rescue, by the very men and women wakened out of suffocating death, If there is reward or compen sation in the world beyond, the good God has surely folded you into the vale of pleasure, into the paradise of childhood’s playground, that eternity will provide. For you never knew what play meant here. As the rear wall fell, crushing in the roofs of the smaller houses near and spreading the fire into the adjoining blocks David Barton gripped John Gor don’s arm tight and exclaimed: “The wind is changing! Hope House will go next!” They were on tin* corner next to Hope House, and the horror of thQ wjiole sit- ualloh' was suddenly intensified if pos sible by the danger which now threat ened the one building in the whole ward that represented humanity at Its best. The wind had changed to the east. The rain was increasing. It came down in u steady cold that hatl no ef fect on the fire except apparently to increase Its fury. The awful confusion was Increasing every moment. The alarm had been sent in for the entire department. In almost a second’s time the mass of low wooden tenements that stood crowded together on both sides of Hope House was bursting with fire. The maddened, panic smitten people wire carrying tneir goods out into the streets. Under the shapeless mass of hot bricks and twisted iron beams In Bowen street human forms could be seen - here a face staring up, here a hand, a foot, a trunk of formless hor ror. The whole pile seemed a writhing, tangled heap of human agony. Groans and cries burst from it that were ap palling. The mass had fallen so near to the two men that some of the bricks lay at their feet. Before either realized what he was doing they were both dig ging at the ghastly mound, Hope House forgotten for the time being. Their hands were burned and lorn by the hot bricks and splintered beams. Barton especially seemed inspired with unusn- al strength. He.was drenched to the skin. His light overcoat was soon a mass of tattered rags. He wna lifting a beam that lay across a figure that had moved a hand thrust out of the debris. Gordon was helping him. “It’s Mrs. Caylor!” Gordon exclaimed as the face of the ligure appeared. The woman was crushed into a sick ening physical mass, but she was alive and conscious. “It's Mr. Gordon, Mrs. Caylor!” said John, with a sob, as he tenderly wiped the face and with Barton’s help lifted off the beam that hud crushed her. The woman gasped and spoke feebly, but clearly: “Do you think I’ll see Lome? He was a good boy—a good boy.” ‘ Yes, yes. Mrs. Caylor, and his body’s straight now. and he’s out of pain.” "A goou boy. Yes, out of pain now, she murmured. Gordon and Burton lifted the form and carried it over to Hope House entrance. There was no need of words. No other place was possible. As yet the lire had not tou- hed it. The crowd that surged throligh Bowen street had suddenly left everything else unsaved to protect Hope House. Miss Andrews was out by that tangled heap of torture and death, digging with her hands at the monstrous pile, working with a man’s energy and shaming more than one man by her calm but determined cour age. But Hope House had suddenly come to mean more in a few seconds than It had meant In a dozen years to the peo ple. That silent, pale, resolute, awfully patient woman who had been loving them rcsistlcssly all these years, who was now over there digging at the liv ing graves of the peoide, what of the place called her home, the center of her benignant Influence? It should not perish. The people of Bowen street surrounded the place and fought death for a grim hour, aided by re-enforce ments of the department. In almost u dream of action Barton and Gordon had participated In this wild fury of defense. They first carried the body of Mrs. Caylor Into the ball. As they laid It down both knew that what they laid down was a lifeless, sbapelesa heap of bones and flesh. She was with Louie now On the other side of Jordan, In the sweet fields of Eden Where the tree of life Is blooming. The men bushed out to the defense, and in that next hour Waterside dis trict witnessed as heroic n struggle us any age of chivalry ever boasted. It was not an occasion for the depart ment to dictate any rules or methods o! procedure. The people made rules. They tore c^owu buildings, flung them selves upon flaming fragments, stamped under foot and literally beat back the fury of the encircling tire. And Hope House was saved. When it was all over, the building stood black eucd. defaced, scorched, but intact, ami into its archway came streaming a dark procession of forms bearing dreadful burdens, which were laid in straight rows through the hall and on the library floor. Before the gray dawn broke through the pall of smoke, dripping with a drizzling air that pen etrated eve i the warmly dressed early risers on the boulevards, there were forty seven forms lying side by side on the floor of Hope House, and under the ghastly mound how many more no Man dared to guess. John Gordon found Miss Andrews still at work out by the nn.'s. ’Aon must stop and cat something,” he said gently, but firmly. And .-h be spoke he laid his hand on her arm. She was hearing on her face and per si n the marks ol her desperate energy. But she had never ceased to be Grace Andrews, calm, self poised, patient, in domitable, but never hysterical or nervous. A faint color appeared in her face, and she let Gordon bring her some thing to eat. Shi* tasted it sitting on a beam near the ruins. The firemen, who knew her. never thought of refusing her a place with the workers. Through the dawn up into the increasing light of the awful day that revealed new horrors she worked on, and Gordon and Barton silently worked beside her. The great excitement laid kept Bur ton nerved up to the occasion. As the dawn broke, however, the strain was too severe for the frail tenement. He felt something snap somewhere, and his eyes blinded as he staggered over the ruins, lie brushed back the hair that hung matted and dripping over his forehead and tried to steady him self. There was a child’s arm protrud ing from a mass of plaster and bricks at which he had been working as in a nightmare, sobbing and coughing, and alternately cursing and praying. Gor don wa$ several feet away, lifting a beam with Miss Andrews. He straightened up and Saw it all in a mist that darkened swiftly. Again he brushed his hand over his forehead and tried by all the exercise of his will to keep from falling, but the next mo ment he reeled, stumbled against a projecting timber and fell face down ward. The fingers of the child, which had been moving slightly, touched his warm cheek. When John Gordon came over to lift Barton up, the child's arm encircled Barton's neck. Gordon gently unclasped the arm and, lifting up Ids friend, carried him into Hope House. As he laid him down Barton opened his eyes and whis pered, “Never mind me, save the oth ers.” Gordon kneeled and kissed Barton's forehead, and, leaving him In charge of one of the residents, ho went out to the work. When he and Miss Andrews had dug out the child. It had breathed ts last. Miss Andrews kissed the dis figured face, and the first tear that Gordon had ever seen her shed fell on the body. “One of our children in the kinder garten. Oh. my God! For this slaugh ter of the innocents who shall be counted guilty?” She carried the child into the house, and when she came back there was an added (fivinity of righteous indignation In her blue eyes, added sadness in the lines of her patient face. Day broke on Waterside district. Ward 18, over a scene that bad never before been witnessed in any part of the city. There had been very many fires before this horror of tenement house fire, Ward 18. Lut no disaster had ever before been marked by such sickening slaughter of children. In No. 91, Mr. Marsh’s double decker, twenty- nine children were burned or crushed to death. In the other blocks twenty- three more were victims of the falling wall or the night’s exposure. Seventy- fiVe families were instantly beggared, saving only the clothes they wore, and left without a roof to shelter or a cent to pay for bread. Great piles of value less furniture and bedding tilled the streets and alleys, soaked by the rain which continued all day. Hope House stood solitary and alone, choked vtith the dead and the living, among whom Miss Andrews moved with an angel's pity and a commander's firmness. She was perfectly self possessed and knew Just what to do next. Under her lead ership order grew out of awful confu sion, and Hope House,'transferred into a hospital, knew at once that she who had boon the gracious head of the set- tlemcnt was also its director under the shadow of this fearful calamity. Barton had been carried into one of the resident’s rooms. When Gordon came in to see him after he had .welded to re-enforcements sent in by the de partment, Barton was lying so pule and still that Gordon feared the end had come, but the great eyes opened in a moment, and Barton whispered: “Take me up to my rooms, John. Williams is used to caring for me, and I am in the way here.” “In the way! Miss Andrews,” Gor don spoke to her as she appeared at the door of the room, “is my friend Mr. Barton in the way here?” “In the way! I feared you had passed on, Mr. Barton, when I saw you carried Into the house by Mr. Gor don. . You are not able to be moved. The exposure”— “The exposure did me good!” Barton Interrupted almost roughly. “Send for a carriage. John. I can go easily enough. I fainted out there. I'm not uhihI to night work. They saved 11o|h* House, Miss Andrews?” •'Yes. thimk God,” she said softly. Even with all the horrors of that night, and the awful sight out in the hall and library, she felt a thrill at the thought that the people had loved her a little. “Get me out of b *, John,” Barton said again as Miss Andrews stepped back into the hall and resumed her work. “It’s the beginning of the end, and I don’t want it to come to me here.” Gordon did not remonstrate. Under other circumstances he might have done so. When he had first entered the room, he had partly closed the door, but the groans, the shrieks for mercy, the wails of friends discovering relatives in the piles of crushed humanity out on the floor, had swept Into the room and Barton had shrunk down in the bed and shuddered. Gordon went out, closed the door and ordered u carriage for Barton. When It came, he went to help Barton get ready. To his amaze ment. ho was up and waiting. When he got up off the bed on which he was sit ting, he reeled on his feet and would have fallen if Gordon had not put an arm about him. “You are not able to leave!” “I am, I tell you! I will never die bore. I’ll live long enough to get to my rooms. And I’ll live long enough to Vi-itc up this horror too. The day of Judg.. ••id ought to begin today for s"mc of h, Mfoplc iii this God forsaken mein i>"lls, John, intros your friend, Mr. Marsh! I suppose the building was insured. He never lost anything, eh? Not t iiat sort!” Gordon supported him through the ball, and Barton, in spite of bis tre mendous will power, nearly fainted at • the sights and sounds there. Miss An drews was helping one of the surgeons. A great crowd thronged the entrance to Hope House, and Gordon had great ditliculty in getting Barton out to the carriage. He put him into it and was stepping in himself when Barton pulled the door and told the driver to go on. Gordon hesitated. “You’re needed here. Go on, dliver. I I’ll promise to live till tomorrow, John. ' Go in and help her. She needs some one.” The carriage started slowly on ac count of the crowd. Gordon waved a silent goodby. When the carriage was opt of Bowen street, Barton fainted. He lay like a dead man in a corner of the carriage, and when the driver . reached his rooms and got down to open the door he was frightened at the sight of what looked like a corpse in the carriage. He and Williams carried Barton in, and before noon Barton lay in a tremendous fever, which the doc tor said was a clear case of pneumonia. “Can't save him,” the doctor said to | Williams curtly. “I’ll send up the best ; nurse we’ve got. But Barton might as well shoot himself as do what ho did last night.” Down at Hope House all day John Gordon, Grace Andrews, th • assistants ! and a score of surgeons worked to save | life, with heart breaking doubt in their I souls as they labored as to the future ! fate of the mangled, erasdied, burned, maimed humanity that did n< t merci fully die. In the feverish horror of it all. as ;he work of searching the ruins went on and dens • thrones of euriosity •v 1 ers choked all the distriet. John Gold n \ . a •. are of one prom-incut . th" was a • on fontly om.’i pres- cn T mmy i!-.: (‘a!!. He was on hand, t’-ccrf..!iy i ace easing those who had list i" ••" !':•■•. seeip-iu r temporary quarters far these who were wander ing bewildered through the streets or sitting d'Kidi and stolid on their dam aged piles of household goods, distrib uting wagon loads of bread and coffee anil in several eases hunting up lost children and bringing together families that had become separated during the confusion. Once as he stepped out of the hall for a moment to get a breath of fresh air Gordon almost ran Into Randall, who had one child by the band and another In his arms, both of them devouring sandwiches. Randall nodded to Gor don, but did not speak, and Gordon stepped back without saying anything. But all the rest of the day he had a vision of Tommy Randall and those children. This story will be continued in next Friday’s issue of The Ledger. Cut thi* out and take it toCherokee Drug Co., Gaffney; L. 1). Allison, Cowpens, and get a free sample of Chamberlain’s Stomach and Liver Tablets, the best physic. They cleanse and invigorate the stomach, improve the appetite and regulate the bowels. Regular size 25c. perbix. Over 100,IKK) hogsheads of tobacco are now stored in Liverpool. Huiiifer «>f Pileumoil■». A cold at this time is liable to cause pceumonia which is so often fatal, and even when the patient has recov ered the lungs are weakened, making them peculiarly susceptible to the development of consumption. Foley’s Honey and Tar will slop the cough, heal and strengthen the lungs and prevent pneumonia. Cherokee Drug Co. London is better oil for trees than any othsr city in Europe. AN«\fre Colil for Y11ret- Montlm. The following letter from A. I. Nus- baum, of Batesville, Ind., tells it* own story. ‘T suffered for three month« with a severe cold: A drug gist prepared me some medicine, ano a physician prescribed for me, yet I did not improve. 1 then tried Foley’i Honey and Tar, and eight doses cured me.” Refuse substitutes. Cherokee Drug Co. In Liverpool the oopulatioc is Oil,* 828 to the square mile. Rheumatism Is caused by an excess of uric and lactic adds In the blood. Rheumacide, the great blood purifier, lexative and toqlo, curea tne dlaease bv driving the aclda out of the blood At Druggists. To plant unreliable seeds is to bury money. It is also a waste of money to pay too much for good seeds. It will be a satis faction to you to buy Iresh seeds of guar anteed reliability, and to get them at fairest prices. We handle none but seeds supplied by growers who can be trusted. We shall appreciate your patronage and believe that you'will in due season appreciate the quality of the goods supplied. Cherokee Drug Co. LIMESTONE AND FREDERICK STREETS. 3 * Commercial Printing Of every description executed with neatness and dispatch at The Ledger office, Gaffney, S. 0. New Type, New Presses, the finest quality of Ink and Paper, and C^npe- tent Workmen. Send us your orders. National Bank of Gaffney, Capital Stock, - - $50,000.00 Surplus ancLProfits, - 25,000.00 Stockholders Liability, 50,000.00 Total, - - - $125,000.00 13epo«its Jciiyv. icjo'*, $202,122.00. We solicit the .business andjgood will of everybody in Cherokee county. F. G. STACY, President, D.*C. ROSS, Cashier, J. G. WARDLAW. V.-Brest., MAYNARD SMYTH, A. C. A. N. Wood. President. It. K. IIkown. Vlee-President THE MERCHANTS AND PLANTERS BANK? OF GAFFNKY. S. C. Established I'.Dl. Capital $50,000.—Surplus and Profits $8,500. STATE, COUNTY AND TOWN DEPOSITORY Does a general Banking and Kxelianja* business. V and Burglar Proof Safe, with Automatic Time Lock, ail occupations. well lifted up with Fire Proof Vaul We solicit the business of people C. TVI waivt I'rw. i'»shi«- LOOK TO YODR INTEREST. - If it’s the best you are looking for in fertilizers this is the place to buy. I handle only the best grades and guarantee prices against all honest competition. I still have a]few wagons and buggies which I will selll cheap to close out. Wagon and buggy harnes!-. I am proud of the record I have made in the shoe business. Nearly every sale makes a permanent customer. Honest goods at fair prices have done the work. We often hear expressions like this, “I get better value in those at J. I Sarratt’s than any place in the city.” I continue to keep my stock of farming tools and farmers’ sup plies up to the standard and will save you money on anything in either line. NOW IN STOCK Seed oats for spring sowing. Lean save you money on Clothing, Dry Goods, Hats, Trunks, Valises, Satchels and Bags. See me before buying, I have several good farm mules which I will sell cheap for cash or on time for good papers. Respectfully, J. I. The Bargain Center of Gaffney Goods Going at 25 per cent. Below Actual Cost $2.00 Shoes for $1.12 $1.25 Shoes for 75 $1.00 Shoes for 60 Hats, Shirts and many other things included in this reductio— These are not shoddy goods, but are first-class in every respeft * and are RKAL BARGAINS. Call and see for yourself. : ; 1 J. I*.. 'To lie son & Oo. The Gaffney City Land and improvement Company Offer* for ■ale Building Lotii In this flourishing town, Gaffney City; Farms nee by and In reach of the Schools of Limestone Springs and of this place, le lots of from M to 100 acres on liberal time rates) also Agricultural Lands to rent tor Fern pur poses. For full particulars apply to J. V. @AK1€.A'X'T, Atfent. N. B.—All persons are forbidden to enter on. walk or ride through or over the lands of this company, cutting and removing timber, fishing or bunting, under penalty of law.