Morten dashed off.

“Dick, you must go up to the second floor in the same building.  There’s a large sail there; put it in the sea, and stretch it over the roof of the storehouse.  You understand?  The storehouse must be saved, or else—­”

Uncle Richard was already out of the door with Anders Begmand.

“Gabriel! you run up to the farm!  Gabriel!” cried the Consul.  But there was no Gabriel to be seen; he had already vanished through another door.

“Oh! what a wretched boy it is!” said the young Consul, in spite of himself.

There was something uncanny about the black smoke, and the dark red flame, which seemed every moment to get a surer foothold, and to gather strength without a soul to oppose them.  Gabriel noticed nothing:  he saw only the red glare on the ship, which loomed against the dark grey sky, and off he ran like a madman over the field above the house.  When he saw the ship was in danger, Tom Robson was his first and only thought, and he went straight into the house where he was so well known.

“Mr. Robson!  Tom!  Tom!” he shouted into the dark room, which smelt like an old rum-cask.  “She’s on fire, Tom!  The ship’s on fire!”

He groped his way to the bed, and gave Mr. Robson a good shaking.  The landlady, a slatternly sailor’s wife, now entered with a light.  Only a few minutes before, she had managed to get Tom undressed, somehow or another.

“Oh no! can that be Mr. Gabriel?” said she, drawing her night-dress closer to her.  “Is it a fire?  Mr. Robson!” she cried, and helped Gabriel to shake him.

“What’s the matter?” muttered he in English, turning round his face, all bruised and bloody as he was.

“Oh no, no!” whined the woman, “how beastly drunk he is!  Isn’t it a shame for such a fine fellow to make himself just like a pig?  Tom!  Tom!  Oh dear me, how tipsy he is!”

Without a moment’s hesitation, Gabriel dashed the contents of the basin in his face.  Mr. Robson sputtered and blew, and raising himself on his left arm, swung the right feebly over his head, and shouted, “Three cheers for Morten Garman!  Hip—­hip—–­” But before he got to “Hurrah,” he fell back on his side and was snoring again.  Gabriel left the room; there was nothing to be done with Tom.

The wind was sweeping down over the meadow, and driving the thick smoke from the pitch-house out over the fjord.  All round the house it was as light as day.  Long tongues of flame were flying far away over the fields, shedding their glare here and there on the front of a whitewashed house, while up above on the level ground it was still dark, under the shadow of the vessel.  And now a glitter was seen, and a rumble was heard in the direction of the town.  The fire brigade was on its way.  And from the farmhouses which lay near, down over the fields, but chiefly in the avenue leading from the town, people were to be seen running, first singly, then two or three, then several together, until the crowd in the avenue appeared like a close black mass, dotted here and there with red-and-white specks.  When Gabriel got down again to the house he was at his wits’ ends, and, leaning against the garden wall, he sobbed aloud.