"I've got another uncle, too, but we don't know where he is," went on Laddie.

"Is he lost at sea?" asked Freddie. "If he is, I know how to find him.

Just ask Tommy Todd's father. He was shipwrecked, and me and Flossie found him in a snow storm."

"You must tell me about that some time," said Mrs. Whipple. "But Laddie's other uncle isn't lost at sea, so far as we know. It's too sad a story to tell to children. But Mr. Whipple has a brother, who is also a brother to Laddie's mother, but this brother has long been lost."

"How'd he get lost?" asked Freddie. "Did he go to the store and couldn't find his way back?"

"No, my child. It was different from that. I'll tell you, perhaps, another time. Go on with your play now."

So Laddie, Freddie and Flossie went back to their "store," and had lots of fun. Then they played other games, using Freddie's fire engine and Laddie's train of cars, and even Flossie's doll, who rode as a pa.s.senger.

"Well, what'll we do next?" asked Freddie, when he and Laddie had taken turns squirting water from the fire engine in the bath room.

"Let's play automobile," said Laddie. "I can get----"

He stopped talking and seemed to be listening.

"What's the matter?" asked Flossie, as Laddie hurried to a window that looked down into a side street.

"It's a fire!" cried Laddie. "I can hear the puffers! Come on! It's right down this side street!"

Flossie and Freddie looked out of the window long enough to see a crowd of people in front of a store not far from the hotel, which was on a corner.

And in the street, which was a side one, as Laddie had said, were a number of fire engines.

"Let's go down!" cried Freddie, all excited at what he saw.

"Oh, you mustn't!" gasped Flossie.

"Course we can," declared Laddie. "My aunt always lets me look at a fire when it's near here, and this is awful close. Maybe this hotel will burn down."

"Oh-o-o-o!" cried Flossie. "Where's my doll?" And she ran to get her pet.

"Come on, we'll go!" said Freddie to Laddie. "Girls don't like fires, but we boys do."

"Sure," said Laddie. "We'll go, all right. My aunt's looking out the front window, and we can go out the side door and down the elevator," he went on. "I know all the elevator men, 'cause I've lived in this hotel a whole year. My aunt won't care 'cause she won't see us, so she won't be worried. I don't like her to worry."

"Me either," said Freddie. So the two little boys, making sure Mrs.

Whipple was still looking from the front windows of her apartment, to see what all the excitement was about, stole out of a door into the side hall and so reached the elevators.

"Down, George!" called Laddie to the colored elevator man.

"Down it am, Master Laddie," was the good-natured answer. "Where is yo'all gwine?"

"To see the fire," was the answer. "Don't he talk funny?" asked Laddie of Freddie, as they left the elevator at the ground floor.

"He talks just like our colored cook, Dinah," said Freddie. "Did you ever see her?"

"Nope."

"You ought to eat some of her pancakes," went on Freddie. "I'll write, when I have a chance, and ask her to send you some."

"Oh, hear the engines whistlin'!" cried Laddie. "Hurry up, or maybe they'll be gone before we get there."

The fire was not near enough to the hotel to cause any danger, though many of the hotel guests were excited, and so no attention was paid to the small boys, Freddie and Laddie, as they hurried out to see all that was going on. There was a crowd in the side street and more engines and hook and ladder trucks were dashing up to help put out the fire.

From the blazing store great clouds of black smoke were pouring out, and firemen were rushing here and there. Laddie looked for a while at the exciting scene and then he called to Freddie:

"I'm going back and get my aunt. She likes to look at fires."

"All right; I'll wait for you here," Freddie said. They had been standing not far away from the side entrance to the hotel, and as Laddie turned to go back after his aunt, Freddie walked down the street a little way, nearer the fire.

"I can see Laddie and his aunt when they come," thought the small boy.

But just then a bigger crowd, anxious to watch the fire, came around the corner, and, rushing down the narrow side street, fairly pushed Freddie ahead of them.

"Here! Wait a minute! I don't want to go so fast!" cried the little fellow. "I want to wait for Laddie!"

No one paid any attention to him, and he was swept along, half carried off his feet by the rush, until at last he found himself standing alone, almost in front of the burning store.

"Oh, I can see fine here!" thought Freddie. "I wish Laddie and his aunt would hurry and come here. Wow! This is great!"

Freddie was so excited watching the puffing engines, seeing the big black clouds of smoke, and the leaping, darting tongues of lire from the windows of the burning building, also watching the firemen squirt big streams of Water on the blaze, that he did not think of himself, and the first he realized was when some one shouted at him:

"Stand back there, youngster!"

Freddie did not know he was the "youngster" meant, and stood where he was.

"Get back there!" cried the voice again. "You may be hurt!"

But Freddie was busy watching the fire. He wished he had brought his own little engine with him.

"I could squirt water on some of the little sparks, anyhow," he said to himself. "I guess I'll go back and get it, and find Laddie and his aunt."

Freddie was about to turn when suddenly he saw a fireman in a white rubber coat, which showed he was one of the chiefs, or head men, rushing toward him.

"Get back! Get back!" cried this fireman. "Don't you know you're inside the fire lines!"

Then for the first time Freddie noticed that back of him was stretched a rope, behind which stood the crowd of men and boys. Freddie was so small that he had slipped under the rope, not knowing it. He had either slipped under himself or been pushed by the throng.

"Get back! Get back!" cried the fireman.

The next instant there was a loud noise, as if a gun had been fired, and Freddie felt himself being lifted up and carried along quickly.

CHAPTER XIV