Tom smiled a bit tremulously as he heard Sam’s plucky answer. “One finger, eh?” he thought. Well, it couldn’t be that, for in their signal code one finger meant a fast ball, and it was beyond Tom’s or anyone else’s power to throw a fast ball at the angle confronting him. Judging the distance as best he might, his gaze on the tiny light that glowed five stories above him, he stepped slowly backward across the roof. Finally he stopped.

“How far is it, do you think?” he asked Mr. George.

“About ninety feet, I’d say,” was the answer.

“Just the distance between bases,” muttered Tom. “I’ll try to get it to him coming down, I guess.”

“I wouldn’t, Tom. Sam’s used to catching them straight. Sock it right at him. If he can see it he’ll get it.”

“Well,” answered Tom doubtfully. He fixed his fingers around the ball, saw that the twine ran unentangled to the coil, which Mr. George had laid beside him, and took a long breath. Now that the moment had come he was losing his nerve, or so it seemed to him. The others drew aside in silence, only a whisper disturbing the stillness up there, although from below came the throb of the busy engines, the murmur of the throngs, the shrill signalling of an engine asking for fuel. Mr. George raised the trumpet to his mouth again.

“All ready, Sam! Get it, boy!”

There was a faint answer, drowned by the quick scraping of Tom’s shoes on the loose gravel, and off sped the ball, grey-white in the half-darkness, up and away toward the dimly illumined window and the motionless form poised there. There was a quick gasp from the thrower as he recovered. Then a moment of anxious silence broken by a murmur of disappointment. The ball had gone three feet wide of the window and, although Sam had been seen to lean dangerously to the right, he had failed to touch it, and it had rebounded from the wall and fallen to the street. Eager hands found the line and began to pull it back over the edge of the roof.

“Pretty near,” said Mr. George cheerfully. “A little more to the left next time, Tom. You’ve got the distance all right.”

“My foot slipped on the gravel,” panted Tom. “He’s saying something, isn’t he?”

The Chief commanded silence and from across the darkness came Sam’s voice untroubledly, “Three feet further to the left, Tom! I almost had it! Make it be good! Right over now in the groove!”

“Plucky young fellow,” growled the Chief. “Got that ball yet?”

“It came off,” answered someone. “Here’s the cord.”

Mr. George quickly stripped the tin-foil from another clean, white ball, looped the end of the cord once more and once more pushed the thumb tack into the tough leather with a grunt. “There you are, Tom,” he said. “Here’s luck!”

“I guess you’ll have to hurry,” said a newspaper man. “Looks as if the fire was in there now, don’t it?”

It did, for the window, dark before, now shone dull red and Sam’s form was silhouetted plainly against it. Tom seized the ball, measured his distance again, silently prayed for success, stepped forward, and threw. A breathless silence then. The figure on the ledge settled back. The ball was lost in the shadow of the tall building. Still those on the roof waited and still no sound came, until, suddenly, faintly, there was a hail from above.

“Got it! Tie on your rope!”

It was nearly a fortnight later. Sam, returning at dusk along Main Street from the ball field after an afternoon of fall practice, paused in front of Cummings and Wright’s and, one hand thoughtfully fingering the change in his pocket, viewed admiringly the array of football goods displayed in one big window. He had more than half promised the captain of the high school eleven to try for the team as soon as baseball was shelved for the winter. If he did, he reflected, he’d have to spend quite a little money for togs, and, now that he was firmly resolved to go to college next year, he could ill afford to part with any of his slender horde. Ruminating, he turned his gaze up the street, along which the lights were already beginning to flash. Against the darkening sky the smoke-blackened shell of the Adams Building towered empty and forlorn. A frown creased Sam’s forehead as his eyes rested on the tall structure with its broken windows and grimy walls. He had not yet got so he could recall that experience without a sudden sickening sensation at his heart. He sometimes wondered if he would ever be able to forget that awful quarter of an hour up there, the anxious period when, held firmly by Mr. Hall and Mr. York, he had waited there on the outer ledge and hoped against hope that Tom’s aim would be true, or the hazardous descent by the rope with the flames almost licking at their heels. They had made him go first, when it had seemed that there was scarce time for all to escape. He remembered how quietly and calmly Mr. Hall had instructed him about wrapping the rope about his leg and lowering himself down, and how Mr. York had assured him that if he went slowly and kept his head he would reach the ground safely. Well, it was something to have gone through such a test with men like those, he reflected, and now that it was over—his eyes narrowed as he gazed thoughtfully up the busy street—well, now that it was all over he was almost glad that it had happened. Somehow, life had seemed finer and bigger since that night!

A tapping on the broad pane beside him caused him to look around. At the back of the window Tom Pollock was knocking on the glass with a hockey stick and beckoning him inside. Sam smiled faintly, nodded, and entered. The store held few customers, and none on the sporting goods side. Tom closed the panel at the back of the window and turned with a smile.

“Ah,” he said, “Mr. Craig, I believe! Champion ten-story catcher of the Sky-scraper League! What were you doing out there, Sam? Going to sleep?”

“Just—just thinking,” replied Sam soberly.

“You want to break yourself of that,” responded Tom, with a warning shake of his head. “It’ll get to be a habit. What’s new? How did practice go? Sorry I had to cut to-day.”

“Pretty fair, I think. I guess I’ll have to call it off soon. A lot of the fellows are trying for the football team. Sidney left to-day; Buster, too.”

“Yes, you couldn’t keep Sid away from a pigskin if you tied him. By the way, Mr. Hall was in here about an hour ago asking for you. Said I was to tell you to go around to the club this evening. Wants to see you about something. I think he said he’d had a letter from Mr. York.”

Sam nodded. “Yes, I guess I know what it is,” he said. “I had a letter from Mr. York this morning; or, rather, a note. He—he’s got the contract, Tom.”

“For the new Adams Building? That’s good. Hope they’ll make it fireproof this time. How is he?”

“All right, I guess. He didn’t say. He didn’t write much; only five or six lines. He said his firm had got the contract and that—that he’d have a job for me next month.”

“Really? Bully for you, Sam! Say, that’s fine! I’m awfully glad. What are you going to do—stand on the top of the building and catch beams and things?”

“N-no, I guess it will be something about the office. I don’t know yet. But I’m mighty glad because I guess I’ll be able to make enough to start college next fall.”

“Pshaw, you won’t need money, Sam! Why, I’ll bet there isn’t a college in the country that wouldn’t be tickled to get as celebrated a chap as you! You know, old man, you’re a bit of a hero. Mr. Hall says you had a whole page to yourself in one of the New York papers on Sunday.”

“I wish they wouldn’t,” said Sam. Then a twinkle danced in his eyes. “Anyway, they had you in it, too, I’ll bet.”

“Oh, yes, but I wasn’t important. He said there was a fine picture of you standing on a window-ledge with mask and mitt and leg guards! I must get that paper and see it.” And Tom chuckled.

Sam smiled a little over the idea of the mask and mitt. Then, soberly, he said: “You were the real hero of that stunt, Tom. If you hadn’t thrown that ball just right the time you did—well, you wouldn’t have had many more tries!”

“No, that’s a fact,” agreed the other gravely. “It wasn’t any time to get our signals mixed, was it, Sam?”

“No, and you—you certainly were fine, Tom. I don’t know whether I ever exactly told you how—how awfully grateful——”

“Don’t mention it!” exclaimed Tom hurriedly. Then, with a grin, “It was a pleasure, sir, I assure you,” he said gaily. “I always esteem it a great honour to pitch to Catcher Craig.”

THE END