It became a groan, then swelled into a deep cry of alarm and lamentation.
And now, almost simultaneously, the west wall of the building, and the south wall, and all the southwestern portions of the roof, covered them-selves with voluminous mantles of flame, which increased so hugely and with such savage rapidity that the one stream on the roof was seen to be but a ridiculous and useless opposition.
Everybody began to shout advice to his neighbor; and nobody listened even to himself.

The firemen were in as great a turmoil as was the crowd, while women covered their eyes.

Young Frank Chenoweth was sobbing curses upon the bruised and shaking Trumble and Jefferson Bareaud, who could only stand remorseful, impotently groaning, and made no answer.
The walls of the southernmost warehouse followed the roof, crashing inward one after the other, a sacrificial pyre with its purpose consummated; and in the seeth and flare of its passing, Tom Vanrevel again shaded his eyes with his hand, and looked down across the upturned faces.

The pedestal with the grotesque carvings was still there; but the crowning figure had disappeared--the young goddess was gone.

For she, of all that throng, had an idea in her head, and, after screaming it to every man within reach, only to discover the impossibility of making herself understood in that Babel, she was struggling to make her way toward the second warehouse, through the swaying jam of people.