He grabbed the sleeping man and dragged him through, the flames; but both were afire as they came into the open.
Now in this story Elijah Westlake Bemis is not shown often in a heroic light.

Yet he had in his being the making of a hero, for he was brave.
And heroism, after all, is only effective reliance on some virtue in a crisis, in spite of temptations to do the easy excusable thing.

And when Lige Bemis sneaks through this story in unlovely guise, remember that he has a virtue that once exalted even him.
"Gabe Carnine," said Ward, as the barn fell and there was nothing more to fear, "we didn't fire your haystack; I give you my word on that.
But we are going to take these boys home now.

And you better let us alone." That John Barclay remembered, and then he remembered being in the front yard of the farm-house a moment--alone with Jane Mason, his bridle rein over his arm.

Her hair was down, and she looked wild and beautiful.