THE BURNING FOREST.
When the car was lost sight of in the pall of smoke that had settled
down over that section of the county, Hugh took it upon himself to
explain the plan of campaign which he had mentally mapped out while on
the road.
“Whatever we do, fellows,” he told the scouts clustering around him, all
with eager faces, and perhaps streaming eyes, for that smoke did smart
tremendously, “we know there’s no use going behind the line of fire.
When it’s once passed over a place either the damage has been done, or
else the farm has had a narrow escape. What we want to do is to keep
moving along in front of the fire, so as to try to keep it from ruining
some of these people.”
“Tell us our duty, Hugh, and you’ll find every scout on the job,” said
Alec.
“I know that without you telling me, Alec,” the scout master replied.
“Now, to the left lies the Heffner farm. I don’t think the fire can have
reached there so far, though it’s heading that way fast. I’m going to
take half of your number and strike through the woods here to help Mrs.
Heffner. You know she’s been trying to make a living for her little
family of children since her husband died two years ago. If anybody
needs assistance they do.”
“Only half did you say, Hugh?” exclaimed Shorty McNeil, in a panic lest
some of them be left out of the lively game.
“Yes, because I want Alec with the rest to turn off to the right of us.
You know how the land lies, and what course to take to get to old Zeke
Ballinger’s poultry farm, where he raises squabs, and broilers for the
city market. If the fire puts him out of business it’s going to ruin the
old man, for he barely makes a living now. Do your level best to save
his buildings, Alec.”
“We certainly will, Hugh, and thank you for trusting me with the job.
How shall we divide the troop?” asked the leader of the Otters.
“I’ll pick one, and then you do the same,” said Hugh. “We’ll keep it up
till all have been selected. Billy, step over here with me.”
Billy felt proud of having been the first choice of the scout master;
but he knew very well it was pure personal affection that brought this
about, and not any belief that he could render better service than any
of the other fellows; indeed, the more agile scouts were apt to discount
all of Billy’s efforts, no matter how strenuously he tried to excel.
“I’ll take Tom Sherwood,” said the leader of the Otters, promptly.
Hugh’s second choice proved to be Arthur Cameron, for he knew what a
useful member of a rescue party the student of surgery was likely to
prove. After that they picked their followers rapidly. It was amusing to
notice how each patrol leader made sure to get those of his own command
first of all, before turning to others. Still, this was only natural,
since they were supposed to know the particular virtues of those with
whom they came in frequent contact.
The division was quickly accomplished. Fourteen boys stood back of Hugh
and an equal number waited to obey the orders of Alec.
The two leaders only halted to make an arrangement looking to a possible
combination of their forces later on. If it was found that their
assistance was no longer needed at the place to which they had gone, the
party thus set at liberty was to hasten to join the other. After that
further plans could be arranged; for evidently there would be plenty of
work to do all along the line.
“Is that all, Hugh?” asked Alec, who was plainly impatient to be moving.
“Yes, good-by, and hope you have luck!” the scout master told him.
“Same to you; come along, fellows, we’re off!”
One party plunged into the woods on the right of the road, while the
other vanished in the opposite direction. Of course neither knew what
obstacles they might encounter on their way, or which mission would
prove to be the more difficult.
Hugh had chosen to go to the farm of Mrs. Heffner because his sympathies
were more strongly aroused in her case. True, old Zeke Ballinger was to
be pitied, for he had every dollar he possessed invested in that little
poultry and squab ranch, and would be utterly ruined if the fire took
it. Still, he was a man, after all. A lone widow, fighting to make a
living off a small farm for her children, should be considered first of
all, Hugh thought.
“Sure you’ve got your points of the compass right, are you, Hugh?” asked
Billy, with the familiarity that years of friendship for the scout
master gave him. When there was need of displaying the spirit of a
private in the ranks toward his commanding officer, Billy could do it
all right; but as a rule he met Hugh as one chum would another.
“I think I have, to the fraction of a dot,” replied the other. “I know
what a bad job it would be to make a mistake.”
“I should say it would,” Billy asserted. “If we happened to get mixed up
in the woods, and wandered around, first thing we knew we might find
ourselves trapped by the old fire, and beautifully singed in the
bargain.”
“We’re heading straight for the Heffner farm,” Hugh assured him. “A
little further on we ought to strike the zigzag trail she uses to come
out on the main road. If Mr. Lewis had carried us on a little further
we’d have struck the junction.”
The other boys were also talking among themselves, but in a subdued sort
of way. Glimpses of the fire, which they could catch at irregular
intervals, inspired them with considerable respect regarding the
conflagration. In fact, they felt somewhat awed, to tell the truth.
In the past some of them had passed through queer experiences with Hugh
Hardin as their leader, but never one like this, with the woods on fire,
and people to be rescued, as well as property to be saved.
“What’s that strange humming noise we can hear every little while,
Hugh?” asked Jack Durham.
“It’s the roar of the fire, as sure as anything,” Ralph Kenyon told him
before the scout master could say a word.
“But why does it come and go like that?” insisted Jack. Some of the
other boys shrugged their shoulders, and listened to once again catch
the peculiar sound mentioned.
“The wind changes, or else drops down to a lull,” Ralph explained. As he
was reckoned a clever woodsman, Jack accepted the theory without a
protest.
“Ralph is quite right there,” Hugh added. “If that miserable breeze
would only die down, the fires might be gotten under control; but so
long as it keeps going it is bound to whip a spark into a flame. If an
army of men put the fire out in one place they’d hardly turn their backs
before the wind would make it spring up again like magic.”
“Hang the wind, anyway!” said Billy energetically. “It blows billions of
sparks ahead and starts new blazes by the dozen.”
“It’s only a good thing when you’re sailing a boat, flying a kite, or
something like that,” asserted Harold Tremaine, the newest member of the
Wolf Patrol, he having taken the place of a boy whose folks had moved
away from town some months before.
The going was not so very smooth, even in the daytime, for matted bushes
often caused them to make little detours, and there were other obstacles
which had to be passed over.
“Gee! I’d hate to be trying to run through here at night-time,” said
Billy, as he caught his foot in a wild grapevine and measured his length
on the ground.
“With a fire racing after you, eh, Billy?” remarked Ralph Kenyon. “It
strikes me you’d stand a pretty good chance of being roasted.”
“Don’t mention such a thing, Ralph, if you care for my feelings,” the
stout boy begged him. “I was thinking of some ferocious wild animal
rather than of a fire. Hugh, how about that little side road you spoke
of; hope we haven’t been so unlucky as to miss it?”
“I expect to come on it in another minute or so, unless all my
calculations are wrong, and I don’t believe they are,” was the confident
reply which the scout master gave him.
“Seems to me I can see something that looks like a woods lane just ahead
there by that silver birch, Hugh!” spoke up Monkey Stallings, who was
with them.
“Good eyes, Monkey!” exclaimed Jack Durham. “That it is.”
“Thank goodness!” muttered Billy, who was breathing hard with the great
exertions he had been forced to make all this while.
It turned out to be as they said. The cut-off road by which the Heffners
were accustomed to come from their farm whenever they started for town
lay before them.
“This is something like it,” commented Ned Twyford, as they struck out
at a considerably faster gait, once they reached the open ground.
“I should say it was,” Billy said, as though his every word might be
uttered in a spirit of sincere thanksgiving.
“We’re getting closer to the fire every step we take, Hugh!” announced
Ralph, who had been noting all things.
Hugh knew that as well as anybody. It had been giving him considerable
anxiety for several minutes past. Not that he believed there was cause
to fear for the safety of himself and comrades, because that had not as
yet entered into his calculations. He was thinking of the poor woman,
who, alone in that burning forest, with her little children, might be
striving to fight the onrush of those greedy flames, eager to lick up
her scanty property.
The very thought caused Hugh to start off on a jog-trot. He was
immediately copied by all the rest, even fat Billy joining in, although
the effort made him pant more than ever, so that his tongue seemed to be
protruding from between his teeth.
“Better stop that old trick of yours, Billy,” warned Bud Morgan,
noticing this. “Remember once before how you took a tumble and bit your
tongue just fierce. Some day you’ll nip off the tip entirely, let me
tell you.”
“Glad you told me, Bud,” grunted Billy, who did not take offense easily.
“I’d sure hate to be tongue-tied when I go to singing school, or to see
the girls.”
“Hold your breath, Billy; you’ll have need of it all,” the other warned
him further, and accordingly Billy subsided.
All of them knew they must soon arrive at the Heffner farm. Some, who
had been up there before, could picture the place in their minds, and
remembered how close the woods came to the buildings on at least two
sides. Unfortunately these were the north and west, for the farmer when
clearing the land had concluded that the big woods might serve as a sort
of wind-breaker in winter, a shield against the extreme cold.
That made it doubly bad under the present conditions. It brought the
danger closer to the door of the widow. Between the woods and her
outbuildings there lay only a strip of ground which bore an orchard; and
it was possible that, as usual, heavy grass had been allowed to die
there under the apple trees in the fall.
Hugh was considering all these things as he ran ahead, picturing them in
his mind, and trying to figure out just what he should set his force to
doing first.
As a rule it is the one who can plan ahead who has the better chance of
success. Sometimes his schemes may go amiss, but often he saves a vast
amount of time by the process. This was Hugh’s invariable method of
doing things, when the chance offered.
Suddenly Hugh felt a thrill pass over him.
“Wasn’t that some one shrieking, and a kid at that?” demanded Arthur,
who kept close to the side of the scout master while they ran.
“It sounded like it to me,” Hugh replied, “though it may have been a pig
squealing for all we know. Let’s hit it up faster, boys; everybody let
out a kink!”
Of course it was hard on Billy, but he was bound to “keep up with the
procession,” as he called it, even if he burst off every button on his
coat trying.
If the road had not been so very crooked they could easily have seen
before this what lay ahead of them. True, the smoke was very dense, and
the air seemed to be charged with a myriad of sparks that kept raining
down upon them; but at that it was possible to see some distance away.
So fast did those sparks come down that the boys were kept busy brushing
them off their shoulders. They also kept an eye on one another’s hat, so
as to give warning in case any of the head gear began to smoke.
There could no longer be any doubt concerning the nature of those shrill
sounds. Every fellow sensed their meaning, and knew that children were
screaming, either in sheer fright or under the stress of great
excitement as they worked trying to assist their poor mother to save her
possessions.
It was fine to see how those lads set their teeth hard together, and
endeavored to put on a spurt, as though intent only on coming upon the
scene as speedily as possible.
There was no longer any doubt that the fire had reached the Heffner
farm. They could see it in several directions, and the roaring sound had
grown much louder now. It thrilled them through and through. Other
experiences in the past may have seemed exciting while they lasted, but
all of them had to take a back seat when compared with this dash through
the woods to the imperiled farm of the Widow Heffner.
All at once they came out of the copse, and the scene was before them.
On one side lay the small farm-house, and back of it the barn and other
outbuildings, together with several stacks, one of them of straw,
showing that the fall threshing had all been completed.
Moving figures could be seen flitting back and forth. Hugh instantly
made them out to be those of a woman, and one man, together with several
partly-grown children. They were bearing pails of water to dash upon the
sides of the outbuildings in the hope that in this way they might save
them from going.
Even the children had some sort of pans, and were working with all the
zeal possible to add their little mite to the soaking process, meanwhile
crying at the top of their shrill voices.
Uttering loud shouts of encouragement, Hugh and his fourteen followers
ran forward to the assistance of the brave but almost distracted woman
farmer.