AS BUSY AS BEAVERS.
“Leave it to us, Mrs. Heffner,” Hugh told the woman as he reached her
side. “You are all tired out with working. Get your children back to the
house, and keep them out of harm’s way. We’ll save your property if it
can be done!”
She was wringing her hands and very much excited.
“Oh! I am glad you have come, Hugh, you and your brave friends. Save the
place if you can; it is everything I own in the world. The children
would starve if it went. But I must keep on working, for every little
bit helps!”
Hugh did not waste another second of time. There was need of haste, for
already the fire was creeping along through the dead grass in the
orchard, heading straight for the outbuildings, and those stacks of hay.
The latter must have caught fire before now only that they were covered
by a board shield intended to shed rain.
The scout master began to give his orders as though he had been
accustomed to running a fire engine all his life, and also commanding a
squad of fire-fighters.
“Get any sort of buckets or other things to carry water. Start that pump
to going as lively as you can. Jack, you begin, and someone spell you
when you slacken up. Don’t let a fire get started, whatever happens. As
soon as you see it smoking, pour water on the place. We’ve just _got_ to
fight it off, you hear, fellows!”
“That’s the kind of talk, Hugh,” said Billy, as he picked up a wash
boiler and appropriated it to his own individual use.
Each boy hunted high and low for any kind of vessel that could be used
to convey water to the exposed sides of the outbuildings. At another
time many a hearty laugh would have greeted the queer appearance of some
of the things they managed to scare up. Several even dashed into the
farm-house and came out carrying pitchers, kitchen tins and even coal
buckets!
Of course, one fellow at the pump, no matter how hard he worked, could
never supply such a string of constantly going and coming carriers. Hugh
looked around to see whether there might not be other means for securing
a supply of the greatly needed fluid.
“Here, Monkey, you and some of the rest run over to the duck pond there
and fill your buckets that way. It’s not much further than to come to
the pump; and the supply of water isn’t going to give out either.”
Just then the woman came staggering along with a bucket that she had
filled at the pump. She was almost exhausted, and seeing this, Hugh
deliberately took her burden away from her.
“I’m going to take your place, Mrs. Heffner,” he told her, and when she
made a feeble resistance, he continued: “There’s a shortage of buckets,
and I can’t stand around idle while a woman works. Go back and sit down
and watch us.”
One thing Hugh noticed with more or less satisfaction. The children had
ceased their wild, hysterical screaming as soon as they saw the stream
of boys swarming over the place. They had fallen back, and were
observing all that went on with wide-open eyes. Confidence had
apparently taken the place of fright. With such a small army of willing
workers on hand it was quite patent to their childish minds that the
fire must surely be beaten back.
Hugh wished he had a little more of that confidence himself, as he saw
how the encroaching flames were nearing the outbuildings. He knew that
some of them must immediately snatch up old brooms, branches off the
trees, or any other sort of smothering article they could secure, and
proceed to beat out the flames before they reached the threatened
buildings.
Accordingly, he handed his bucket over to one of the other boys, and
began to designate those whom he wanted to accompany him in his foray.
He was careful to select those who were handicapped in their work by not
having the right sort of water carrier. Any with buckets might keep on
doing just what now occupied their attention.
In this way Hugh picked out six boys, counting himself.
“Get an old broom or any sort of thing that will be useful in beating
out the burning grass!” he told them, and that was the first intimation
the boys had as to what the nature of their new occupation was to be.
There was not an idle scout to be seen anywhere. Every fellow worked
like a beaver. The lone man, whom Hugh had supposed was a farm hand,
stopped in his work once or twice to stare at the rushing squads of
boys. His face was blackened with the smoke, and while it had struck
Hugh that there was something familiar about the other, he had really
never taken a second glance at him.
Hugh did not even wait until all of his bunch had armed themselves with
such smothering devices as they could find about the stable. He was
already at work at the line of creeping, jumping fire, having selected
his point of attack near the straw stack. He pounded, whipped and beat
at the fire with all the vim he could muster, even jumping on what
obstinately remained, and stamping it out. That stack must not be
allowed to come in contact with the fire if it could be prevented
through any effort on his part.
Billy was close beside him, having found carrying that wash boiler, even
half filled with water, no child’s play. He, too, had discovered an old
stable broom, with which he was belaboring the fire with savage fury,
pounding it as though he might have a special grievance against its
further encroachment.
When all of the squad became busy, they began to make a noticeable
impression on the flames. Baffled, the fiery tongues darted out a few
times at the fighters, and then seemed to give up the unequal combat.
It was just as Hugh knew would be the case. Hardly would they turn to
another section than the smoldering fire was sure to spring up again. So
it kept them busy going back again and again to repeat the whipping,
only to have the wind play the same trick on them.
Alone, Hugh could never have managed to keep the fire in restraint, but
with such able assistance it was finally subdued in that particular
quarter.
This gave them a minute to get their breath and look around at the
stirring picture which often returned to their minds in future days.
Over to the north it was a fearful sight, with the fire leaping up among
some of the trees. Pines were blazing like great torches, but oaks,
beeches and other forest trees did not seem to be affected, the fire
being confined to the trash at their bases, such as windrows of dead
leaves, stumps, logs and anything else in the way of fuel.
Those farmers who had their winter supply of wood stacked in the forest
waiting for the first snow so as to haul it on sleds to the house, stood
to lose the entire crop, and would have to cut anew. Others who had
heaps of fence rails laid by for winter work would also meet with a
complete loss, for the ground fire hunted all of these things out and
made quick work of them.
Leaving some of the boys to keep watch over that treacherous grass fire,
Hugh hurried back to see how the rest were getting along with their
work. He stopped at a shed and made a discovery that pleased him.
“Here, Jack, come and help me get this spraying machine out!” he called
to the nearest scout. “We can fill the barrel at the pond and drag it
over to the house. I’ll cut the nozzle off the hose so a good stream of
water can be forced to the roof, and smother any spark that drops. It’s
going to insure a home for those poor kids anyway, even if everything
else goes up in smoke.”
Jack Durham was only too willing to take hold. He was strongly built,
and able to work like an ox. Together they ran the wheeled spraying
machine down to the duck pond, and utilizing the first bucket that came
along Hugh started to scoop up the water, throwing it into the barrel
that was mounted on the two wheels.
When it was two-thirds full, he and Jack seized hold, and with
considerable straining and dragging, managed to get it over to the
farm-house.
Just as Hugh had said, when he used his sharp pocket knife blade to
sever the nozzle at the end of the hose, it was possible to reach any
part of the roof with a small stream of water once the pump was set
going.
“We’ll try it, to make sure first before I leave you in charge, Jack,”
said Hugh.
A few plunges of the easily worked pump satisfied the scout master that
it was all right. He saw a large spark drop on the dry roof of the house
near the ridge-pole, and had no difficulty whatever in drowning it out
with the stream he turned in that direction, squeezing the end of the
severed hose in order to make the water carry further.
“You see how it’s done, don’t you, Jack?” he asked, holding up the hose
to display his manner of making the opening smaller, and thus increasing
the force of the discharge. “Use it that way when you have to reach the
further end of the roof. And step around occasionally to the other side
to make sure a fire isn’t stealing a march on you. That’s all. The house
is going to be saved at all events.”
“You just make your mind easy on that score, Hugh,” Jack told him. “If
my muscles don’t go back on me, which they never have as yet, I can pump
this thing all day, and stand up under it.”
Leaving the other on guard, Hugh once more turned back to other parts of
the exciting fire line. He noticed that the hired man was still carrying
buckets of water methodically, and it struck Hugh he had been standing
by Mrs. Heffner in a way that was worthy of praise. Still, Hugh paid
little or no attention to him, for a dozen different things were passing
through his brain then, all of which had to do with the saving of the
farm buildings.
“How long do you reckon this is going to keep up, Hugh?” asked Arthur,
as he stopped near the scout master, to mop his face with his big red
bandana handkerchief.
“I don’t know,” replied Hugh. “I hope that another hour at the most will
see the worst over with. If we can keep things from going that long it’s
likely we’ll come out all right.”
“Whew! but the air’s getting mighty torrid, I tell you!”
“That’s because the fire’s passed us and is moving along on both sides,
as well as from the north. We’re in the midst of a big burning, and soon
even escape to the south will be cut off, unless we feel like running
the gantlet. The danger now isn’t so much from the flames as from the
sparks.”
“Yes, they’re thicker than ever, it strikes me,” assented the other,
making several quick slashes at his shoulders, and then snatching off
his campaign hat to beat out a smouldering fire in the crown.
“It’ll be worth something to us to save the place for Mrs. Heffner,”
said Hugh. “I’m sure every scout is ready to work till he drops, so as
to make her mind easy. Think of those poor kids without a home!”
“We can stand it for another hour, if we have to!” Arthur declared, and
with that he ran off to make up for lost time, rejoining the string that
was heading for the pond with their buckets.
Many times did those sharp-eyed boys discover a fire just starting,
where a live coal had managed to settle in some snug nook, and the dry
wood soon began to smoulder. The dash of a bucket always put an end to
these ambitious beginnings, and so the buildings had up to now been kept
intact.
Hugh put his hand on the side of the barn. He was worried when he felt
how hot the wood seemed to be.
“It wouldn’t take much to start things so they’d go with a rush,” he
told himself, “and a hundred buckets wouldn’t hinder the flames.”
Just then he heard the children start to screaming again, and the sound
gave him a nasty feeling, for he felt that it meant new trouble. As Hugh
turned he was dismayed to see the straw stack was on fire, a spark
having managed to lodge in some exposed part of it, and being unnoticed,
had finally communicated its fiery touch to the inflammable material of
which the stack was composed.
“That settles it for us, I guess!” one of the scouts was heard to shout,
when this new disaster was discovered.