Hot sunlight, winds as hot, a shimmering heat which distorted objects at a
distance and made the sky line a dazzling, wavering ribbon of faded blue;
and then the dull haze of smoke which hung over the land, and, without
tempering the heat, turned the sun into a huge coppery balloon, which
drifted imperceptibly from the east to the west, and at evening time
settled softly down upon a parched hilltop and disappeared, leaving behind
it an ominous red glow as of hidden fires.
When the wind blew, the touch of it seared the face, as the smoke tang
assailed the nostrils. All the world was a weird, unnatural tint, hard to
name, never to be forgotten. The far horizons drew steadily closer as the
days passed slowly and thickened the veil of smoke. The distant mountains
drew daily back into dimmer distance; became an obscure, formless blot
against the sky, and vanished completely. The horizon crouched then upon
the bluffs across the river, moved up to the line of trees along its banks,
blotted them out one day, and impudently established itself half-way up the
coulee.
Time ceased to be measured accurately; events moved slowly in an unreal
world of sultry heat and smoke and a red sun wading heavily through the
copper-brown sky from the east to the west, and a moon as red which
followed meekly after.
Men rode uneasily here and there, and when they met they talked of prairie
fires and of fire guards and the direction of the wind, and of the faint
prospect of rain. Cattle, driven from their accustomed feeding grounds,
wandered aimlessly over the still-unburned range, and lowed often in the
night as they drifted before the flame-heated wind.
Fifteen miles to the east of Cold Spring Coulee, the Wishbone outfit
watched uneasily the deepening haze. Kent and Bob Royden were put to riding
the range from the river north and west, and Polycarp Jenks, who had taken
a claim where were good water and some shelter, and who never seemed to
be there for more than a few hours at a time, because of his boundless
curiosity, wandered about on his great, raw-boned sorrel with the white
legs, and seemed always to have the latest fire news on the tip of his
tongue, and always eager to impart it to somebody.
To the northwest there was the Double Diamond, also sleeping with both eyes
open, so to speak. They also had two men out watching the range, though
the fires were said to be all across the river. But there was the railroad
seaming the country straight through the grassland, and though the company
was prompt at plowing fire guards, contract work would always bear
watching, said the stockmen, and with the high winds that prevailed there
was no telling what might happen.
So Fred De Garmo and Bill Madison patrolled the country in rather desultory
fashion, if the truth be known. They liked best to ride to the north and
east--which, while following faithfully the railroad and the danger line,
would bring them eventually to Hope, where they never failed to stop as
long as they dared. For, although they never analyzed their feelings, they
knew that as long as they kept their jobs and their pay was forthcoming, a
few miles of blackened range concerned them personally not at all.
Still, barring a fondness for the trail which led to town, they were not
unfaithful to their trust.
One day Kent and Polycarp met on the brink of a deep coulee, and, as is the
way of men who ride the dim trails, they stopped to talk a bit.
Polycarp, cracking his face across the middle with his habitual grin,
straightened his right leg to its full length, slid his hand with
difficulty into his pocket, brought up a dirty fragment of “plug” tobacco,
looked it over inquiringly, and pried off the corner with his teeth. When
he had rolled it comfortably into his cheek and had straightened his leg
and replaced the tobacco in his pocket, he was “all set” and ready for
conversation.
Kent had taken the opportunity to roll a cigarette, though smoking on the
range was a weakness to be indulged in with much care. He pinched out the
blaze of his match, as usual, and then spat upon it for added safety before
throwing it away.
“If this heat doesn't let up,” he remarked, “the grass is going to blaze up
from sunburn.”
“It won't need to, if you ask me. I wouldn't be su'prised to see this hull
range afire any time. Between you an' me, Kenneth, them Double Diamond
fellers ain't watching it as close as they might. I was away over Dry Creek
way yesterday, and I seen where there was two different fires got through
the company's guards, and kited off across the country. It jest _happened_
that the grass give out in that red day soil, and starved 'em both out.
They wa'n't _put_ out. I looked close all around, and there wasn't nary a
track of man or horse. That's their business--ridin' line on the railroad.
The section men's been workin' off down the other way, where a culvert got
scorched up pretty bad. By granny, Fred 'n' Bill Madison spend might' nigh
all their time ridin' the trail to town. They're might' p'ticular about
watchin' the railroad between the switches--_he-he!_”
“That's something for the Double Diamond to worry over,” Kent rebuffed. He
hated that sort of gossip which must speak ill of somebody. “Our winter
range lays mostly south and east; we could stop a fire between here and the
Double Diamond, even if they let one get past 'em.”
Polycarp regarded him cunningly with his little, slitlike eyes. “Mebbe you
could,” he said doubtfully. “And then again, mebbe you couldn't. Oncet
it got past Cold Spring--” He shook his wizened head slowly, leaned, and
expectorated gravely.
“Man Fleetwood's keeping tab pretty close over that way.”
Polycarp gave a grunt that was half a chuckle. “Man Fleetwood's keeping tab
on what runs down his gullet,” he corrected. “I seen him an' his wife out
burnin' guards t' other day--over on his west line--and, by granny, it
wouldn't stop nothing! A toad could jump it--_he-he!_” He sent another
stream of tobacco juice afar, with the grave air as before.
“And I told him so. 'Man,' I says, 'what you think you're doing?'
“'Buildin' a fire guard,' he says. 'My wife, Mr. Jenks.'
“'Polycarp Jenks is my cognomen,' I says. 'And I don't want no misterin'
in mine. Polycarp's good enough for me,' I says, and I took off my hat and
bowed to 'is wife. Funny kinda eyes, she's got--ever take notice? Yeller,
by granny! first time I ever seen yeller eyes in a human's face. Mebbe it
was the sun in 'em, but they sure was yeller. I dunno as they hurt her
looks none, either. Kinda queer lookin', but when you git used to 'em you
kinda like 'em.
“'N' I says: 'Tain't half wide enough, nor a third'--spoke right up to 'im!
I was thinkin' of the hull blamed country, and I didn't care how he took
it. 'Any good, able-bodied wind'll jump a fire across that guard so quick
it won't reelize there was any there,' I says.
“Man didn't like it none too well, either. He says to me: 'That guard'll
stop any fire I ever saw,' and I got right back at him--_he-he!_ 'Man,' I
says, 'you ain't never saw a prairie fire'--just like that. 'You wait,' I
says, 'till the real thing comes along. We ain't had any fires since you
come into the country,' I says, 'and you don't know what they're like. Now,
you take my advice and plow another four or five furrows--and plow 'em out,
seventy-five or a hundred feet from here,' I says, 'an' make sure you
git all the grass burned off between--and do it on a still day,' I says.
'You'll burn up the hull country if you keep on this here way you're
doing,' I told him--straight out, just like that. 'And when you do it,' I
says, 'you better let somebody know, so's they can come an' help,' I says.
''Tain't any job a man oughta tackle alone,' I says to him. 'Git help, Man,
git help.'
“Well, by granny--_he-he!_ Man's wife brustled up at me like a--a--” He
searched his brain for a simile, and failed to find one. “'I have been
helping Manley, Mr. Polycarp Jenks,' she says to me, 'and I flatter myself
I have done as well as any _man_ could do.' And, by granny! the way them
yeller eyes of hern blazed at me--_he-he!_ I had to laugh, jest to look
at her. Dressed jest like a city girl, by granny! with ruffles on her
skirts--to ketch afire if she wasn't mighty keerful!--and a big straw hat
tied down with a veil, and kid gloves on her hands, and her yeller
hair kinda fallin' around her face--and them yeller eyes snappin' like
flames--by granny! if she didn't make as purty a picture as I ever want
to set eyes on! Slim and straight, jest like a storybook woman--_he-he!_
'Course, she was all smoke an' dirt; a big flake of burned grass was on her
hair, I took notice, and them ruffles was black up to her knees--_he-he!_
And she had a big smut on her cheek--but she was right there with her stack
of blues, by granny! Settin' into the game like a--a--” He leaned and
spat “But burnin' guards ain't no work for a woman to do, an' I told Man
so--straight out. 'You git help,' I says. 'I see you're might' near through
with this here strip,' I says, 'an' I'm in a hurry, or I'd stay, right
now.' And, by granny! if that there wife of Man's didn't up an' hit me
another biff--_he-he!_
“'Thank you very much,' she says to me, like ice water. 'When we need
your help, we'll be sure to let you know--but at present,' she says, 'we
couldn't think of troubling you.' And then, by granny! she turns right
around and smiles up at me--_he-he!_ Made me feel like somebody'd tickled
m' ear with a spear of hay when I was asleep, by granny! Never felt
anything like it--not jest with somebody smilin' at me.
“'Polycarp Jenks,' she says to me, 'we do appreciate what you've told us,
and I believe you're right,' she says. 'But don't insiniwate I'm not as
good a fighter as any man who ever breathed,' she says. 'Manley has another
of his headaches to-day--going to town always gives him a sick headache,'
she says, 'and I've done nearly all of this my own, lone self,' she says.
'And I'm horribly proud of it, and I'll never forgive you for saying I--'
And then, by granny! if she didn't begin to blink them eyes, and I felt
like a--a--” He put the usual period to his hesitation.
“Between you an' _me_, Kenneth,” he added, looking at Kent slyly, “she
ain't having none too easy a time. Man's gone back to drinkin'--I knowed
all the time he wouldn't stay braced up very long--lasted about six weeks,
from all I c'n hear. Mebbe she reely thinks it's jest headaches ails him
when he comes back from town--I dunno. You can't never tell what idees a
woman's got tacked away under her hair--from all I c'n gether. I don't
p'tend to know nothing about 'em--don't want to know--_he-he!_ But I
guess,” he hinted cunningly, “I know as much about 'em as you do--hey,
Kenneth? You don't seem to chase after 'em none, yourself--_he-he!_”
“Whereabouts did Man run his guards?” asked Kent, passing over the
invitation to personal confessions.
Polycarp gave a grunt of disdain. “Just on the west rim of his coulee.
About forty rod of six-foot guard, and slanted so it'll shoot a fire right
into high grass at the head of the coulee and send it kitin' over this way.
That's supposin' it turns a fire, which it won't. Six feet--a fall like
this here! Why, I never see grass so thick on this range--did you?”
“I wonder, did he burn that extra guard?” Kent was keeping himself rigidly
to the subject of real importance.
“No, by granny! he didn't--not unless he done it since yest'day. He went
to town for suthin, and he might' nigh forgot to go home--_he-he!_ He was
there yest'day about three o'clock, an' I says to him--”
“Well, so-long; I got to, be moving.” Kent gathered up the reins and went
his way, leaving Polycarp just in the act of drawing his “plug” from his
pocket, by his usual laborious method, in mental preparation for another
half hour of talk.
“If you're ridin' over that way, Kenneth, you better take a look at Man's
guard,” he called after him. “A good mile of guard, along there, would
help a lot if a fire got started beyond. The way he fixed it, it ain't no
account at all.”
Kent proved by a gesture that he heard him, and rode on without turning to
look back. Already his form was blurred as Polycarp gazed after him, and
in another minute or two he was blotted out completely by the smoke veil,
though he rode upon the level. Polycarp watched him craftily, though there
was no need, until he was completely hidden, then he went on, ruminating
upon the faults of his acquaintances.
Kent had no intention of riding over to Cold Spring. He had not been there
since Manley's marriage, though he had been a frequent visitor before, and
unless necessity drove him there, it would be long before he faced again
the antagonism of Mrs. Fleetwood. Still, he was mentally uncomfortable, and
he felt much resentment against Polycarp Jenks because he had caused that
discomfort. What was it to him, if Manley had gone bock to drinking? He
asked the question more than once, and he answered always that it was
nothing to him, of course. Still, he wished futilely that he had not been
quite so eager to cover up Manley's weakness and deceive the girl. He ought
to have given her a chance--
A cinder like a huge black snowflake struck him suddenly upon the cheek. He
looked up, startled, and tried to see farther into the haze which closed
him round. It seemed to him, now that his mind was turned from his musings,
that the smoke was thicker, the smell of burning grass stronger, and the
breath of wind hotter upon his face. He turned, looked away to the west,
fancied there a tumbled blackness new to his sight, and put his horse to a
run. If there were fire close, then every second counted; and as he raced
over the uneven prairie he fumbled with the saddle string that held a
sodden sack tied fast to the saddle, that he might lose no time.
The cinders grew thicker, until the air was filled with them, like a
snowstorm done in India ink. A little farther and he heard a faint
crackling; topped a ridge and saw not far ahead, a dancing, yellow line.
His horse was breathing heavily with the pace he was keeping, but Kent,
swinging away from the onrush of flame and heat, spurred him to a greater
speed. They neared the end of the crackling, red line, and as Kent swung in
behind it upon the burned ground, he saw several men beating steadily at
the flames.
He was hardly at work when Polycarp came running up and took his place
beside him; but beyond that Kent paid no attention to the others, though he
heard and recognized the voice of Fred De Garmo calling out to some one.
The smoke which rolled up in uneven volumes as the wind lifted it and bore
it away, or let it suck backward as it veered for an instant, blinded him
while he fought. He heard other men gallop up, and after a little some one
clattered up with a wagon filled with barrels of water. He ran to wet
his sack, and saw that it was Blumenthall himself, foreman of the Double
Diamond, who drove the team.
“Lucky it ain't as windy as it was yesterday and the day before,”
Blumenthall cried out, as Kent stepped upon the brake block to reach a
barrel. “It'd sweep the whole country if it was.”
Kent nodded, and ran back to the fire, trailing the dripping sack after
him. As he passed Polycarp and another, he heard Polycarp saying something
about Man Fleetwood's fire guard; but he did not stop to hear what it was.
Polycarp was always talking, and he didn't always keep too closely to
facts.
Then, of a sudden, he saw men dimly when he glanced down the leaping fire
line, and he knew that the fire was almost conquered. Another frenzied
minute or two, and he was standing in a group of men, who dropped their
charred, blackened fragments of blanket and bags, and began to feel for
their smoking material, while they stamped upon stray embers which looked
live enough to be dangerous.
“Well, she's out,” said a voice, “But it did look for a while as if it'd
get away in spite of us.”
Kent turned away, wiping an eye which held a cinder fast under the lid. It
was Fred De Garmo who spoke.
“If somebody'd been watchin' the railroad a leetle might closer--” Polycarp
began, in his thin, rasping voice.
Fred cut him short. “I thought you laid it to Man Fleetwood, burning fire
guards,” he retorted. “Keep on, and you'll get it right pretty soon. This
never come from the railroad; you can gamble on that.”
Blumenthall had left his team and come among them. “If you want to know how
it started, I can tell you. Somebody dropped a match, or a cigarette, or
something, by the trail up here a ways. I saw where it started when I went
to Cold Spring after the last load of water. And if I knew who it was--”
Polycarp launched his opinion first, as usual. “Well, I don't _know_ who
done it--but, by granny! I can might' nigh guess who it was. There's jest
one man that I know of been traveling that trail lately when he wa'n't in
his sober senses--”
Here Manley Fleetwood rode up to them, coughing at the soot his horse
kicked up. “Say! you fellows come on over to the house and have something
to eat--and,” he added significantly, “something _wet_. I told my wife,
when I saw the fire, to make plenty of coffee, for fighting fire's hungry
work, let me tell. Come on--no hanging back, you know. There'll be lots of
coffee, and I've got a quart of something better cached in the haystack!”
As he had said, fighting fire is hungry work, and none save Blumenthall,
who was dyspeptic and only ate twice a day, and then of certain foods
prepared by himself, declined the invitation.