“Can’t,” said Sandy laconically, “I’ve been watching that. There’s a belt of fire between us and the river. We should never have camped so far away from it.”
“Well, you know we thought we’d be safer from Henderson’s men up here,” Dick replied.
The boys could hear plainly the howling of the wind and the distant, thunderous roar of the fire. Accustomed as he had become to danger since his sojourn in the north, Dick could not overcome a sudden feeling of fear and apprehension.
“Where will we go?” shivered Sandy. “It seems to be all around us.”
“We’ve got to go through it somehow,” Dick answered, not altogether sure, himself, what ought to be done. “It’s dangerous to remain here any longer. What do you think is best?”
Sandy, eyes running water, scratched his head in perplexity.
“If we could get to the river,” he said, “we’d be safe. I don’t see any other way.”
A few moments later, two disconsolate figures clambered up the side of the coulee and struck off hurriedly at right angles with the fire. With a catch in his throat, Dick perceived the huge walls of flames bearing down upon them. For several miles, at least, they were cut off from the river. Even the sky glowed dully like a large orange disk through a thick blanket of smoke.
“What’s that!” exclaimed Sandy, suddenly starting back.
Something had shot past them through the underbrush—a heavy body, hurtling along in mute terror. Almost immediately came other bodies, small and large—rabbits scurrying almost between their legs; deer, jumping past in a wild stampede; bear and moose, crashing their way forward in a cumbersome, heart-stirring panic, as they ran from the fire.
“If they’re afraid, it’s about time we were,” Sandy declared grimly, through set teeth. “If this smoke gets any worse we’ll be suffocated in another ten minutes. My throat feels as if I had been drinking liquid fire for a week.”
Twenty feet away a flying ember settled down on the dry grass and immediately burst into flames. With the ever increasing velocity of the wind, similar patches of fire sprang up around them on every side.
“I’m afraid,” said Dick, fighting bravely against mounting despair, “that we’ll never make it. I never saw such a wind.”
Sandy did not reply. With handkerchiefs pressed to their noses and mouths, the boys struggled forward for another quarter of a mile.