prevailing. What cinders arose went straight up high in the air. The
main danger threatened from the stubble.

Creeping into this from the base of the haystack in flames, little
pathways of fire darted out like vicious serpents.

Andy made for these with the rake. He beat at them and scraped the
ground. He stamped with his stockinged feet and pulled up clumps of
stubble with his hands.

The trouble was that so many little fires started up at so many
different spots. Finally, however, the ground was a mass of burned-out
grass for twenty feet clear around the centre of the blaze.

The haystack was sinking down a glowing mass, but now confined itself
and past spreading out.

Andy flung himself on the ground fairly exhausted. His hands and face
were somewhat blistered, and he was wringing wet with perspiration.

He looked pretty serious as he did "a sum out of school."

"That stack held about two tons and a-half," he calculated. "I heard a
farmer at the post-office say yesterday that he was getting eight
dollars in the stack for hay. There's twenty dollars gone up in smoke.
Where will I ever get twenty dollars?"

Andy became more and more despondent the longer he thought of the dismal
situation.