It was the girl who first discovered this. She sprang up from her place
with a startled exclamation.

"Oh," said she, "th' fire is spreadin'!"

He rose quickly to his feet.




CHAPTER III


They were appalled by the predicament in which they found themselves.
The thing seemed quite mysterious.

The rock against which the fire had been built was all aglow, as if it
had been heated in a furnace till red hot--strange circumstance; one
that would have fascinated Layson into elaborate investigation had he
had the time to think about it--and, beyond it, evidently communicated
through it as a link, the rustling leaves of the past autumn, their
surface layers sun-dried, were bursting into glittering little points of
flame all about the narrow ledge of rock on which they were standing. As
they gazed, before Layson could rush forward to stamp out these
sparkling perils, the fire had spread, as the girl, wise in the direful
ways of brush-fires, had known at once that it would spread, to the
encircling pine-tops, left in a tinder barricade about the clearing by
the sawyers and the axemen.