faintly to him in all that rush and crackle of flame and wind
together. "I never saw anything like it before--did you? It sprung up
all at once, and the first I knew it was sweeping along."

"Don't stand here!" Jack panted hoarsely. "Good Lord, girl! You--"

"Why, you've been running!" she cried, in a surprised tone. "Were you
down there in it? I thought you had to stay up on top." She had to
raise her voice to make him hear her.

Her absolute ignorance of the danger exasperated him. He took her by
the arm and swung her up the trail. "We've got to beat it!" he yelled
in her ear. "Can't you see it's coming this way?"

"It can't come fast enough to catch us," she answered impatiently.
"It's away back there down the hill yet. Wait! I want to watch it for
a minute."

A bushy cedar tree ten feet away to their left suddenly burst into
flame and burned viciously, each branch a sheet of fire.

"Well, what do you know about _that_?" cried Marion Rose. "It jumped
from away down there!"

"Come on!" Pulling her by the arm, Jack began running again up the
hill, leaving the road where it swung to the east and taking a short
cut through the open space in the brush. "Run!" he urged, still
pulling at her arm. "We've--got to--swing around it--"

She ran with him, a little of their peril forcing itself upon her