but how long shall I wait?" I muttered.
"Something's happened to him. If only I could see what that fire is
doing!"

The camping-place was low down between two slopes, one of which was high
and had a rocky cliff standing bare in the sunlight. I conceived the
idea of climbing to it. I could not sit quietly waiting any longer. So,
mounting Target, I put him up the slope. It was not a steep climb, still
it was long and took considerable time. Before I reached the gray cliff
I looked down over the forest to see the rolling, smoky clouds. We
climbed higher and still higher, till Target reached the cliff and could
go no farther. Leaping off, I tied him securely and bent my efforts to
getting around on top of the cliff. If I had known what a climb it was
I should not have attempted it, but I could not back out with the summit
looming over me. It ran up to a ragged crag. Hot, exhausted, and out of
breath, I at last got there.

As I looked I shouted in surprise. It seemed that the whole of Penetier
was under my feet. The green slope disappeared in murky clouds of smoke.
There were great pillars and huge banks of yellow and long streaks of
black, and here and there, underneath, moving splashes of red. The thing
did not stay still one instant. It changed so that I could not tell
what it did look like. Them were life and movement in it, and something
terribly sinister. I tried to calculate how far distant the fire was and
how fast it was coming, but that, in my state of mind, I could not do.
The whole sweep of forest below me was burning. I felt the strong breeze
and smelled the burnt wood. Puffs of white smoke ran out ahead of the
main clouds, and I saw three of them widely separated. What they
meant puzzled me. But all of a sudden I saw in front of the nearest a
flickering gleam of red. Then I knew those white streams of smoke rose
where the fire was being sucked up the canyons. They leaped along with
amazing speed. It was then that I realized that Dick and Hiram had been
caught by one of these offshoots of the fire, and had been compelled to
turn away to save their lives. Perhaps they would both be lost. For a
moment I felt faint, but I fought it off. I had to think of myself. It
was every one for himself, and perhaps there was many a man caught on
Penetier with only a slender chance for life.

"Oh! oh!" I cried, suddenly. "Herky, Bud, and Bill tied helpless in that
cabin! Dick forgot them. They'll be burned to death!"

As I