with which he had done his work.

Jeffrey peered through the wood in the direction from which the shot
had come. There was no smoke, no noise of any one running away, no
sign of another human being anywhere.

Away back of him he heard shots, one, two, three; Stocking, probably,
or some of the other men who must be in the neighbourhood, firing at
other fleeing figures in the woods.

He grabbed the burning torch, pulled out the wick and stamped it into
a patch of burnt ground, threw the torch back from the fire line, and
started clubbing the fire out of the grass with the butt of his
rifle.

He was quickly brought to his senses, when the forgotten cartridge in
his gun accidentally exploded and the bullet went whizzing past his
ear. He dropped the gun nervously and finding a sharp piece of sapling
he began to work furiously, but systematically at the line of fire.

The line was thin here, where it had really only that moment been
started, and he made some headway. But as he worked along to where it
had gotten a real start he saw that it was useless. Still he clung to
his work. It was the only thing that his numbed brain could think of
to do for the moment.

He dug madly with the sapling, throwing the loose dirt furiously after
the fire as it ran away from him. He leaped upon the line of the fire
and stamped at it with his boots until the fire crept up his trousers
and shirt and up even to his hair. And still the fire ran away from
him, away down the hill after its real prey. He looked farther on
along the line and saw that it was not now a line but a charging,
rushing river of flame that ran down the hill, twenty feet at a jump.
Nothing, nothing on earth, except perhaps a deluge of rain could now
stop that torrent of fire.

He stepped back. There was nothing to be done here now, behind the
fire. Nothing to be done but to get ahead of it and save what could be
saved. He looked around for his horse.

Just then men came riding along the back of the line, Stocking and old
Erskine Beasley in the lead. They came up to where Jeffrey was
standing and looked on beyond moodily to where the body of Rogers
lay.

Jeffrey turned and looked, too. A silence fell upon the little group
of horsemen and upon the boy standing there.

Myron Stocking spoke at last:

"Mine got away, Jeff," he said slowly.

Jeffrey looked up quickly at him. Then the meaning of the words
flashed upon him.

"I didn't do that!" he exclaimed hastily