water?" he fairly wailed. "We're going to
be burned alive! Have you got water?"

Inside were two girls and two young fellows.

One of the girls was wringing her hands and just sobbing, and the other
girl was trying to calm her down. She just kept crying, "It's coming nearer
and nearer! What shall we do? Oh, what shall we do?" One of the fellows was
all gone to pieces, too, and he just clutched Harry's arm and said, "Save
us; can't you save us?"

Harry just kind of threw him off. He said, "We're here to save you if we
can, and die with you if we can't. The first thing is, not to be a coward.
Remember, when the Titanic went down, the band was playing. There have been
a couple of million people killed in the last two years. Who are you, to be
standing here crying like a baby?"

Oh boy, that hit the girl if it didn't hit the fellow. She just got up and
grabbed Harry by the hand and said, "I'm _not_ a coward. I _can_ be brave."

"All right," he said; "we've got about eight minutes. Sit down and be
calm. These boys are scouts. Take a lesson from them."

_Oh, didn't I admire that fellow!_ I bet the girl did, too. Gee, you
couldn't blame her.

"There ought to be some axes here," he said; "hustle and turn things over."

Illustration #4 "We chopped away the brush to make a long clear space."

Oh boy, it didn't take us long to have that shanty inside out. We found
five axes.

"All right," Harry said; "now we've got just one slim chance and it all
depends upon how fast we can work. We've got to chop down and tear up a
line of brush and start a fire back to meet the other one. Everybody get
busy-woman's place is on the fire line; _hustle!_"

Oh boy, you should have seen that girl who had been crying. She just
grabbed an axe and wouldn't give it up. Now this is the way we did, and all
the while that line of fire was coming along, nearer, nearer, nearer. We
chopped away the brush so as to make a long clear space about ten or
fifteen feet wide. Harry and three of the scouts and one of the girls used
the axes; because that girl just wouldn't hand over the axe and we couldn't
make her. And didn't she turn out to be a regular Mrs. Daniel Boone!

The rest of us threw the brush over toward the fire as fast as we could.
Some of the small bushes we just dragged up out of the earth. Some
hustling!

The fire was so near us now, that we could feel the heat good and strong
and sparks kept falling among us, so we had to keep stampin