g them out.
I don't know how long it took us, but pretty soon we had a long, narrow
space cleared. I know my hands were bleeding. As fast as the brush was
chopped away, some of the fellows dragged it over toward where the fire
was, as near as they dared. That girl would go almost up to the blaze and
push a big clump of brush toward it and then run back. Her dress was all
torn, but she didn't care.

Then we lighted the brush along the edge of the cleared space that was
nearest to the fire. If the wind had been blowing that way, the fire would
have moved right out to meet the other one. But it had to buck the wind and
that was bad. Anyway, the clearing we had made prevented it from coming our
way, but the sparks kept blowing across the clearing, and we knew that all
we had done was to check the fire long enough to get another good head
start away from it.

Believe _me_, we didn't wait long.

Harry was panting so hard he could only just talk. "We've got to get down
the other side of the mountain," he said, "I figure it'll be about ten
minutes or so before the land this side of the clearing gets started. The
sparks'll start it. The clearing isn't wide enough and the wind is wrong.
Drop everything and follow me--quick."

Then Will Dawson spoke up. He never talked very much, but he was a good
scout just the same. He was breathing so hard he just gulped. "Do either
of you girls or fellows know where the man who lived here got his water?
There must be water here somewheres or they wouldn't have built the house
here."

"We can't stem this advance with spring water," Harry said; "we'd need a
reservoir. Come on!"

"But if we could find the spring," Will said, "we could follow the trickle
and get into a brook lower down. How are we going to find our way down the
other side of the mountain. It's worse than this side. The west side of the
mountain is always worse."

"The fire won't climb down as fast is it climbs up," Harry panted; "it
doesn't work that way. The mountain itself acts as a wind shield. We've
got to get over the top blamed quick. I'll find a way down. Don't let's
waste time here!"

Will just said, "The best trail in the world is a brook. It goes the
quickest way. If it takes us fifteen minutes to find the spring, even then
it's best. It's better than getting lost. The brook knows it's way and we
don't. Water is a scout."

"Who says so?" Harry said, kind of impatient.

"Kit Carson said so," Will said.

"We