fter a
time he slept, but it was a restless slumber filled with troubled
dreams. Twice he was half awake, and the second time it seemed to him
his nostrils sensed a sharper tang of smoke than that of burning
tobacco, yet he did not fully rouse himself, and the hours passed, and
new sounds and smells that rose in the night impinged themselves upon
him only as a part of the troublous fabric of his dreams. But at last
there came a shock, something which beat over these things which
chained him, and seized upon his consciousness, demanding that he rouse
himself, open his eyes, and get up.

He obeyed the command, and before he was fully awake, found himself on
his feet. It was still dark, but he heard voices, voices no longer
subdued, but filled with a wild note of excitement and command. And
what he smelled was not the smell of tobacco smoke! It was heavy in his
room. It filled his lungs. His eyes were smarting with the sting of it.

Then came vision, and with a startled cry he leaped to a window. To the
north and east he looked out upon a flaming world!

With his fist he rubbed his smarting eyes. The moon was gone. The gray
he saw outside must be the coming of dawn, ghostly with that mist of
smoke that had come into his room. He could see shadowy figures of men
running swiftly in and out and disappearing, and he could hear the
voices of women and children, and from beyond the edge of the forest to
the west came the howling of many dogs. One voice rose above the
others. It was Black Roger's, and at its commands little groups of
figures shot out into the gray smoke-gloom and did not appear again.

North and east the sky was flaming sullen red, and a breath of air
blowing gently in David's face told him the direction of the wind. The
chateau lay almost in the center of the growing line of conflagration.

He dressed himself and went again to the window. Quite distinctly now,
he could make out Joe Clamart under his window, running toward the edge
of the forest at the head of half a dozen men and boys who carried axes
and cross-cut saws over their shoulders. It was the last of Black
Roger's people that he saw for some time in the open meadow, but from
the front of the chateau he could hear many voices, chiefly of women
and children, and guessed it was from there that the final operations
against the fire were being directed. The wind was blowing stronger in
his face. With it came a sharper tang of smoke, and the widening lig