had gone before her that
way, and a moment later she had gone back and collected a bundle of
"dry-wood", and with a long pole to feel her way she waded carefully in.
As it grew deeper and deeper until it reached her breast, she took the
matches out and held them in her teeth, holding her bundle above her
head. It was hard work to keep her footing this way, however, and once
she stepped into a hole and went under to her chin, having a narrow
escape from falling into a place which her pole could not fathom; but
she recovered herself and at last was on the bridge. When she tried to
light a fire, however, her matches would not strike. They as well as the
wood had gotten wet when she slipped, and not one would light. She might
as well have been at her home in the district. When every match had been
tried and tried again on a dry stone, only to leave a white streak of
smoking sulphur on it, she sat down and cried. For the first time she
felt cold and weary. The rays of the sun fell on her and warmed her a
little, and she wiped her eyes on her sleeve and looked up. The sun had
just come up over the hill. It gave her courage. She turned and looked
the other way from which she had come--nothing but a waste of water and
woods. Suddenly, from a point up over the nearer woods a little sparkle
caught her eye; there must be a house there, she thought; they might
have matches, and she would go back and get some. But there it was
again--it moved. There was another--another--and something black moving.
She sprang to her feet and strained her eyes. Good God! they were
coming! In a second she had turned the other way, rushed across the
bridge, and was dashing through the water to her waist. The water was
not wide that way. The hill rose almost abruptly on that side, and up it
she dashed, and along the road. A faint curl of smoke caught her eye and
she made for it through the field.

It was a small cabin, and the woman in it had just gotten her fire
well started for the morning, when a girl bare-headed and bare-footed,
dripping wet to the skin, her damp hair hanging down her back, her face
white and her eyes like coals, rushed in almost without knocking and
asked for a chunk of fire. The woman had no time to refuse (she told of
it afterward when she described the burning of the bridge); for without
waiting for answer and before she really took in that it was not a
ghost, the girl had seized the biggest chunk on the hearth and was
running w