CHAPTER XV.

THE FIRE IN THE WOODS

Here flying loosely as the mane Of a young war-horse in the blast; There, roll’d in masses dark and swelling, As proud to be the thunder’s dwelling. —Moore.

I’ll read you matter deep and dangerous. As full of peril and adventurous spirit, As to o’erwalk a current, roaring loud, On the unsteadfast footing of a spear. —Shakespeare.

“What! mounted already?” said Major Gordon, as he rode up to the gate of Sweetwater, and saw Kate in the saddle. “I had no idea even that you intended to ride today. I thought, in fact, that we were to read Milton.”

It had come to be as much of a habit for the Major to appear at Sweetwater every morning, as it was for his men to report themselves to him at roll-call. Kate, moreover, always had a smile for him, even if Mrs. Warren had not; and often, before he left, the manner in which the next morning should be spent, whether in riding, reading, or otherwise, was determined.

“Haven’t you heard!” answered Kate, as she arranged her dress, giving a brief nod, her whole demeanor full of excitement.

“I have heard nothing.”

“Not heard it? The woods are on fire. See!”

As she spoke, she pointed with her riding-whip in the opposite direction to that from which her guest had come.

The Major, looking where she indicated, observed, far off, hovering over the distant swamp, a thick, black cloud, which, if the day had been more sultry, he would have supposed to be an approaching thunder storm.

“But why should you go?” he said.

“It is my duty,” was the reply. “The population is thin at best in this wild district, but thinner than ever since the war broke out. But few men can turn out, and I thought”—she hesitated, and then added, frankly, “that my presence, perhaps, would stimulate them to exertion. For, you know,” she added, changing her tone suddenly to a light and jesting one, “that my poor wealth is in timber almost entirely, as that of the patriarchs was in herds and camels; and one doesn’t like to have whole acres burned up, even though caring for riches as little as your humble servant.”

“But you ought not to have thought of going alone. You should have waited for me,” said Major Gordon, impulsively. “It may be fraught with danger.”

“Thank you!” saucily replied Kate, bowing with mock gravity. “You must excuse the curtsey,” she added, “for you see I am on horseback. Oh! don’t explain. I say again, I’m a thousand times obliged to you, for thinking I’m not able to manage myself, or look after my own property; but am just like the hundred and one silly, weak creatures, whom you men would keep in glass cases, as a pretty toy for the mantel-piece.”

“Indeed, Miss Aylesford,” began the Major. “I beg you—”

“Nay, not another word, as you would be restored to favor,” she said, playfully lifting her right hand, from the wrist of which her whip dangled by a silken cord. “Or rather be put on trial for good behaviour. The truth, sir, always comes first. I see now what all your pretty compliments mean. Nay! not a word.” And she shook her head, a pout on her lip, but her eyes dancing with merriment; for the Major was looking quite disconcerted. “You and aunt both agree in having the most sovereign contempt for my capacity for taking care of myself; I will not add the most supreme confidence in your own powers of advice, if not guardianship.”

“I cry your mercy,” said Major Gordon, when, after this wild rattle, she suddenly gave her horse his head; and as he spoke, he cantered on beside her. “I haven’t a word to say for myself. But, as I have never seen a fire in the woods, you’ll be, I hope, my cavalier, so that I may gratify my curiosity.” His tone, as he uttered these words, was demureness itself.

The gay creature he was attending laughed outright. It was a light, silvery laugh, and with all its abandon, lady-like. It was a laugh running over with happiness and glee. She turned her head over her left shoulder, and looked the Major frankly in the face.

“Well done,” was her reply. “You have beat me at my own weapons. But enough of such nonsense.” And in a tone of real seriousness, she asked, “Have you, indeed, never seen a fire in the woods?” “Never. Are they not dangerous sometimes?”

“Often. If the wind shifts, the flames come roaring down on the workmen, frequently faster than a man can run. These pines, in a dry season, burn like tinder. It is a common thing for the conflagration to rage till a heavy rain extinguishes it. Sometimes miles of forest are devastated before the fire goes out.”

All this time, the Major and his fair companion had been pressing forward, at a hand gallop. Before long, the smell of the burning woods, as well as the increasing clouds of smoke, betokened their near approach to the scene of the conflagration; and in a few minutes, turning an angle of the road, they came in full sight of it, and checked their horses.

Directly in front of the equestrians, appeared a space from which the trees had been cut off by the charcoal-burners employed in providing fuel for the neighboring iron-furnace. Here and there about this clearing, which was nearly a mile long and a half a mile deep, stood various smoking, semi-circular mounds, like huge black ovens; while scattered around, were to be seen cubical piles of pine-wood, some partially covered with earth, and some as yet entirely bare. Though Major Gordon had never seen the process of charcoal making before, its different stages, as thus revealed, explained the whole to him. A log-hut, the rudest in construction he had ever seen, located in the midst of this desolate tract, showed that the charcoal burners temporarily resided here. But, at present, no signs of human life were visible about the cabin. Indeed, the eye of the Major did not rest on it, or on the smoking mounds, for more than a second, the spectacle beyond being such as to fix his attention immediately.

Back of the charcoal-clearing stretched the pine forest, like a wall of enormous reeds, sombre and gloomy as death. Just as the Major and Kate arrived at the turn of the road, the fire, racing before a brisk wind, had come into sight at the further end of the clearing. In little more than a minute, it swept across a tract of woodland nearly a furlong in extent. The flames had scarcely caught the lower part of a tree before they had run to its very top. Distance seemed to be no impediment to them, for, reaching a side-road, they did not perceptibly pause, but crossed it at once. Indeed, the dry, resinous trees appeared often to take fire without the contact of the elements, flashing into conflagration from the heat alone.

As the ocean of flame advanced, it tossed billows of pitchy smoke up into the sky, while red forky tongues shot continually forth, and lapping the air for a moment, went out forever. Where the undergrowth had been left standing along the edge of the wood, or where there was a tract of wild grass, the fire, catching to it, whistled along with a rapidity the eye could scarcely follow. It was a melancholy sight to see the tall pines, the growth of a century, standing one moment green to the top; and the next, after writhing helplessly in the lurid fire, left blackened and shrivelled wrecks. The roar of the conflagration, meantime, was awful, the sound of it seeming to pervade all space. Every instant it grew louder and deeper, for the flames had now skirted along almost the entire side of the clearing, and were consequently directly opposite to our equestrians, within only half a mile.

For the first time it now occurred to the Major that their situation might possibly become perilous. He censured himself for not suspecting this before, but as less than five minutes had elapsed since their arrival, perhaps less than half that time, and as, in that brief interval, his whole attention had been engrossed by the novel spectacle, his error was natural. He turned immediately to Kate.

She had not been less absorbed than himself, and was still eagerly regarding the conflagration, her whole attitude and air betraying intense abstraction. The quick, earnest words of her companion aroused her, however, at once. She started with a blush, at the first sound of his deep voice.

“We shall be cut off by the fire,” he said, “if we don’t fly for our lives. As soon as the flames reach this end of the clearing, they will extend laterally in our direction; for that is the course of the wind. Not a minute must be lost.”

Kate scarcely waited to hear him out. At once she saw the truth of what he said, and recognizing the imminency of their peril even better than he did, for she was more familiar with the treacherous rapidity of these conflagrations, she turned her steed, and, with no answer but a look, galloped back along the road they had come.

The horses had, for some time, been restless. But their riders, engrossed by the scene, had not observed this, though mechanically quieting them, from unconscious habit. The moment the animals felt the rein relax, and found their backs turned on the nameless horror which had oppressed them, they gave way to their affright, and rushed onward with terror, the sweat starting on their glossy coats, and their distended nostrils reddening with blood. Neither the Major nor Kate made any effort to check them. For both now recollected that the road they were following curved in towards the line of the fire, and that for a considerable time at least, they would be approaching the conflagration, instead of increasing their distance from it. In this extremity the same thought occurred to both. It was whether it would not be wiser to return, for, even in the event of being surrounded by the flames, the clearing would afford comparative safety. But each felt that already it was doubtful if they could regain the clearing, and that nothing was left but to press on at the most rapid pace of which Arab and Selim were capable. They looked at each other but did not speak, for looks supply the place of words in great emergencies. Both read each other’s thoughts, and both said mentally that their lives now depended on the mettle of their horses.

The air, meantime, was becoming so oppressive, that breathing grew difficult. The smoke and heat filled the whole atmosphere, and the terrified animals, now more unnerved than ever, were bathed completely in sweat, and began to exhibit a disposition to bolt aside. It was with the utmost difficulty that Kate could keep Arab’s head facing the approaching fire, the alarmed beast swerving continually. Selim, from having been trained to the battle field, was less affrighted at the smoke, though, as terror is infectious, he also commenced to be unmanageable.

Precious moments were thus lost. Suddenly the conflagration made its appearance, about two hundred yards in front of them, and crossing the road almost immediately, blocked up the passage with a solid wall of fire; while rapidly spreading laterally, it threatened, in a few instants more, to engulf our equestrians. Blazing fragments of bark were already falling around them; the flames crackled sharper, and the roar deepened.

Heretofore, in seasons of danger, Major Gordon had invariably known what to do. There had always been some possibility of escape, something which, if tried, might perhaps avert death. But now he saw no chance, however remote. He was like the miserable victim, who, bound hand and foot, is laid down in the path of the hideous Juggernaut, and who beholds, with chill horror, the terrible machine advancing continually nigher and nigher. Yet he thought less of himself than of Kate. To see her perish before his eyes, and of a death so awful, he being powerless to assist her, was the pang that wrung his soul. But his agony was not unmixed with a certain pleasure. From the deep recesses of his heart, surprising even himself, there thrilled, in this crisis, a wild joy. He could not pause to analyze it, but it seemed to say that death was sweet, with Kate to share it. Instinctively he looked at her, something of all this finding expression in his glance. Her eyes met his, in a long, full gaze, as if her whole soul was in it, a gaze which raised this sensation of joy to one of absolute bliss. For a moment he almost thanked heaven for the calamity which had broken down the barriers of conventionalism and sex between them. The near approach of death had revealed to him how much he loved Kate; and that look, did it not, he said, betray that she loved him as well?

All this occupied but an instant. But the conflagration, in that brief interval, had diminished its distance one-half.