Boy Scout Fire Fighters; Or Jack Danby's Bravest Deed

by Richard Harding Davis

  CHAPTER II

  FIGHTING THE FIRE

  The three Patrols of the Troop had been nearly at full strength whenthe hike to the camping ground began, and Durland had at his disposal,therefore, when he led them across the open fields toward the burningmountain, about twenty quick, disciplined and thoroughly enthusiasticScouts, ready to do anything that was ordered, and to do it with a will.

  "What's it like over there, Jack?" asked Tom Binns, who was JackDanby's particular chum among the Scouts, and the one who had reallyinduced him to join the Crows.

  "It's going to be pretty hot work, Tom," said Jack. "There's no waterat all, and the only chance to stop that fire is by back firing."

  "That's pretty dangerous, isn't it?"

  "Yes, unless the man who's doing it knows exactly what he wants to doand exactly how to do it. But I guess Mr. Durland and Dick Crawfordwon't make any mistakes."

  "It's lucky for these farmers that Mr. Durland knows a fire when hesees it, isn't it, Jack? If they let that fire alone, Bob Hart said itwould sweep over the whole place and burn up the farmhouses."

  "Sure it would! The trouble is they never believe anything until theysee it. They think that just because there never was a really bad firehere before, there never will be."

  "There have been fires on Bald Mountain before, though, Jack. I'veseen them myself."

  "That's true enough--and that's just the trouble. This is the trouble.There's been scarcely any rain here for the last two months, andeverything is fearfully dry. If the brooks were full the fire wouldn'tbe so likely to jump them. But, as it is, any old thing may happen.That's the danger--and they can't see it."

  Each Scout was carrying his Scout axe and stick, a stout pole that wasuseful in a hundred different ways on every hike. The axes were outnow, and the sharp knives that each Scout carried were also ready forinstant use. Durland, at the head of the little column in which theScouts had formed, was casting his keen eye over the whole landscape.Now he gave the order to halt.

  The Scouts had reached the edge of the fertile land. The course of thelittle stream was directly before them, and on the other side was theland that had been partially cleared of timber the year before, filledwith stumps and dry brush.

  "Go over and borrow a few shovels from the farmhouse over there,"directed Durland. "Crawford, take a couple of Scouts and get them. Iwant those shovels, whether they want to lend them to you or not. It'sfor their own sake--we can't stand on ceremony if they won't or can'tunderstand the danger."

  "Come on, Danby and Binns," said Dick Crawford, a happy smile on hislips, and the light of battle in his eyes. "We'll get those shovels ifthey're to be found there, believe me!"

  The farmer and most of the men, of course, were in the fields, still atwork. If they had seen the advance of the Scouts they had paid noattention whatever, and seemed to have no curiosity, even when three ofthe Scouts left the main body, and went over to the farmhouse. ThereDick and the others found a woman, hatchet faced and determined, with abulldog and a hulking, overgrown boy for company. She sat on the backporch, peeling potatoes, and there was no welcome in the look she gavethem.

  "Be off with you!" she shrilled at them. "You'll get no hand-outshere! You're worse'n tramps, you boys be, running over honest people'sland, and stealing fruit. Be off now, or I'll set the dog onto ye!"

  "We only want to borrow some shovels, ma'am," explained Dick Crawford,politely, trying to hide a smile at her vehement way of expressingherself.

  "What next?" she cried. "Shovels, is it? And a fine chance we'd haveof ever seeing them ag'in if we let you have them, wouldn't we? Here,Tige! Sic 'em, boy, sic 'em!"

  The dog's hair rose on his back, and he growled menacingly as headvanced toward them. But there Jack Danby was in his own element.There had never been an animal yet, wild or tame, that he had everseen, with which he could not make friends. He dropped to one kneenow, while the others watched him, and spoke to the dog. In a momentthe savagery went out of the bulldog, who, as it seemed, was reallylittle more than a puppy, and he came playfully up to Jack, anxious tobe friendly.

  "The dog knows, you see," said Dick. "A dog will never make friendswith anyone who is unworthy, ma'am. Don't you think you could followhis example, and trust us?"

  "You'll get no shovels here," said the woman, with a surly look.

  "Oh, I don't know!" said little Tom Binns, under his breath. His eyeshad been busy, darting all around, and he had seen a number of shovels,scattered with other farm implements, under a pile of brushwood. Heleaped over to this pile now, suddenly, before the loutish boy who washelping with the potatoes could make a move to stop him, and in amoment he was dancing off, his arms full of shovels. Dick Crawford sawwhat had happened, and could not help approving.

  "Thank you," he said to the enraged woman, who rose and seemed about totake a hand herself, physically. "I'm sorry we had to help ourselves,but it's necessary to save your home, though your own men don't seem tothink so."

  They were off then, with the woman shouting after them, and trying toinduce the dog, who stood wagging his tail, to give chase.

  "I don't like to take things that way," said Dick, "but if ever the endjustified the means, this was the time. We had to have those shovels,and it's just as I told her--it's for their sake that we took them, notfor ours at all."

  "What will we do with these shovels when we get them?" asked Tom Binns,who had distributed his load so that each of the others had someshovels to carry. They made a heavy load, even so, and Tom couldn'thave carried them all for more than a few steps without dropping fromtheir weight.

  "I guess Mr. Durland intends to dig a trench, and then start a backfire," said Crawford. "You see, the wind is so strong that if westarted a back fire without precaution like that it would be simplyhastening destruction of the property we are trying to save, and itwould be better not to interfere at all than to do that. With thetrench, you see, the fire we start will be quickly stopped, and theother fire won't have anything to feed on when it once reaches the partthat we've burned over."

  Crawford had guessed aright the reason for getting the shovels, forDurland, as soon as the three Scouts reached the stream with theirprecious burden of shovels, picked out the strongest Scouts and setthem to work digging the trench. He took a shovel himself, and set thebest of examples by the way he made the dirt fly.

  They were working on a sort of a ridge. On each side there was anatural barrier to the advance of the fire, fortunately, in the form ofrock quarries, where there was absolutely nothing that the fire couldfeed on. Therefore, if it hadn't been checked, it would have sweptover the place where they had dug their trench, as through the mouth ofa funnel, and mushroomed out again beyond the quarries.

  The trench was dug in an amazingly short time. It was rough work, buteffective, the ditch, about two feet deep and seven or eight feet wide,extending for nearly two hundred feet. On the side of this furthestfrom the fire Durland now lined up the Scouts, each armed with a branchcovered with leaves at one end.

  "I'm going to start a back fire now," he said. "I don't think it willbe big enough to leap the trench, but to make sure, you will all staylined up on your side of the ditch, and beat out every spark that comesacross and catches the dry grass on your side. Then we'll beabsolutely safe."

  He and Crawford, skilled in the ways of the woods, soon had the brushon the other side burning. The rate at which the little fire they setspread, showed beyond a doubt how quickly the great fire that wassweeping down the mountain would have crossed the supposed clearing.

  "Gee, see how it licks around those stumps!" said Tom Binns. "It'sjust as if they'd started a fire in a furnace or a big open fireplace."

  "That's the wind," said Jack. "It's blowing pretty hard. I think thedanger will be pretty well over by tonight, for the time being, atleast. Unless I'm very much mistaken, there's rain coming behind thatwind."

  "It's hard to tell," said Bob Hart, Patrol Leader of the Crows, wait
ingwith his branch for the time to beat out sparks. "The smoke darkensthe sky so that all weather signs fail. The sun glows red through it,and you can't really tell, here, whether there are any rain clouds ornot. But it's a wet wind, certainly, and I guess you're right, Jack."

  "I don't see how you can tell about the weather as well as you do,Jack," said Pete Stubbs. "You never seem to be wrong, and since I'veknown you, you've guessed better than the papers two or three times."

  "I've lived in the woods nearly all my life, Pete. That's why I cansometimes tell. I'm not always right, by a good deal, but the sky andthe trees and the birds are pretty good weather prophets as a rule. Inthe country you have to be able to tell about the weather."

  "That's right," said Bob Hart. "I've known farmers, when there was amoon, to keep men working until after midnight to get the hay in, justbecause they were sure there'd be a storm the next day. And they wereright, too, though everyone else laughed at them."

  "It means an awful lot to a farmer to get his hay in before the raincomes," said Jack. "It means the difference between a good year and abad year, often. Many a farm has been lost just because a crop likethat failed and the farmer couldn't pay a mortgage when he had expectedto."

  "Well, if they're all as stupid as this fellow, they deserve to losetheir farms," said Bob Hart.

  "Here he comes now, and he looks mad enough to shoot us!"

  It was true. The irate farmer was coming, pitchfork in hand, with histwo sturdy sons and a couple of farm hands, who grinned as if theyneither knew nor cared what would happen, but were glad of a chance fora little excitement.

  "Who gave you leave to dig your ditch here?" he shouted. "This is myland, I reckon. Be off with you now! And look at the fire youstarted!"

  Indignantly he made for Bob Hart with his pitchfork. He was worked upto a regular fury, and it might have fared ill with the Patrol Leaderhad it not been for Jack Danby's quick leap to the rescue.

  "You don't want to use that pitchfork," shouted Jack, springingforward. And, before the astonished farmer realized what the Scout wasup to, the pitchfork had been seized from his hand.

  "What's the trouble here?" cried Durland, rushing up just then. "Shameon you, my man! Can't you see that we've saved your farm?"

  He seized the farmer by the shoulders and spun him around to face thesea of fire that was billowing down the slopes from the blazingmountain, that was now a real torch. The fire had passed beyond thestage of the slow burning circle that is so characteristic of woodfires. It was rushing relentlessly forward, and even now it was at theedge of the clearing.

  "There!" cried Durland. "You can see now how it would have eaten thatcleared timber lot of yours. See?"

  The back fire had been started half way in the timber lot. It hadtraveled fast, and before the onrushing big fire was a space a hundredyards wide of blackened ground, where the saving flames Durland hadlighted had had their will. As far as that space came the big fire.Then, because there was nothing left to feed it and the gap was toowide for it to leap, it stopped, and there was an open space, alreadyburnt over, where only sparks and glowing embers remained.

  "Jumping wildcats!" exclaimed the farmer, in awe. "That was a purtysizable fire! I say, stranger, I guess I was a leetle mite hasty justnow. You've saved us from a bad fire, all right, though I swum I don'tsee how you thought to do it."

  "This is exceptional for this part of the country," said Durland, witha smile. "But I have lived in countries where whole towns have beenswept away by a sudden shift of the wind just because the peoplethought they were safe, and I have learned that the only way to fightfire is with more fire. Also, that you never can tell what a big fireis going to do, and that the only way to be on the safe side is tofigure that the fire is going after you just as if it was human. Itwants to destroy you, as it seems, and it keeps on looking for the weakspot that you haven't guarded."

  "You come right back to the house, all of you," said the farmer, "andthe wife will give you a supper that you don't see the like of in townvery often, I'll warrant ye!"

  Durland was glad to accept the invitation for the whole Troop, for theScouts had had no time to cook their own supper. He felt, too, thathis Troop had won a sturdy friend, and that pleased him.