Page:The Overland Monthly, Jan-June 1894.djvu/225

1894.] the others must be there somewhere.

"Hello, Peter! where are the rest of your family?"

"Peter dear? Sweetheart? Go to the devil!" was the unsatisfactory reply. But Humphrey soon found a path leading down to the brookside, on the other side of the clearing, where he almost stumbled into the arms of Mr. Riordan, who had heard his voice and started to see who was there. His hearty grasp of the blistered hands made their owner wince, though the answer to his hasty question was that they were all safe.

On some bedding in a sheltered hollow in the bank lay Mrs. Riordan, and Bessie was fanning her. She had been prostrated with the heat and the fright, but was greatly cheered by Humphrey's coming. Bessie, too, came forward and greeted him gladly, not seeming to remember that she had parted from him in anger a week before.

She noticed immediately that something was the matter, and he had to admit with reluctance that he had ashes in his eyes, and was burned some. Mr. Riordan's eyes were also greatly inflamed by his recent experiences, and he had noticed nothing. But Bessie was all sympathy when, after she had brought a basin and towel to remove the black, she could see the great blisters on his hands and arms where the shirt sleeve had been burned through. She helped him wrap them up in oiled cloths, with a pity that was almost tenderness. He could only say earnest words of commonplace thanks in return, for both the elder Riordans were talking to him at once.

With rapid question and answer he was soon told how, when they had known some time before the fire reached them that it must inevitably come, they had removed all their small belongings to this shelter by the stream, and covered them with wet blankets. The horse was tied to a snag in the stream when the fire reached them, and he was saved; but the cow, poor bewildered thing, suffocated in the midst of her wild struggles and fright. The heat had been terrible for a long time, for there had been but little wind to hurry the fire on. Bessie and Mr. Riordan would emerge from under their blankets at intervals, and throw water over them again, not forgetting to treat the trembling and wild-eyed horse in the same way, as he stood to his knees in the brook. Sometimes burning cinders would fall upon him, and for a moment stick and burn; then he would give the fearful cry of agony and terror that once heard is not forgotten.

"Yes," said Mrs. Riordan, "we are all saved but the cow; even Peter and the cat. Peter has done nothing but sit on a stump and swear since, but the cat has been catching all the confiding little squirrels and wood creatures that shared our shelter. I am provoked with him."

and Mr. Riordan prepared a meal over a campfire presently, the former spreading a cloth over a table and setting the plates, "quite as if they had not been burned out at all," Humphrey said. He took an early opportunity of asking her—very close at hand indeed—if she did not think his eyes looked better. She glanced critically at them, and said she thought they did, but impartially added, as she moved to put something straight at the other side of the table, that "they lacked a good deal of looking handsome yet."

"They can yet reflect something handsome, you would see if you would look closer."

"You must have had a good deal of experience in making pretty speeches lately."

"I have come a hard journey to see you today, Bessie, and I think you might give me a kind word."

"I will give you some hot coffee, and