“Hold the torch, Polly,” cried Balser, and Polly raised the torch. The boys were within fifteen yards of the bear, and each took deliberate aim and fired. The bear moaned and fell forward. Then Balser and Tom started rapidly toward the mouth of the gully. When they had almost reached the opening they looked back for Polly, who they thought was following them, but there he stood where they had left him, a hundred yards behind them.
Balser called, “Polly! Polly!” but Polly did not move. Then Tom blew his whistle, and Polly started, not toward them, alas! but toward the bear.
“Don’t go to him, Polly,” cried Balser. “He may not be dead. We’ve had enough of him to-night, for goodness’ sake! We’ll come back to-morrow and find him dead.” But Polly continued walking slowly toward the bear.
“Polly continued slowly toward the bear.”
“Polly! Polly! Come back!” cried both the boys. But Polly by that time was within ten feet of the bear, holding his torch and moving with the step of one unconscious of what he was doing. A few steps more and Polly was by the side of the terrible Fire Bear. The bear revived for a moment, and seemed conscious that an enemy was near him. With a last mighty effort he rose to his feet and struck Polly a blow with his paw which felled him to the ground. When Polly fell, the Fire Bear fell upon him, and Balser and Tom started to rescue their unfortunate friend. Then it was that a terrible thing happened. When Polly’s torch dropped from his hand a blue flame three or four feet in height sprang from the ground just beyond the bear. The fire ran upon the ground for a short distance like a serpent of flame, and shot like a flash of chain lightning half-way up the side of the cliff. The dark, jutting rocks—huge demon faces covered with ice—glistened in the light of the blaze, and the place seemed to have been transformed into a veritable genii’s cavern. The flames sank away for a moment with a low, moaning sound, and then came up again the colour of roses and of blood. A great rumbling noise was heard coming from the bowels of the earth, and a tongue of fire shot twenty feet into the air. This was more than flesh and blood could endure, and Balser and Tom ran for their lives, leaving their poor, demented friend behind them to perish. Out the boys went through the mouth of the gully, and across the river they sped upon the ice. They felt the earth tremble beneath their feet, and they heard the frightful rumbling again; then a loud explosion, like the boom of a hundred cannons, and the country for miles around was lighted as if by the midday sun. Then they looked back and beheld a sight which no man could forget to the day of his death. They saw a bright red flame a hundred yards in diameter and two hundred feet high leap from the Black Gully above the top of the cliffs. After a moment great rocks, and pieces of earth half as large as a house, began to fall upon every side of them, as if a mighty volcano had burst forth; and the boys clung to each other in fear and trembling, and felt sure that judgment day had come.
After the rocks had ceased to fall, the boys, almost dead with fright, walked a short distance down the river and crossed upon the ice. The fire was still burning in the Black Gully, and there was no need of Polly’s torch to help them see the slippery path among the rocks.
The boys soon found the cave in which the horses were stabled. They lost no time in mounting, and quickly started home, leading between them the horse which had been ridden by Polly. Poor Polly was never seen again. Even after the fire in the Black Gully had receded into the bowels of the earth whence it had come, nothing was found of his body nor that of the Fire Bear. They had each been burned to cinder.
Many of the Blue River people did not believe that the Fire Bear derived its fiery appearance from supernatural causes. They suggested that the bear probably had made its bed of decayed wood containing foxfire, and that its fur was covered with phosphorus which glowed like the light of the firefly after night. The explosion was caused by a “pocket” of natural gas which became ignited when Polly’s torch fell to the ground by the side of the Fire Bear.