“It came through from the other side, just as I told you,” replied Liu, with the utmost good nature. “There’ll be a pass through the range some day where the fire found its way through.”
“But they set the fire on the other side,” Jimmie urged. “They set it for the purpose of burning our aeroplane an’ driving us out of the district. When we go out of the district they’ll go with us, wearin’ steel bracelets!” he added.
“I rather think,” Liu said, “that they set the fires over there to draw the foresters, away from this section, and so protect their business. That is what they have been doing right along.”
“Yes,” Ned said, “there has been a forest fire for every cargo of opium, for every gang of Chinamen, that has been brought in over the border.”
“So that is the real trouble?” asked Jimmie. “How do you know so much about it?”
Ned smiled and pointed to the slope to the east, where columns of fire were cutting their way through the timber.
“It strikes me,” he said, “that now is a pretty good time for us to get out of this. The outlaws won’t come back so long as this danger exists, and we shall not be missed for a long time—or rather, Liu and Jimmie will not be missed.”
“They’ll think we ran out to escape the heat and lost our lives in the fire,” Liu said.
Ned stood hesitatingly at the mouth of the cavern while Liu gathered a few articles he wanted to take with him.
“If I thought the fire would reach the cave when the big trees in the cañon get to going,” he mused, “I’d go back and get the papers—or more of them.”