"The better for your father's house, dear lady," answered Lord H----. "It was a change to the westward he had to fear; the more fully east the better."
They fell into silence again, but in a minute or two after, looking to the left of the road, where the trees were very closely set, though there was an immense mass of brushwood underneath, Lord H---- beheld a small, solitary spot of light, like a lamp burning. It was seen and hidden, seen and hidden again by the trees as they rode on, and must have been at some three or four hundred yards distance. It seemed to change its place, too, to shift, to quiver; and then, in a long, winding line, it crept slowly round and round the boll of a tree like a fiery serpent; and a moment after, with flash and crackling flame, and fitful blaze, it spread flickering over the dry branches of a pitch pine.
"The fire is coming nearer, dear Miss Prevost," said Lord H----, "and it is necessary we should use some forethought. How far, think you, this farmhouse is now?"
"Nearly four miles," answered Edith.
"Does it lie due south?" asked her companion.
"Very nearly," she replied.
"Is there any road to the westward?" demanded the young nobleman, with his eyes still fixed upon the distant flame.
"Yes." she answered; "about half a mile on there is a tolerable path made along the side of the hill on the west, to avoid the swamp during wet weather; but it rejoins this road a mile or so farther on."
"Let us make haste," said Lord H----, abruptly; "the road seems fair enough just here, and I fear there is no time to lose."
He put his hand upon Edith's rein as he spoke, to guide the horse on, and rode forward perhaps somewhat less than a quarter of a mile, watching with an eager eye the increasing light to the east, where it was now seen glimmering through the trees in every direction, looking, through the fretted trellis-work of branches, trunks, and leaves, like a multitude of red lamps hung up in the forest. Suddenly, at a spot where there was an open space or streak, as it was called, running through some two or three hundred yards of the wood, covered densely with brush, but destitute of tall trees, the whole mass of the fire appeared to view, and the travelers seemed gazing into the mouth of a furnace. Just then the wind shifted a little more and blew down the streak; the cloud of smoke rolled forward; flash after flash burst forth along the line as the flame caught the withered leaves on the top of the branches; then the bushes themselves were seized upon by the fire, and sent flaming tongues far up into the air. Onward it rushed, with a roar, and a crackle, and a hiss, caught the taller trees on either side, and poured across the road right in front. Edith's horse, unaccustomed to such a sight, started, and pulled vehemently back; but Lord H----, snatching her riding whip from her hand, struck him sharply on the flank, and forced him forward by the rein. But again the beast resisted; not a moment was to be lost; time wasted in the struggle must have been fatal; and, casting the bridle free, he threw his right arm round her light form, lifted her from the saddle, and seated her safely before him. Then, striking his spurs into the sides of his well-trained charger, he dashed at full speed through the burning bushes, and in two minutes had gained the ground beyond the fire.