XVI.
The wide open Space.—The terrific Scene.—Arrested and driven back.—New Purposes.—The Story of the Great Fire of Miramichi, and the Ruin wrought in one tremendous Night.
THE wide open space upon which they had come extended for some miles away on the right and on the left. About a mile off on the other side arose the trees of the forest again. Above these the smoke was rolling in vast, dense, voluminous clouds, while underneath them shone the red glare of a mighty conflagration. It was in those very woods which rose before them. They could see and feel its terrible presence. They could see, behind the line of trees that stood nearest, the dash of the surging flames as they seized upon the dry foliage and resinous wood of the forest; and the angry glow of the red fire, as, following the advance of the flame, it grasped and held in its blighting, withering embrace all that it seized upon. At the breath of the flame the forest shrank away; at the touch of the fire it crumbled into dust.
The foremost line of trees stood there, black against the glow of the fire that raged behind, like the bars of some vast, immeasurable furnace. Beneath, behind those bars, gleamed the fire; overhead rose the smoke, spreading over the sky, and filling all the air with its hot and suffocating fumes.
The whole party stood there looking on in silence. The guides conversed with one another and with the priest in French, of which Bart understood nothing. By the expression of their faces, and by the shaking of their heads, however, he learned,—if indeed he did not know well enough already,—that any farther progress in that direction was impossible.
“What do they say?” asked he at length of the priest.
“Well, of course, you see yourself,” said the priest, “that it’s impossible to go any farther, and consequently we must give up the idea of reaching that part of the forest where your friend was lost.”
“What shall we do?” exclaimed Bart, in deep distress.
“Well, that is what we are thinking of now. It all depends upon whether your friend has come in this direction or not. Now, you came in this direction, and you must have been within a few miles of this place; but you reached Tracadie safely, and saw no fire.”
“No,” said Bart, “only smoke.”
“But you must have been near it, for you saw the flames last evening. They were concealed by the trees when you were in the woods. Besides, the fire has, no doubt, been spreading in this direction ever since. Now, as for your friend, if he came in this direction at all, he may have reached a place to the north of the fire, and I am of the opinion that we might go in that direction. We shall thus see something of the other parties that are searching the woods up there. In fact there is nothing else to be done. If we don’t find him farther to the north, then I shall take it for granted that he has wandered in another direction altogether, and perhaps may come out at the Bay de Chaleur.”