Here and there, tall jets, shooting suddenly upward, stalked far in advance of the main line—fiery giants, with red arms stretched forth, as if eager to grasp their victim. Already their hot breath was upon him; another minute, and he must perish!
In a sort of stupor we stood, Garey and I, watching the advance of the flames. Neither of us uttered a word: painful emotions prevented speech. Both our hearts were beating audibly. Mine was bitterly wrung; but I knew that the heart of my companion was enduring the very acme of anguish. I glanced upward to his face: his eye was fixed, and looked steadfastly in one direction—as though it would pierce the sheet of flame that rolled farther and farther from where we stood, and nearer to the fatal spot. The expression of Garey’s eye was fearful to behold; it was a look of concentrated agony. A single tear had escaped from it, and was rolling down the rude weather-bronzed cheek, little used to such bedewing. The broad chest was heaving in short quick spasms, and it was evident the man was struggling with his breath. He was listening through all this intensity of gaze—listening for the death-shriek of his old comrade—his bosom-friend!
Not long was the suspense; though there was no shriek, no cry of human voice, to indicate the crisis. If any arose, it was not heard by us. It could not have been; it would have been drowned amid the roar of the flames, and the crackling of the hollow culms, whose pent-up gases, set free by the fire, sounded like the continuous rolling of musketry. No death-cry fell upon our ears; but, for all that, we were satisfied that the drama had reached its dénouement: the unfortunate trapper had been roasted alive!
Already the flames had passed over the spot where we had last seen him—far beyond—leaving the ground charred and black behind them. Though the smoke hindered our view of the plain, we knew that the climax had passed: the hapless victim had succumbed; and it remained only to look for his bones among the smouldering ashes.
Up to this moment Garey had stood in a fixed attitude, silent and rigid as a statue. It was not hope that had held him thus spell-bound; he had entertained no such feeling from the first: it was rather a paralysis produced by despair.
Now that the crisis was over, and he felt certain that his comrade had perished, his muscles, so long held in tension, suddenly relaxed—his arms fell loosely to his sides—the tears chased each other over his cheeks—his head reclined forward, and in a hoarse husky voice he exclaimed:
“O God! he’s rubbed out, rubbed out! We’ve seed the last o’ poor Old Rube!”
My sorrow, though perhaps not so keen as that of my companion, was nevertheless sufficiently painful. I knew the earless trapper well—had been his associate under strange circumstances—amid scenes of danger that draw men’s hearts more closely together than any phrases of flattery or compliment. More than once had I seen him tried in the hour of peril; and I knew that, notwithstanding the wildness and eccentricity of his character—of his crimes, I might add—his heart, ill directed by early education, ill guided by after-association, was still rife with many virtues. Many proofs of this could I recall; and I confess that a feeling akin to friendship had sprung up between myself and this singular man.
Between him and Garey the ties were still stronger. Long and inseparable companionship—years of participation in a life of hardships and perils—like thoughts and habitudes—though perhaps dispositions, age, and characters a good deal unlike—all had combined to unite the two in a firm bond of friendship. To use their own expressive phrase, they “froze” to each other. No wonder then that the look, with which the young trapper regarded that black plain, was one of indescribable anguish.
To his mournful speech I made no reply. What could I have said? I could not offer consolation. I was grieving as well as he: my silence was but an assent to his sad soliloquy.