The flames had hardly made themselves manifest before they were shooting up brightly toward the roof.
“My! That bolt must have struck mighty close to me!” thought Jack. “I’m lucky to be alive.”
“I’ve got to get out of here,” he added the next instant; “that fire’s burning like a box factory. Come on, Tom!”
He shook his comrade’s shoulder, but the other only moaned.
“That brute struck him a terrible blow,” exclaimed Jack; “but thank goodness, he appears to have some color in his face now, though he must have been mighty pale for a time. Well, that’s a good sign.”
He bent over his comrade, and while the flames crackled and roared furiously upward he dragged Tom out of their reach, across the door-sill of the barn and out into the fresh air. As he did so, he stumbled over a recumbent form near the door.
It was Blinky. Close by were the insensible bodies of Duggan and Duke.
“I’ve got to get Tom to a safe and comfortable place before I bother about them,” thought Jack.
The flames were leaping up through the hole in the roof, lighting up the whole neighborhood as plain as day. By their glare Jack found a bed of soft fern and laid his chum’s still form upon it. Then he went back for the other victims of the lightning, for he knew that if they lay where they were the flames would soon become hot enough to scorch them.
One by one the boy pluckily dragged the heavy forms of the men who a short time since were trying to do him harm, to a place of safety. By the time he had finished, there was a glare coming from the burning barn that was as bright as the blaze of a thousand arc lights. Glancing over toward Tom, Jack was overjoyed to see his cousin sitting up with his eyes open and gazing somewhat dazedly about him.