Hugh had chosen to go to the farm of Mrs. Heffner because his sympathies were more strongly aroused in her case. True, old Zeke Ballinger was to be pitied, for he had every dollar he possessed invested in that little poultry and squab ranch, and would be utterly ruined if the fire took it. Still, he was a man, after all. A lone widow, fighting to make a living off a small farm for her children, should be considered first of all, Hugh thought.
“Sure you’ve got your points of the compass right, are you, Hugh?” asked Billy, with the familiarity that years of friendship for the scout master gave him. When there was need of displaying the spirit of a private in the ranks toward his commanding officer, Billy could do it all right; but as a rule he met Hugh as one chum would another.
“I think I have, to the fraction of a dot,” replied the other. “I know what a bad job it would be to make a mistake.”
“I should say it would,” Billy asserted. “If we happened to get mixed up in the woods, and wandered around, first thing we knew we might find ourselves trapped by the old fire, and beautifully singed in the bargain.”
“We’re heading straight for the Heffner farm,” Hugh assured him. “A little further on we ought to strike the zigzag trail she uses to come out on the main road. If Mr. Lewis had carried us on a little further we’d have struck the junction.”
The other boys were also talking among themselves, but in a subdued sort of way. Glimpses of the fire, which they could catch at irregular intervals, inspired them with considerable respect regarding the conflagration. In fact, they felt somewhat awed, to tell the truth.
In the past some of them had passed through queer experiences with Hugh Hardin as their leader, but never one like this, with the woods on fire, and people to be rescued, as well as property to be saved.
“What’s that strange humming noise we can hear every little while, Hugh?” asked Jack Durham.
“It’s the roar of the fire, as sure as anything,” Ralph Kenyon told him before the scout master could say a word.
“But why does it come and go like that?” insisted Jack. Some of the other boys shrugged their shoulders, and listened to once again catch the peculiar sound mentioned.