"Let's fight as long as we can, anyway," said Charley, who was rapidly making his plans. "Captain, get all the buckets out of the cook tent, and set half the men to wetting down the tents; the other half will come with me. Walt, come with me, also. Come on, men. Each of you bring along a big spruce limb with you."
"We have got to fight fire with fire," he explained to Walter, as he headed for the path the guards had trod down in the grass. "Just outside the path is the best place to start a back fire. The path will help to keep it from working back on the tents."
The two lads tore up big bunches of dry grass, and, lighting them, ran along the half-circle path, scattering fire as they went. The Spaniards were quick to catch the idea, and, stationing themselves at regular intervals along the path, with their green spruce boughs they beat out the flames that leaped the little path and threatened the tents. The prairie grass was knee high, and as dry as tinder, and, although the wind was against it, the back fire ate its way steadily back toward the leaping flames.
"We have done all we can," said Charley to his chum, as they stood watching anxiously the approach of the flames. "It's a toss-up whether we will win or not. If our camp goes, we are done for, that's all. We haven't got the money to refit again. My! that would be a wonderful sight to enjoy if our future wasn't hanging in the balance."
It was, indeed, a wonderful sight. The fire, now scarcely a quarter of a mile away, was sweeping steadily down upon them, a solid wall of flame ten feet high licking up the dry grass with a roaring cackle like a mighty wind in a forest, while toward it the back fire was slowly but steadily eating its way. The space between the two fires was as bright as day, and in it the lads could see scores of animals, running bewildered here and there, trapped between the two lines of flames: deer, coons, wild-cats and foxes ran back and forth in frantic terror. Within twenty feet of where the boys stood a lithe form cleared the flames of the back fire in a mighty leap, and rushed by the tents, heedless of the presence of human beings in its mad flight for safety.
"A panther," commented Charley briefly, as the terror-stricken animal rushed by.
During all this time the other occupants of the camp had not been idle. Under the Captain's directions, his gang of Spaniards had formed a bucket line from the ditch to the tents, and they soon had the little dwellings dripping with water. The teamster had got his frightened mules out of the corral and led them to a place of safety on the grade, and the two engineers had run the truck out on the road beyond the line of flames. Their tasks done, all—Americans and Spaniards—worked to get their most valuable possessions to a place on the grade were they would be safe. They had but little time to work, however, for the intense heat soon drove them back to the road, where they gathered together and watched anxiously the meeting of the fires. They had not long to wait. With a roar, in which was mingled the cries of the tortured animals, the advancing wall of fire swept down on the thin line of back fire. Our little party held their breath and waited. If the wall of flame leaped the dozen or so feet the back fire had eaten away, their camp was gone. Five minutes and a transformation had taken place. Of the mighty conflagration nothing remained but the blacked, smoking dirt of the prairie. The back fire had vanquished its mighty rival. But the danger was not yet over. The wind had swept bits of blazing grass down among the tents, and tiny fires were springing up in a hundred different places. These the boys and their followers beat out with the green branches of the spruces. It was a full half hour before the last of them was extinguished, and they were able to stop and rest, and take account of the damage done. No one was seriously hurt, but all bore marks of the conflict, in the way of burned clothing, singed hair, and blisters, but all were too happy over the saving of the camp to pay much attention to these minor injuries.
"Whew! that was a close shave," said Walter; "but all's well that ends well. By the way, I didn't see anything of McCarty and his crew. I should have thought he would have come in with his men and given us a hand."
"Perhaps he has had his hands full out there," suggested Captain Westfield. "Maybe that fire was just set so as to draw the men off the machine."
"I never thought of that," said Charley, anxiously. "The fire drove everything else out of my head. Let's go out and see what's the matter. The machine isn't running."