or them
to catch, as we had taken good care, you may be sure, to have every bit
of brush cleared from our fort. Fortunately for us our hill was wooded
only around the base.

Even then the heat was intense. It seemed to me as though my skin was
shriveling up, and every once in awhile the waves of smoke would almost
submerge us in their acrid, stifling vapor.

Then we were in the midst of it as it swept around our hill on all sides
and the great pines below were turned into flaming spears that seemed to
thrust themselves at our stronghold.

It was like being in the thick of a great battle, the crackling, the
roar of the flames and stifling smoke, the crash of falling trees. It
seemed like an endless time, but it could only have been a few minutes.

Gasping, only half-alive, like survivors of a wreck who reach the shore
only after having been overwhelmed with terrible seas, we leaned against
our cowed ponies (they were originally cow ponies) with our heads down.

I hardly recognized Jim, his face was blackened with smoke and his eyes
reddened, his eyebrows and eyelashes scorched. There was nothing
familiar about him, but the white grin of his teeth.

"You look like a hunk of smoked beef," he remarked. "It's time we were
out of this."

The center of the fire had swept in advance down the valley, but the
left wing was still fighting along the upper slopes on the opposite side
of the valley.

"One drink for me at any rate before we start," I cried.

My thirst was something awful and I raised the canteen to my lips, but I
threw it down with a yell. The very metal seemed hot.

"That's a cursed shame, Jo," said Jim in sympathy. "You wait, we will
get water before we camp again. We are going to get out of this hades of
a place." This was not profanity but description.

"All ready now, Jo?"

I nodded, for I could not speak, and we started to attempt to escape in
the wake of the fire. We made our way slowly down the rock trail and
then out on the slope of the hill.

A scene of desolation lay around and above us. Nor was it all over.
There were many blazing trees that had not fallen and there was plenty
of light to guide us on our fiery journey.

The undergrowth was burnt off and nothing left but black bushes and grey
smouldering ashes everywhere.

"Which way?" I asked Jim, when we reached the foot of the hill.

"Up the mountains, of course," was his command.

"Where are the Apaches?" I questioned.

"Ask of th