almost
limbless, stood in solemn grandeur in the midst of the sawdust waste. It
had been of no use to the woodcutters and they had allowed the shell of
the old forest monarch to stand. Now, from its broken top, Nan espied a
thin, faint column of blue haze rising.

It was the queerest thing! It was not mist, of course and she did not
see how it could be smoke. There was no fire at the foot of the tree,
for she could see the base of the bole plainly. She even got up and ran
a little way out into the open in order to see the other side of the
dead tree.

The sky was very blue, and the air was perfectly still. Almost Nan was
tempted to believe that her eyes played her false. The column was almost
the color of the sky itself, and it was thin as a veil.

How could there be a fire in the top of that tall tree?

"There just isn't! I don't believe I see straight!" declared Nan to
herself, moving on along the roadway. "But I'll speak to Toby about it."

Chapter XXV. THE TEMPEST

Nan, however, did not mention to Toby the haze rising from the dead
tree. In the first place, when she reached the little farm on the island
in the tamarack swamp, old Toby Vanderwiller was not at home. His wife
greeted the girl warmly, and Corson was glad to see her. When Nan spread
the check before him and told him what it was for, and what he could do
with so much money, the crippled boy was delighted.

It was a secret between them that the grandmother was to have the black
silk dress that she had longed for all her married life; only Nan and
Corson knew that Nan was commissioned to get the check cashed and buy
the dress pattern at the Forks; or send to a catalogue house for it if
she could not find a suitable piece of goods at any of the local stores.

Nan lingered, hoping that Toby would come home. It finally grew so late
that she dared not wait longer. She had been warned by Aunt Kate not to
remain after dusk in the swamp, nor had she any desire to do so.

Moreover there was a black cloud rolling up from the west. That
was enough to make the girl hurry, for when it rained in the swamp,
sometimes the corduroy road was knee deep in water.

The cloud had increased to such proportions when Nan was half way across
the sawdust desert that she began to run. She had forgotten all about
the smoking tree.

Not a breath of air was stirring as yet; but there was the promise of
wind in that cloud. The still leaves on the bushes, the absence of b