ed eagerly for some sign of cloud that should presage rain, but
the sky remained cloudless. Several times he had heard of fires in the
vicinity, but they had kept away from that portion of the forest over
which he had control, and he had not been summoned from his post. The
boy had given up his former schedule of covering his whole forest twice
a week, and now was riding on Sundays, thus reaching every lookout point
every other day. It was telling upon the horses, and he himself was
conscious of the strain, but he was more content in feeling that he had
gone the limit in doing the thing that was given him to do.

One day, while in a distant part of the forest, he came upon the signs
of a party of campers. Since his experience with the tourists the boy
had become panic-stricken by the very idea of careless visitors to the
forest, and the chance of their setting a fire, and so, recklessly, he
put his horse at a sharp gallop and started down the trail that they had
left. The signs were new, so that he overtook them in a couple of hours.
But in the meantime he had passed the place where the party had made
their noonday halt, and he could see that full precautions had been
taken to insure the quenching of the fire.

When he overtook them, moreover, he was wonderfully relieved and freed
from his fears. There were six in all, the father, who was quite an old
man, the mother, two grown-up sons, and two younger girls. They had
heard his horse come galloping down the trail, and the two younger men
had hung back to be the first to meet him.

"Which way?" one of them asked, as Wilbur pulled his horse down to a
walk.

"Your way," said Wilbur, "I guess. I just rode down to see who it was on
the trail. There was a bunch of tourists hanging around here a few weeks
ago, and the forest floor is too dry to take any chances with their
campfires."

"Oh, that's it," said the former speaker. Then, with a laugh, he
continued: "I guess we aren't in that class."

"I can see you're not," the boy replied, "but I'm one of the Forest
Service men, and it's a whole lot better to be safe than sorry."

"Right," the other replied. "I think you might ride on with us a bit,"
he continued, "and talk to the rest of them. It may ease their minds.
You were headed our way down that trail as though you were riding for
our scalps."

Wilbur laughed at the idea of his inspiring fear in the two stalwart men
riding beside him.

"I guess I'd have had some j