“An’ all this come from one little match, Mac,” cried Haw-Haw ecstatically at the ear of Mac Strann.  “All what we’re seein’!  Look at the gal, Mac!  She’s out of her wits!  She’s foolin’ about Barry, doin’ no good.”

A gust of smoke and fire must have met Barry face to face when he entered the barn, for he seemed now as helpless as if he were under a strong narcotic influence.  He leaned heavily back into the arms of the girl, his head rolling wildly from side to side.  Then, clearer than before, dominating all the confusion of noise, and with a ringing, trumpet note of courage in it, the black stallion neighed again from his burning stall.  It had a magic effect upon Barry.  He stood up and tore himself from the arms of the girl.  They saw her gesture and cry to the surrounding men for help, and a dozen hands were stretched out to keep the madman from running again into the fire.  They might better have attempted to hold a wild horse with their naked hands.  He slipped and broke through their grips, and a second later had leaped into the inferno of smoke, running bent close to the ground where the pure air, if there were any, was sure to be.

“The gal’s sick!” said Haw-Haw Langley.  “Look, Mac!”

And he began to laugh in that braying voice which had given him his nickname.  Yet even in his laughter his eyes were brightly observant; not a single detail of misery or grief was lost upon him; he drank it in; he fed his famine-stricken soul upon it.  Kate Cumberland had buried her face in her arms; Buck Daniels, attempting to rush in after Dan Barry, had been caught beneath the arms by Doctor Byrne and another and was now borne struggling back.

From the very heart of the burning barn the sharp single whistle burst and over the rolling smoke and spring fire rose the answering neigh.  A human voice could not have spoken more intelligibly:  “I wait in trust!”

After that neigh and whistle, a quiet fell over the group at the barn door.  There was nothing to do.  There was not enough wind to blow the flames from this barn to one of the neighbouring sheds; all they could do was to stand still and watch the progress of the conflagration.

The deep, thick voice of Mac Strann broke in:  “Start prayin’, Haw-Haw, that the hoss don’t kill Barry when he gets to him.  Start prayin’ that Barry is left for me to finish.”

He must have meant his singular request more as a figure of speech than a real demand, but an hysteria was upon Haw-Haw Langley.  He stretched up his vast, gaunt arms to the dim spot of red in the central heavens above the fire, and Haw-Haw prayed for the first and last time in his life.

“O Lord, gimme this one favour.  Bring Barry safe out of the barn.  Bring him out even if you got to bring the damned hoss with him.  Bring him out and save him for Mac Strann to meet.  And, God A’mighty, let me be around somewhere’s when they meet!”

This strange exhibition Mac Strann watched with a glowering eye.