CHAPTER XXXV.

WHAT FRIGHTENED NELLIE.

Nick Ribsam thought not of himself, in his anxiety for his sister.  He had left her but a few brief minutes before, sitting on the shore of the lake, and now when he returned she was missing.

He had called to her repeatedly without receiving any answer, and when he looked about him in the smoke and gloom, he could see nothing of her loved figure.

He noticed that it was very hot where he stood, and there could be no doubt that the flames were advancing in that direction.  His dread was that Nellie had lost her wits in the presence of the new danger, and had run blindly into the burning woods where there could be no escape for her.

“Nellie!  Nellie!” he shouted in agonized tones; “Where are you?  Why don’t you answer me?”

He thought he heard something like a faint response, but it was not repeated, and poor Nick was half distracted.  For the first time since entering the burning forest he lost his self-control, and not doubting that his sister was somewhere close at hand, he dashed among the trees, still calling to her at the height of his voice.

He had gone but a short distance when he was brought face to face with such a fierce blast of flame that he was forced to turn and run back to the water’s edge, where he stopped for a minute or two gasping for breath.

This repulse served to give him time to collect his wits, and he tried hard to decide what was best to do, for he was resolved never to leave that place until he learned the fate of Nellie.

“She had good sense,” he added to himself, “and she would not have done such a foolish thing.  She has gone to some other spot along the shore and is waiting for me.”

Possibly this was so, but it did not explain the curious fact that all the calls of Nick remained unanswered.  The space inclosing the pond was so slight that his voice must have penetrated every portion of it, and it did seem that if she were in any place safe for her to be, she could not fail to hear him.

Nick found a long branch, which answered for a pole with which to guide the raft, and stepping on it he began pushing it along shore as rapidly as he could, looking into the gloom about him and often pronouncing the name of his sister.  His heart sank within him when this continued several minutes, and half the circuit of the pond was completed without bringing him the first evidence of the whereabouts of Nellie.

Finally he paused, wearied and distressed beyond description.

The darkness of night rested on Shark Pond and the surrounding woods.  The murky volumes of smoke seemed to shut out all light, excepting when the tongues of fire shot through them.  The wind blew a gale, stirring the water into tiny waves, and the roaring of the fire through the woods, the sound of trees crashing to the earth, and the millions of sparks, with blazing bits of wood, were carried a great distance through the air.  Some of these flaming brands fell on the raft on which Nick Ribsam stood, and they continually dropped hissing into the water around him.