You will not wonder that I could not look at him; that I looked away for very pity’s sake, praying that I might quickly breathe the flames, as I made sure he had, and so be the sooner past the anguish crisis.

There was good hope that the prayer would have a speedy answer.  The fires were burning clearer now, leaping up in broad dragon’s tongues of flame from the outer edges of the fagot piles to curtain off all that lay beyond.  Through the luminous flame-veil the capering savages took on shapes the most weird and grotesque; and when I had a glimpse of the dead men’s row, each hideous face in it seemed to wear a grin of leering triumph.

Thus far there had been never a puff of wind to fan the blaze.  But now above the shrilling of the Indian chant and the crackling of the flames a low growl of thunder trembled in the upper air, and a gentle breeze swept through the tree-tops.

So now I would commend my soul to God, making sure that the breath He gave would go out on the wings of the first gust that should come to drive the fiery veil inward.  But when the gust came it was from behind; a sweeping besom to beat down the leaping dragons’ tongues; a pouring flood of blessed coolness to turn the ebbing life-tide and to set the dulled senses once more keenly alert.

With the wind came the rain, a passing summer-night’s shower of great drops spattering on the leaves above and dripping thence to fall hissing in the fires.  Then the thunder growled again; and into the monotonous droning of the Indian chant, or rather rising sharp and clear above it, came a sudden rattling fire of musketry from the camp in the savanna—­this, and the sharp skirling of the troop captain’s whistle shrilling the assembly.

While yet the flames lay flattened in the wind, I saw the Indians wheel and bound away to the rescue of their camp like a pack of hounds in full cry.  In a trice they were wallowing through the stream at the foot of the powder boulder; and then, as the flames leaped up again, a dark form burst through the fiery barrier, my bonds were cut, and a strong hand plucked me out of the scorching hell-pit.

If I did aught to help it was all mechanical.  I do remember dimly some fierce struggle to free my legs from the blazing tangle; this, and the swelling sob of joy at the sight of the faithful Catawba hacking at Dick’s lashings and dragging him also free of the fire.  And you may believe the welcome tears came to ease the pain of my seared eyes when my poor lad—­I had thought him gone past human help—­took two staggering steps and flung his arms about my neck.

Uncanoola gave us no time to come by easy stages to full-wit sanity.  In a twinkling he had pounced upon us to crush us one upon the other behind the larger tree.  And now I come upon another of those flitting instants so crowded with happenings that the swiftest pen must seem to make them lag.  ’Twas all in a heart-beat, as it were:  the Catawba’s freeing of us; his flinging us to earth behind the tree; a spurt of blinding yellow flame from the foot of the powder-cliff, and a booming, jarring shock like that of an earthquake.