Читать книгу Camping in the Winter Woods: Adventures of Two Boys in the Maine Woods онлайн

80 страница из 81

Ben and the trapper were also burned and blistered, but made slight of their ills; and, following their splendid example, the boys soon declared that they, too, were all right.

The fire burned fiercely around the shores of the lake, and the weary group of fighters sat in awesome silence and watched it vent its wrath. The flames were reflected in the water, and George declared it looked as if the whole world was afire, water and all. They saw great flame-wrapped trees topple and fall hissing into the lake.

A deer, driven out by the approaching flames, jumped into the lake from the opposite shore and swam directly toward them. The boys wondered if it was the same one they had seen during the fire. The startled creature emerged within a rod of them and staggered away in the blackness.

They remained there until the fire, having completely circled the lake, came together at the lower end. Joining forces, it swept up the side and over the top of an adjoining ridge.

“Nothing to stop it for a hundred miles,” said Bill, sadly.