“It's terrible,” sighed Val, “about the hay and the stables. Manley will be so discouraged--he worked so hard to cut and stack that hay. And he was just going to gather the calves together and put them in the river field, in a couple of weeks--and now there isn't anything to feed them!” “I guess he's coming; I hear somebody.” Kent was straining his eyes to see the top of the hill, where the dismal sight shadows lay heavily upon the dismal black earth. “Sounds to me like a rig, though. Maybe he drove out.” He left her, went to the wire gate which gave egress from the tiny, unkempt yard, and walked along the trail to meet the newcomer. “You stay there,” he called back, when he thought he heard Val following him. “I'm just going to tell him you're all right. You'll get that white dress all smudged up in these ashes.” In the narrow little gully where the trail crossed the half-dry channel from the spring he met the rig. The driver pulled up when he caught sight of Kent. “Who's that? Did she git out of it?” cried Arline Hawley, in a breathless undertone, “Oh--it's you, is it, Kent? I couldn't stand it--I just had to come and see if she's alive. So I made Hank hitch right up--as soon as we knew the fire wasn't going to git into all that brush along the creek, and run down to the town--and bring me over. And the way--” “But where's Man?” Kent laid a hand upon the wheel and shot the question into the stream of Arline's talk. “Man! I dunno what devil gits into men sometimes. Man went and got drunk as a fool soon as he seen the fire and knew what coulda happened out here. Started right in to drownd his sorrows before he made sure whether he had any to drown! If that ain't like a man, every time! Time we all got back to town, and the fire was kiting away from us instead of coming up toward us, he was too drunk to do anything. He must of poured it down him by the quart. He--” “Manley! Is that you, dear?” It was Val, a slim, white figure against the blackness all around her, coming down the trail to see what delayed them. “Why don't you come to the house? There _is_ a house, you know. We aren't quite burned out. And I'm all right, so there's no need to worry any more.” “Now, ain't that a darned shame?” muttered Arline wrathfully to Kent. “A feller that'll drink when he's got a wife like that had oughta be hung! “It's me, Arline Hawley!” She raised her voice to its ordinary shrill level. “It ain't just the proper time to make a call, I guess, but it's better late than never. Man, he was took with one of his spells, so I told him I'd come on out and take you back to town. How are you, anyhow? Scared plumb to death, I'll bet, when that fire come over the hill. You needn't 'a' tramped clear down here--we was coming on to the house in a minute. I got to chewin' the rag with Kent. Git in; you might as well ride back to the house, now you're here.”