He thrust his canoe for the open water and then stayed aghast. It seemed that the world was very light. His lip fell a little. And he heard a voice speak overhead, a voice which was like a bow drawn at a venture. "I know you're about hyar, Pete," said Mac in a roar like that of a wild beast. "I know you're hyar!" He didn't know, but his instincts and his knowledge told him the truth. Underneath him somewhere lay the incendiary. In some dark hole or corner the beast of fire was hidden. Pete's heart stood still and he knew what a fool he had been to meddle with aught on the upper floor. And he heard the light crackle of his new fire. "Come out, you hound," cried Mac. And then the flame caught the sawdust carrier and Mac saw the creep of light under a crack and knew the Mill was fired--fired irredeemably and beyond hope. He pulled his gun and shot down through the floor at a venture, and by a wonderful chance the bullet cleared any beam and struck the water close by Pete. The Siwash let go and thrust the dug-out into the stream. And in the Mill the fire was like an explosion. It ran along the carriers and the ways of the belts and reached out into inaccessible corners where lay the warm dust of years and grew up through a thousand cracks like red-hot weeds at the breath of spring in a tropic garden. "Oh, my God," said Mac. The breath of the fire choked him: he ran back from it: it burst up about him: to escape he leapt over it, but before he got to the great Chute the flame spurted from beneath the Big Hoes and licked at the teeth of shining steel. Then it played about the Pony Saw and far off under the Bull-Wheel it grew up and danced. Then it went like a fiery creeper, like a red climbing rose, and touched the dusty roof. In the next moment the body of the Mill was fire. Mac went back, missed his footing and slipped headlong down the chute, even as Pete had once fallen. He rose with a shout which was half a shriek, for he had dislocated his shoulder, and folks running in the road to the lesser fire, turned to the greater and saw the Mill ablaze. And out in the river Pete was paddling hard. But the lamp that he had lighted was a very bright one, that made the river suddenly a golden pool and shone afar off on the other side of the white roof of the Big Cannery. One man on the wharf saw him and called to Mac, who came fast. "By the Lord, that's Pete," said Mac, "that's Pete and my shoulder's out. Get a boat, boys, get a boat! There's one under the wharf at the other end. Get a boat and go after him!" But to go out on the river at midnight after a killer and an incendiary from mere love of the law or even of hunting was beyond those who heard the man from Michigan speak. "Oh, hell, not me! Tain't my funeral," they said. And then Quin came running to them. He was white as the ashes of his house would be on the morrow, but he saw what Mac and the others saw. That must be Pete on the river!