Ab rolled instinctively a little away from the smoky sheets of flame and, sitting up, looked for Oak. He could not see him. He ran wildly around among the rocks looking for him and despairingly called aloud his name. The moment his voice had been hoarsely lifted, "Oak!" the memory of all that had happened rushed upon him. He stood there in the red firelight a statue of despair. Oak was dead; he had killed Oak, and buried him with his own hands, and yet he had seen Oak but a minute ago! He had bounded through the flames and had wrestled and run races with Ab, and they had talked together, and yet Oak must be lying in the ground back there in the forest by the little hill. Oak was dead. How could he get out of the ground? Fear clutched at Ab's heart, his limbs trembled under him. He whimpered like a lost and friendless hound and crouched close to the hospitable fire. His brain wavered under the stress of strange new impressions. He recalled some mutterings of Old Mok about the dead, that they had been seen after it was known that they were deep in the ground, but he knew it was not good to speak or think of such things. Again Ab sprang to his feet. It would not do to shut his eyes, for then he saw plainly Oak in his shallow hole in the dark earth and the face Ab had hurried to cover first when he was burying his friend, there under the trees. And so the night wore away, sleep coming fitfully from time to time. Ab could not explore his retreat in the strange firelight nor run the risks of another night journey across the wild beasts' chosen country. He began to be hungry, with the fierce hunger of brute strength, sharpened by terrific labors, but he must wait for the morning. The night seemed endless. There was no relief from the thoughts which tortured him, but, at last, morning broke, and in action Ab found the escape he had longed for. CHAPTER XX. THE FIRE COUNTRY.