[14]

"That was brave, wasn't it?" spoke Francis, in a rather quavering voice. "You can touch off one now."

Miles eagerly seized the match and, setting it to a squib, flung the twisted paper a pace from him. The same whiz, burst, sizzle, but this time he lost the keen pleasure in a sudden hideous thought that, even as the squib left his hand, came over him. "Francis," he cried, before the flame died down, "is this safe, think you? Say the powder in the keg took fire?"

"Pshaw! You're afraid; I knew you'd be," replied Francis, his own courage quite restored.

Thereupon Miles lit a third squib to show his fearlessness, and then together they set off the remaining two. "That's the last, and I've no more paper," sighed Francis, and Miles echoed the sigh.

They were sitting now on the edge of the bunk; the cabin seemed very black to their eyes, still dazzled with the last flash, and the air was hot and heavy with the pungent odor of burnt powder. Miles sniffed it contentedly. "This is what 'twould be like in a great battle," he began. "Sometime I mean to be a soldier and have a musket. Did you ever shoot with a musket, Francis?"

"No, but I've shot off a fowling piece," answered the other. He clambered upon the bunk, groping audibly in the dark, and presently dropped down[15] again beside his companion with something long and slender and heavy in his arms. "Look you, Miles, here's daddy's fowling piece now," he said exultantly. "What say if I shoot her off?"

[15]

"'Twould make a mighty big noise in so small a room," Miles answered longingly.

"Give me the match, then."

Later Miles remembered clearly how Francis had sprung to his feet at the word, but after that all was a confusion of dire noises,—a rending crash, then a sound of women screaming, of children crying, and of men running with clattering footsteps across the great cabin. Through it all he felt the weight of Francis Billington, who had pitched back against him, and he saw a little spurt of yellow fire that licked along the boards. Though he did not remember snatching a blanket from the bunk, one was in his hand, and he was down upon the floor, smothering the flames that would press out beyond the edges. A powder keg was somewhere near, he recollected, and he beat out one little jet of flame with his hand, that smarted fiercely.

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