minutes passed, and nothing very serious happened. True, once or twice Jasper believed he heard a crash as some weak tree yielded to the strain, and went over. But this did not come to pass very near them, so they did not incur any particular danger.
"Seems to be letting up a bit!" finally remarked Larry, raising his voice in order to be heard, for the racket was still tremendous.
"Oh! do you really think so?" cried Jasper, excitedly.
"There's no doubt of it," declared Elmer, with a reassuring nod, for he understood the nervous nature of the smaller boy, and in times past had made it his particular business to build up Jasper's courage and determination, always wabbly.
The crashes of thunder as a rule sounded further away, though now and then one would break that seemed to outdo all the rest, as though the storm might be trying to linger in the vicinity of the upturned tree.
Then the rain slackened.
"Not that it matters much," said Elmer, laughing; "because we're all like drowned rats right now. But wait till it stops; then we'll build a jolly big fire, and dry off."
"But how about matches – Larry forgot to bring any, and I lost mine?" sighed Jasper, dolefully.
"Oh! that's all right," the scout leader went on. "I've got some safe and sound in my pocket right now."
"But if you're soaked through to the skin, won't the matches be done for?" asked the smaller lad, who was beginning to feel better already, now that the storm had broken, and a rift appeared in the dark clouds overhead.
"I could stay in the water ten minutes, and still have matches to burn," laughed Elmer, "because, you see, I make it a point to carry them in a water-proof safe that has been tested, and found all right. Besides, I know how to make a fire without a solitary match, and have done it again and again."
"Oh! yes, to be sure, I saw you do it once!" cried Larry.
"You mean by use of a little bow, and a stick that turns around in a notch of some wood, don't you, Elmer?" asked Jasper, interested.
"Just that," replied the scout leader. "I might try it now, to show you fellows how it's done; only it generally takes a lot of time, you know; and the sooner we have a warm blaze after this rain stops, the better. So we'll stick to the matches this round."
He was thinking of Jasper, who had never been very stout or strong, and whom he could feel trembling whenever he chanced to touch the boy. Excitement, and the wetting, might cause trouble, unless he found means for warming the boy up ere long.
By degrees the wind died away completely, while the rain hardly amounted to much – in fact, what water fell was now the drippings from the trees overhead.
"Come, let's get a move on us," said Elmer, as he started to climb out of the depression behind the upturned roots of the fallen oak.
"Wow! I'm standing in water half way to my knees!" laughed Larry, to whom the affair was something like a picnic – now that they had run across one who knew how to find a way out of the labyrinth, dry their clothes, and generally create an atmosphere of cheer.
"Wait till I take a look in at this tree," observed Elmer, hurrying around to where the broken pieces of the trunk lay.
"Whatever is he doing now?" asked Jasper, as he saw the scout leader clawing at the heart of the fallen forest monarch.
"Well, I rather think he's getting some dry wood out of that log," replied the other. "I've seen him make a fire in a rain before, and that was the way he got hold of some tinder for a start. Yes, there he picks up a lot, and is coming this way with it. We'll soon have a bully blaze started, and once she gets going why there's oceans of wood lying around loose here that will burn."
"Yes, I guess there are oceans of it; anyhow there's been enough water turned loose on it to swamp things. Elmer, is there anything we can do to help?" asked Jasper, eagerly.
"Sure there is, both of you," replied the other, readily. "Get busy breaking up some of those dead limbs there. We'll need a lot soon, and besides, it's going to help warm you up. Jump around, and slap your arms across your chest, Jasper, just like you would do on a winter's day, if cold. Here goes for a start," and as he spoke Elmer applied a match to the little pile of loose dry tinder he had heaped up.
A flash, and up sprang the flame, for the boy had made his preparations carefully so as not to waste a single match. One of the first tests a tenderfoot scout is put to, is to make a fire in the woods without paper, and possessing only three matches. The careless new beginner learns how to husband his resources, after he has been shown how priceless even so common a thing as a match may become, under certain conditions.
When the fire had taken a good hold, other fuel was added, dry so long as it could be obtained, and then some of the wet stuff, which readily dried off and burned fiercely.
"If I had only had a camp hatchet along," said Elmer, as he made Jasper disrobe, so as to get his clothes hanging near the blaze, "I could have done this affair up in better style; but I reckon none of us have any reason to growl at the way things are going, eh, fellows?"
"Well, I should say not," laughed Larry, who had followed the example of the others, and was hanging his garments on convenient roots of the fallen tree, where the heat would reach them by degrees. "We're lucky all the way through, and that's a fact. It was mighty good of you to track us away up here, Elmer. Whatever made you do it?"
"Oh! I happened to have nothing to do, and while neither of you had the politeness to ask me to go along, why, I thought I'd like to know just how you made out. So I kept out of sight, and yet near enough to hear what you said lots of times. And on the whole you did pretty well, fellows. You can't expect to learn everything about woodcraft at once, you know; and the time I was up in the Canada bush gave me a long start over the rest of the bunch."
He did not want to confess that he had been a little worried lest the two ambitious scouts get lost in those great woods lying northwest of Hickory Ridge; but such was really the case. And as subsequent events proved, his fears had after all not been groundless.
While their clothes were steaming and drying the boys jumped around, and managed between thus exercising themselves, and keeping fairly near the blaze, to ward off any chilliness; for after the storm the air had become remarkably cool.
"There's the blooming old sun peeking out!" declared Larry, presently.
"For goodness' sake don't scare it off," said Jasper, who was now busily engaged getting inside his clothes. "Oh! say, look here, somebody's changed with me."
"What's the matter?" asked Elmer; although he gave Larry a wink as he spoke, as if he knew very well what ailed the other.
"Why, I've got the wrong trousers, that's what! They look like they'd been made for my younger brother," complained Jasper; then seeing Larry smiling he continued: "Now, what are you grinning at, Larry? Trying to play a joke on me, are you?"
"Well, since both of us are a heap bigger than you, whose clothes d'ye think you've got hold of anyway, eh?" demanded Larry. "Fact is, they've shrunk, that's all. Had 'em too near the fire, after being wet. They'll stretch again in time, Jasper. Mine are in the same fix, you see."
Amid considerable merriment then, the three scouts finished dressing.
"I'll never forget this, never," declared Jasper, after he had completed this operation in the best way possible.
"And just think what
