Wildfire! Read online

  The leg was gashed in several places and trickling blood.

  Ben had run into Spanish bayonet himself a few times. He knew how painful the stabs were, but they were not deep.

  “The bleeding’ll stop pretty soon.” Ben clutched the puppy against his chest with one hand and extended the other to Elliot. The drift of smoke made him cough. “Here, get up.”

  He thought Elliot would be pleased to see the pup safe, but he didn’t seem to care. “The woods are on fire, aren’t they?” Elliot’s voice was a thin thread of fear.

  “Yes. We’ve got to move. It’s coming this way.”

  “How do you know?” Elliot asked. He looked terrified.

  “The animals know. Get up.” He pulled Elliot upright.

  As Elliot saw the flames more clearly, his voice rose in panic. “What if the whole forest burns?”

  “We just have to keep ahead of the fire.” Ben spoke as calmly as he could. He supported Elliot and pulled him forward.

  They climbed over tangled vines and fallen logs, traveling slowly but steadily—toward where, or what, they had no idea. The smoke made both of them cough and burned their eyes. The puppy whimpered.

  They heard the distant sound of sirens. “It’s the fire engines from Carville!” Ben said.

  Elliot asked, “They’ll put it out right away, won’t they?”

  Ben knew it could take a while to control a wildfire. “They’ll sure try.”

  From the sound of the engines and the look of the flames, he figured the fire was less than three miles away, and the park was about three miles from where he lived. So he and Elliot must have traveled roughly parallel to the road. Ben realized they could actually be at some point near his home by now.

  The thought filled him with a surge of strength. He remembered they had circled again and again, so he didn’t know whether the bungalow would be to the right or the left of them, or how far into the woods they were. Or how to get out.

  But at least he had hope now.

  Elliot seemed to feel the same way. He put out more effort, using his bad leg as much as he could. Although they didn’t know which way to go, they were at least getting farther from the fire. It seemed better than just standing still.

  Ben strained his eyes, trying to see a familiar tree or other landmark through the darkness.

  But he couldn’t make out anything recognizable.

  The sirens stopped. The boys told each other the firefighters were working now.

  This thought cheered them for a while. They coughed and battled on, through tangled vines and piercing spiny plants and dried-up ferns.

  But as time went by, the boys’ spirits sagged. The forest was very quiet, a lonely unknown vastness. Animals seemed to have gone to some distant secret place. No birds sang.

  The boys were lost. Lost.

  8

  “Somebody must be looking for us by now,” Elliot said. His voice trembled.

  “Yes.”

  “They won’t know where to look, though.”

  “The other kids probably told them we ran into the woods.”

  “Great,” Elliot said. “Even I know that much.”

  Ben realized it wasn’t much of a lead. But it was something.

  They struggled on. They didn’t know what else to do. Ben was afraid that if they struck out to the right or the left, they might stray farther from the road.

  The unending quiet, the choking smoke, the loneliness, ate at his confidence. Elliot seemed a heavy burden now. Even the puppy seemed heavy. Ben coughed and tried to take in a full breath. The air was painfully thick with smoke.

  He remembered the moment at the picnic when he had agreed to set off the rockets. It seemed a long time ago. He could hardly believe he had been so stupid, and for what? To do something exciting? To impress Elliot? And now here they were, just trying to survive.

  Ben thought if only he could live that moment over again, he would be content to be his own ordinary self, a backwoods boy in Bending Creek, eating Goomby’s honey cake and listening to “The Stars and Stripes Forever.”

  Hope ebbed from him. Dragging Elliot, he took a few more steps, then a few more.

  He thought he heard something, a faint familiar wave of sounds.

  He stood still, listening, wondering if he had imagined it.

  He took a few more steps, a little to the right this time. Again the soft familiar clamor came through the trees, louder.

  “What’s that?” Elliot asked.

  Suddenly Ben knew. He could scarcely get the words out. “It’s the bells!”

  With a rush of joy, he recognized each one. There was Mr. Hendrick’s brass bell, and Miss Alice’s I’ve-got-news bell, and more that belonged to the Olsens and other neighbors. And loudest of all, Goomby’s come-home bell, clanging over and over, the best noise Ben had ever heard in his life.

  “This way!” Pulling Elliot, Ben veered toward the wonderful discordant sounds.

  “I hear them!” Elliot exclaimed.

  Both boys laughed, jubilant, exhausted.

  They kept following the bells.

  Finally they saw the lighted porch of Ben’s bungalow through the trees. It was like a glorious ending to a nightmare.

  Ben looked up the road. There was no glow in the sky now, no flames. Only smoke, the lingering ghost of a dead fire.

  They were safe.

  The porch was packed with neighbors, along with Grandpa and Grandma, and Goomby in the middle of them, shaking her big noisy bell for all she was worth.

  Both boys whooped with relief. “Here we are!” Ben yelled. “Here we are!”

  With their pale smudged faces and torn dirty clothes, the boys stumbled up onto the porch.

  “We got him,” Ben said proudly, showing the dog.

  “Oh, good,” Goomby said. The rest of Ben’s family and the neighbors huddled around them.

  Grandma explained that Lucy Johnson and the other kids had told the boys’ families they were in the woods, so Grandpa and Mr. Lorton and some other men had searched for them until the firefighters came and ordered everyone out of the forest.

  “We knew we had to find you somehow. The bells seemed like the best way,” Goomby said.

  Grandpa told Elliot, “We promised your folks we’d call them if you came here, and they promised the same. They’ve been waiting at home.” He added to Ben, “We heard about the rockets.” His eyes flashed with anger. “You could have burned down the whole forest.”

  “And destroyed all of our homes,” Mr. Hendrick put in.

  “Besides, you worried us nearly to death,” Grandma scolded.

  “It was that darned dog!” Elliot protested. “If he hadn’t taken off like that—”

  Miss Alice frowned at him. “I told you to buy a collar and leash.”

  Grandpa told Elliot, “I’ll call your folks.” He went inside. Everybody followed him, crowding into the bungalow.

  Ben stood apart from the others, hugging the puppy against his chest. He knew he would have to give him to Elliot soon, but he wanted to hold him a little longer.

  When the Lortons came, there were more explanations, more scoldings, more anger and joy.

  “Well, we’ll get on home,” Mr. Lorton said finally. “Take your puppy, Elliot.”

  “I don’t want the dog anymore,” Elliot said. He turned his weary face to Miss Alice. “You were right—it’s a big responsibility. Too big for me.”

  Ben stared at him. Did he really mean it?

  “You’re sure?” Mrs. Lorton asked her son.

  “I’m positive,” Elliot said.

  “Then I guess—I guess you’ll have to give him back to Miss Alice,” his mother said. “I’m sorry, Miss Alice. I hope you can find another home for him.”

  She answered helplessly, “Oh, dear.”

  “No,” Elliot said. “I want to give him to Ben. He cares more about him than I do. He’ll watch out for him better.” Elliot added, “He already has.”

  Ben’s feelings seemed to f
orm a lump in his throat, choking him.

  Goomby glanced at the boys. She said firmly, “We’d like to have a dog.” Practical as ever, she added, “They catch rats.”

  Grandma and Grandpa offered brightly, “Well, that’s true. They do.”

  “So if it’s agreeable to Miss Alice, we’ll take him,” Goomby said.

  Miss Alice sighed and smiled. “I’m very relieved. Of course it’s agreeable.”

  The grownups murmured goodbyes. Elliot left with his parents. At the doorway he turned, gave Ben a grin, and joked, “We must take a walk in the woods again sometime.”

  Ben smiled and returned the joke. “Okay, but not anytime soon.”

  Soon everybody was gone except the family.

  Grandpa and Goomby consulted privately for a minute. Then Grandpa said to Ben, “This is a very serious thing you did. You understand that?”

  “Yes, sir.”

  “The police chief and the chief of the Carville fire department want to talk to you. I’ll come home early from work to take you to see them.”

  “Yes, sir.”

  “Then for a week you’re not to play with the dog or take him out or feed him. Goomby and I will do that, starting tomorrow.”

  “Okay.”

  Goomby said firmly, “That’s for tomorrow. This is tonight, and Ben’s home again.”

  Grandpa nodded.

  Ben went out to the porch with the puppy. Goomby turned off the light and left them alone.

  Ben felt guilty and ashamed, and he knew he deserved to feel like that. But after some quiet time, the bad events of the day seemed to slip away. He sat in the porch chair, brimming with happiness.

  He patted the sleepy puppy in his lap. His thoughts spun into the future … their walks together, the Frisbee games.

  He said aloud, “You belong with us. You’re our dog.”

  The pup wagged his tail. Ben knew he didn’t really understand—but in a way, maybe he did.

  Also by Elizabeth Starr Hill

  Bird Boy

  Chang and the Bamboo Flute

  Text copyright © 2004 by Elizabeth Starr Hill

  Pictures copyright © 2004 by Rob Shepperson

  All rights reserved

  www.fsgkidsbooks.com

  Designed by Nancy Goldenberg

  eISBN 9781466806139

  First eBook Edition : November 2011

  First edition, 2004

  Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data

  Hill, Elizabeth Starr.

  Wildfire! / Elizabeth Starr Hill ; pictures by Rob Shepperson.—1st ed.

  p. cm.

  Summary: Living with his great grandmother in rural Florida, ten-year-old Ben looks forward to the Fourth of July celebrations, but the day becomes complicated by the presence of a new neighbor boy, a stray puppy, and local wildfires.

  ISBN-13: 978-0-374-31712-6 ISBN-10: 0-374-31712-7

  [1. Self-perception—Fiction. 2. Country life—Fiction. 3. Orphans—Fiction. 4. Fourth of July—Fiction. 5. Forest fires—Fiction. 6. Florida—Fiction.] I. Shepperson, Rob, ill. II. Title.

  PZ7.H55Whf2004

  [Fic]—dc22