“Uncle says it has held twenty by crowding,” Stallings assured him.
Meanwhile Hugh was busy at the engine. In addition to numerous other qualifications that made him a good scout with a wide range of information, Hugh possessed a practical knowledge of motors that had proved of considerable value to him on many occasions.
After a little examination of the one which he now expected to handle, he soon had it throbbing noisily. When the moorings were cast off they ran easily out of the boathouse and upon the broad expanse of water.
The flood was constantly widening its sweep as it sought out new places for invasion. There was a perceptible current nearly everywhere, though, of course, it was fiercest in the original river bed, where the sweeping waters met with no obstructions to their progress, now that the passenger bridge had been carried off.
Hugh immediately turned toward the lower part of the town. They could see some people along the shore waving to them and shouting, but what they said none of those aboard the motorboat understood, nor could they take the time to try and find out.
Hugh was very careful how he steered his boat, for there were snags to be met with, and should they strike one while going at such speed, it might prove the finish of theIdler, as the boat was named.
They could see that there was a considerable bustle about this section of the town. The poor folks living here were doing all in their limited power to save some of their scanty but nevertheless precious belongings. They were wading hip deep in the cold water in some cases, bearing beds, clothes, and one even had a small cook stove thus elevated.
Others were trying to make excuses for rafts out of any stray pieces of lumber they could get their hands on. In most cases these were so flimsily patched together that there was a strong likelihood of their parting as soon as any sort of a load had been placed on them.
“Yap-yap-yap!”
“Hello! that sounds like the Otter signal!” exclaimed Billy Worth, pricking up his ears; “I’ve heard Alec Sands and Buck Winter give it many a time. But we’re in Lawrence, not Oakvale, it happens.”
“But they may have had an Otter Patrol in their troop; how about that, Tip?” remarked Hugh, still guiding the launch with the dexterous hand of a born pilot, and at the same time keeping one eye on the throbbing motor.
“To be sure we have, and Wash Bradford is the leader of the Otters,” came the prompt reply. “There’s a boat right now; and yes, that’s Wash himself loading it with some household stuff the others are passing out of that window to him.”
“He’s beckoning to us,” said Stallings. “You can work in closer to them, can’t you, Hugh? It might be he wants to put us wise to something of importance.”
“No trouble getting there with this boat, if only there’s enough water,” the steersman answered, with a confidence that he believed was not going to be misplaced. “Billy, you’re up in the bow, so suppose you take that pole and keep finding what the depth is. Sing out to me as often as you dip.”
“But gee whittaker, Hugh! I don’t know what a fathom is,” protested Billy, although he did snatch up the push pole indicated, and commenced dipping it straight down.
“Then go by feet, so long as you tell me of any shoaling,” explained Hugh.
“Three feet, then. Now two and three-quarters. Going at two and three-quarters. Two and a half! Are you all done? Oh! Two and a quarter, and sold to the gentleman over there. How’s this, Hugh?”
“We’re in close enough, and I’ll try to hold her here against the current while Tip has a confab with his comrade,” announced the pilot, who wished to let the local boys have all the say possible in the management of things, so that they might feel the responsibility that rested on their shoulders, and at the same time reap the full reward that was to come.
“What is it, Wash?” asked Tip, flushing with pleasure when he heard Hugh designate him as the one to do the talking, when some fellows would have monopolized all rights to that themselves; and it increased his respect for the visiting comrade more than ever.
“We’re getting on hunky-dory here, Tip,” replied the leader of the boat party, as he took a package of bed clothes from one of the other scouts who appeared at the open window just then and deposited it in the stern of the craft, where a woman and three children were huddled, looking the picture of despair.
“Then you didn’t want any help, I take it?” questioned Tip Lange.
“Not that we know of, Tip. But this woman says her sister must be in a terribly bad way. She lives in a tumble-down shanty of a house around the next corner, that must be a heap deeper in the water than this one is. If it hasn’t floated away before now it’s apt to go any old time. The current is too swift for us to hold our own with oars, and besides, this is such a heavy boat.”
“Then you want us to try for it, do you, Wash?” demanded Tip. “How about it, Commodore? Will the launch stand out against that current?”
“I believe so,” replied Hugh, and then, turning to Wash, he continued: “Did you say it was around that corner, and to the left toward the river?”
Wash looked at the woman, who had been listening to this talk while wringing her hands in anguish. She eagerly nodded her head and exclaimed:
“Yes, yes, it is that way, Mister. She’s got three childer, too, and her man he is working on the railroad plenty miles away. Please get them safe; and do not forget to bring the bed clothes, too. The childer freeze without some covers.”
She waved both hands distractedly, as though beseeching them to hurry. Indeed, with that terrible current growing more and more violent with the passage of time, as the flood kept on rising, there was indeed much need for haste. And some of the flimsily built dwellings of the poorer classes in the manufacturing town of Lawrence had already washed away, the boys had heard, being carried off piecemeal by the greedy waters.
Hugh did not linger. All they had to do was to back away until the boat could be turned, and then manage to round the designated corner. They would very likely discover the house where the woman and the three “childer” lived, and who had been trapped by the flood.
Once they cleared the sheltering wall the full force of the speeding current struck them, so that Hugh found it absolutely necessary to put the little three-horse engine to its best “licks” in order to make headway.
“I see the house!” cried Billy, on the lookout. “There are youngsters in the upper windows waving bits of white rag to us. We’ve got to hurry, boys, or we’ll be too late after all. That old shanty is ready to go to pieces right now!”
All of the scouts could see that what Billy said was the actual truth. Somehow the water made through this street with considerable more force than the one they had just come from, where Wash and his set were as busy as beavers.
“Look at it sway, would you?” exclaimed Monkey Stallings, a note of genuine anxiety showing in his quivering voice.
“Oh! what would we do if it rolled over, with those poor children inside?” Billy was saying, as though trying to get his wits centered on the critical situation, so that he might be quick to act in case such a dreadful emergency arose.
“Don’t mention it!” cried Tip Lange, who was looking rather peaked and white himself, if the truth must be told, though he tried very hard to force a smile smacking of confidence on his face.
“Can we make it, do you think, Hugh?” Billy continued. “Is the engine powerful enough to knock up against the old current here? It’s just like the sluiceway of a mill. It comes down through the street so fierce and wild.”
“Oh, no trouble about that part of it,” the pilot assured him. “What I have to look out for is to keep away from the lower side.”
“I see what you mean,” Monkey observed sagaciously. “If the building should go over it would be a bad thing for us to get caught. That’s why you want to keep away from the lower side, Hugh, I guess.”
Hugh did not bother answering. He had his hands full with managing the boat, for that current made its course rather erratic.
Gradually they were drawing around the end of the old building. Up in the window the children could be seen. They no longer waved white bits of rag to attract the attention of those in the launch. Instead, they acted as though alarmed, because it must have seemed to them that the rescue boat meant to pass by and leave them to the mercy of the raging flood.
Their cries were pitiful. Billy could not stand it, so he cupped his hands in order to make his voice carry above all the other sounds, and shouted words of encouragement.
“Don’t be afraid there, we’re not going to leave you! But it’s necessary for us to come around on the side of the house, don’t you see? Move around with us and get ready to come aboard. We’ll get you safe ashore all right!”
They must have understood from his words and encouraging signs what he meant, for their agonized cries ceased, though they continued to watch the progress of the launch with an eagerness that might easily be excused.
“I guess now that if any of us happened to be in that shaky old trap, expecting it to roll over any minute, we’d feel scared pretty bad, too,” remarked Tip Lange, as if he thought it his duty to make apologies for the fright of the helpless inmates.
With the three “childer” was the poor mother, who had seemed just as badly alarmed as her crying brood, though she had not called out to the approaching rescuers.
Hugh saw that his chance had come. He proceeded to lay the launch alongside the building in such a way that he could keep the propeller constantly moving, and thus be in a state of preparedness, so that should the house give signs of toppling over, it would be possible for them to escape a catastrophe.
“I’ll have to stick to my engine, boys,” Hugh told them. “So you must do the work. First thing is to get all of them aboard. After that we can try to save a part of their things, particularly clothes and bed coverings. Get that?”
All of the others answered in the affirmative. Every fellow had his teeth set, and grim determination could be seen in their eyes as they prepared to cheat the flood out of its prospective victims.
Hugh calculated to a nicety when he brought the boat against the quivering wall of the doomed dwelling. The three children filled the window just alongside, and the eager mother crouched further back, bent on seeing them safe before she would think of leaving. That was the mother spirit every time, Billy Worth told himself, sacrificing her own chances for the sake of those she loved.
“Here you are!” he cried, as standing there he held out his hands toward the almost wild youngsters. “One at a time, now, and don’t crowd so. Give me the smallest first, the baby! There. Now the next one, and plenty of time for all!”
Although Billy said this, he was not quite so sure of it in his own mind, for he could see the building swaying back and forth in a terrifying manner, and did not know but that it might be lifted off its foundations at the next surge.
He succeeded in placing the three children safely in the launch. Then only would the relieved mother consent to clamber through the open window and join her little family in the rocking boat.
“Shall we try for some of their stuff, Hugh?” asked Monkey Stallings, who, being as agile as the animal after which he had been named, was better fitted for climbing into the house and taking chances with its upsetting than possibly any of his mates.
“Yes, but make quick work of it, and if you do go down, get free from the wreck as fast as you can. We’ll stand by to pick you up,” Hugh told him, though he was himself a little dubious about the wisdom of such a course.
“Count on me with you there,” said Tip Lange firmly. He did not mean that all the credit of this rescue should pass from the local troop. If they were to receive the praise that would come later on, they must merit it to some degree.
So the two agile scouts clambered through the window one after the other. It was anything but a pleasant sensation they experienced when the house gave an additionally severe roll.
“She’s going!” whooped Monkey; but as the threatened catastrophe failed to come about he managed to recover himself; and presently they became partly used to that strange sensation which in the beginning had almost made them seasick.
A hurried hunt was made for clothes. Fortunately the woman had gathered these together some time before, when meaning to try and escape from the house, but being deterred when she found that the water was already over the head of her youngest child.
Garments of various kinds, such as poor people might possess, together with a bundle of bed quilts that took the place of more expensive blankets lay handy to the scouts. These the boys quickly seized upon and dumped through the window, being cautious enough to make sure that the boat still rubbed against the side of the building in the same place they had left it.
Altogether Monkey and Tip were possibly not in there more than three minutes, if that long. And, although neither of them said so, it was apparent from the haste with which they clambered out again that both felt considerable relief in being able to leave in good shape.
Hugh saw that it was the height of folly to linger another second, now that they had accomplished all they meant to undertake. Accordingly he put on more speed, and with the others pushing away from the house they quickly left it astern.
The rescued children were all staring at their late home. Humble though it may have been, still they must have cherished feelings of affection for the roof that had lately sheltered them.
All at once they uttered a concerted cry as of terror.
“There she goes!” called out Billy, almost in awe; and as Hugh glanced toward the house they had just left he was in time to see it roll completely over, and then float down with the swirling current to become its plaything until finally it would go to pieces.
“Well, we didn’t get out of there any too soon, seems like!” said Tip Lange, not a vestige of color in his face, as he turned to stare at his new-found friends.
“I’m glad to be here instead of swimming out yonder,” commented Monkey dryly.
“And if we couldn’t manage to find an open window quick enough, think of what a time we’d be having in there!” added the Lawrence scout. “But let’s be thankful it didn’t happen that way.”
“We Wolf Patrol fellows,” said Billy Worth, “have noticed that when things get to looking dark for us there’s always a quick change for the better. We call it Wolf luck, and seems like we’ve even come to look for it.”
“Well, I only hope it’s as catching as the measles, and that you’ve given it to me,” Tip told him, “so that after this our troop will meet a favoring current. It’s easy to move along when everything seems to be going your way.”
The next thing was to get the woman and her children safely ashore. Hugh picked out a place where he thought it would be best to land them. In doing this he bore in mind the fact that she had relatives who were being assisted by Wash Bradford and his squad.
In the end it was managed so that they all came together on high ground, where they could find some sort of shelter in case the rain started coming down again, as seemed likely to happen at any minute.
Once more the launch was ready to start out on its mission of mercy, with the four scouts as eager as ever to do all they could to help the unfortunate victims of the great flood.
“If I had half a chance, and the stuff along,” ventured Billy, “do you know what I’d do, fellows? Why, make a flag of white, with a red cross in the center. If this isn’t the sort of relief work those people do then I miss my guess. But since I’ve only got a handkerchief, and nary a speck of red cloth along, I’ll have to let it pass. Hugh, there’s a gentleman beckoning to you over there. I wonder what he can want.”
“I think I know who he is,” said Tip Lange. “Yes, that’s Mr. Hungerford, the mayor of our town, and a mighty fine man at that. Better run in and see what he wants, Hugh, if you think best.”
“I certainly will,” was the immediate reply of the pilot, as he changed the course of the launch until they came close to where the gentleman stood.
“What can we do for you, Mr. Hungerford?” called out Tip, thinking that as he knew the mayor he ought to take it upon himself to interrogate him.
“You Boy Scouts are covering yourselves with honor and glory to-day, I want to tell you in the first place,” said the gentleman. “Lawrence isn’t going to forget it, either, understand. I saw you landing that family, and the other boys in the boat doing just as well. Besides I’ve watched some of your crowd working a raft through one of the quieter streets to load up with people or goods. But I believe we can now take pretty good care of all those in danger in the town. With your means for getting around it would be a splendid thing, boys, if you started up the flooded valley to see what good you could do.”
“Yes, sir, we were just meaning to do that,” Hugh assured him.
“I am glad to hear you say so,” said the mayor, a little of the worried look on his face disappearing. “Reports have been brought in that they are having a truly terrible time of it all along up there; and I am sure you will find dozens of things you can do to save life and property. God bless you, boys! Lawrence is proud of her sons this day. Now, make all reasonable haste, and play your part in this terrible drama that has been thrust upon us. Good-by, and the best of luck to you!”
They waved their hats, and gave the mayor a parting cheer as Hugh started the throbbing motor on at full speed. And it can be readily asserted that Tip Lange’s heart was swelling with a song of thanksgiving in that he believed the scouts of Lawrence had at last been afforded a glorious chance to come into their own.
“Oh! did you ever see such a sight as that?” cried Tip Lange, after they had presently turned into the section that lay back of Lawrence.
No wonder the boy was amazed and almost terrified. It was a spectacle calculated to make any one rub eyes, and wonder whether it was not all a dream.
All his life Tip Lange, living in the town of Lawrence, had been accustomed to seeing that broad and fertile valley green with growing crops and grass and trees in the summer, or covered with a white mantle of snow when the season changed. But now it lay there a tremendous inland sea, water everywhere, with bunches of trees, or it might be farmhouses and barns, visible in various quarters.
Fences were mostly far under the surface. Some people were paddling around on hastily constructed rafts, and trying desperately to save a small portion of their personal property. A few boats were also in evidence, but these seemed to be leaky, and of little value so far as doing the work of rescue went.
“Why, it must be all of two miles across from hill to hill!” declared Billy, as he stared in awe at the wonderful sight, and began to realize more than ever the majesty of such an amazing flood, backing up into the valleys, and inundating a thousand homes and farms.
“Those who were wise got to the hills long ago, I reckon,” Monkey Stallings ventured to say, as they began to push along swiftly through this inland sea.
“And let’s hope that covers most of the people living in the valley,” Hugh added. “There are always some who will not believe things can be as bad as they seem to their neighbors; or who hate to leave their property so much that they take the risk of staying. Those are the kind we’ve got to find and help.”
“I only hope we can do it all before night comes along,” said Tip, “because if the water keeps on rising it will be a terrible night for anybody stranded in a farmhouse, with the rain beating down, and mebbe the wind blowing great guns, for they say there’s another furious storm headed this way, you know.”
“What shall we do first, Hugh?” asked Billy.
“I’m depending on you fellows to use your eyes and tell me if you can see a white flag of distress waving in any direction,” the pilot replied. “It would seem that if people wanted to be taken off they’d have the sense to rig up some sort of a signal of distress.”
“Why, over there, those people in that boat are waving to us now!” cried Monkey Stallings. “They seem to be baling out at a crazy rate, and I guess the old ship is threatening to sink under ’em.”
Hugh instantly changed his course, and headed for the foundering boat. Those who were aboard the craft did not cease their efforts to keep afloat, and doubtless watched the approaching launch with anxious eyes.
Fortunately there was no catastrophe, and in good time the scouts had the chance to rescue them. It turned out that they were an old couple, badly frightened when one of their oars broke, and they found that the leaking boat threatened to go down with them, far from land.
They had quite a quantity of stuff aboard, and seemed to set such store by it that the boys could not refuse to save it. Already the boat was filling with water since no further effort was being made to keep it down; and before long it would be almost level with the gunwale, when it might drift about in that condition.
Hugh decided that it would be a waste of time to try and land the fugitives of the flood as fast as they were rescued. They could be kept aboard until their number had increased to a respectable figure, when the run to the nearest shore would be undertaken.
Hardly had they again started on than Tip gave notice that he had sighted another signal of distress.
“I wish I had marine glasses along,” he said, after directing Hugh how to point the boat’s nose, “then I could tell what that means. Seems to me somebody must be swimming, and waving a handkerchief or something.”
“No, I think you’re wrong there, Tip,” Billy observed, after he had stared intently at the object ahead, while Monkey Stallings continued to wave a piece of white cloth he had picked up, so as to assure the imperiled ones their signal had been seen. “They don’t seem to be moving at all. P’raps they’re sitting on some sort of raft, low down near the surface of the water.”
As the launch was making pretty good time, of course the scouts rapidly approached closer to the object of their curiosity. Many were the guesses they continued to make in trying to solve the mystery.
Finally it was determined that those they were drawing near must be standing on some rock or mound, for there was no sign of a farmhouse near them.
This proved to be the actual case. There were seven in the party, a man, his wife, and five children. They had started to wade from their farmhouse to the hills, thinking it could be done; but the water kept on getting deeper and deeper until they became frightened and dared proceed no further.
When they turned to go back, the sight of all that wide sweep of agitated water appalled them; so they had clung to the little rise of ground they had accidentally struck, hoping and praying that some boat or raft would come to their assistance.
They were a thankful crowd when the scouts managed to get them all aboard; and a dripping one into the bargain.
“We’ve justgotto get ashore now, Hugh,” remarked Billy, after the last of the seven had been helped into the launch, this being the father of the family.
“Yes, they’re shivering as it is, and will soon take severe colds in this raw air,” decided the pilot of the expedition, as he started the engine, and headed straight toward a point which he had already picked out as the best place for the fugitives to be landed.
“We’ll see to it that they have a jolly big fire going before we leave them,” Billy continued; for he was very fond of a fire himself, and believed that it was likely to be a solid comfort to shipwrecked people.
“That’s a good idea,” commented the patrol leader, who knew he could leave all that sort of things to his chum, for Billy was a great hand to look out for the material side of things.
As they drew nearer the point they found that there were already people there, who may have reached there by wading through the water when it was not so high; or else by boat or raft. At any rate there seemed to be quite a number of them, watching the approach of the launch with the intense interest that forlorn fugitives, chased out of their homes by a flood, always show in newcomers.
“And think of them not even having the sense to get a roaring fire going,” remarked Billy, “with all that good fuel around them, too! Well, some folks hardly know enough to come in out of the rain. If this scout business is doing one thing for the boys of America, it’s teaching them to use their brains and do things. The next generation isn’t going to be near as helpless as this one.”
“There’s a log leading out into the water, Hugh!” cried Monkey Stallings. “You wouldn’t want to ask for a better place to run alongside. We can get our cargo over the side in great shape.”
Apparently Hugh thought likewise, for he at once aimed to draw up by the log. It proved all that the Stallings boy had prophesied, and as some of the scouts began to assist their passengers ashore the load was soon lightened.
Then while Tip and Hugh and Monkey began to carry the bundles with them, Billy cast around for a suitable place in which to build the fire he contemplated starting. Undoubtedly those hapless people would have good cause to remember the khaki of a scout with feelings of gratitude; and in the future it was going to be reckoned a badge of honor indeed for any fellow around Lawrence to be wearing such a suit.
Billy exercised his knowledge of such things to start his blaze in a place where it would burn best with that wind prevailing. He interested some of the children in the task of dragging plenty of fuel forward, so that in a very short time he had a jolly blaze leaping upward.
It was wonderful what a difference that fire made in the feelings of those stranded people. Why, with the coming of its genial warmth and glow, the look of woful anxiety began to leave their faces. They gathered around, held out their hands to the fire, and even started talking hopefully concerning the future.
Those who had been standing in the water up to their waists, and whom the cool air had caused to shiver, now began to steam as they sat to the leeward of the fire, regardless of what smoke blew in their faces, so long as they could feel comfortable again.
Billy was not yet satisfied. It might start raining at any time, and unless some sort of temporary shelter were provided, these people would soon be wet to the skin.
Accordingly he showed the men how a scout would make a shelter out of boughs if he found himself overtaken by night in the woods. While this might not answer as well as a tent, at the same time, if properly made, it would shed most of the rain, and with the aid of the fire tend to keep them fairly comfortable until they knew what next to do.
Help would of course come from the good people who happened to live on the higher ground, and who might be depended on to see to it that these unfortunates at least did not starve. When the raging waters went down, and the river shrank back into its normal bed, they would once more take up the task of trying to restore their ruined homes in the great level valley, once so prosperous.
Much as the scouts would have liked to have stayed longer, so as to help still further, they felt that they owed it to other victims of the flood that they get busy again. These were only a small fraction of the valley sufferers, and could not expect to monopolize the time of those who had the launch, possibly the only power boat in all that vicinity.
From the way in which Hugh started off, Billy Worth determined that he must have some settled plan in his mind, although nothing had been spoken with regard to it.
He looked beyond the boat’s bow, and while far away he could see what seemed to be farm buildings, nothing in the way of a fluttering signal of distress caught his eye.
“Still Hugh knows what he’s doing, never fear,” Billy told himself, because he had had many a practical demonstration along these lines, and felt unlimited confidence in his superior.
His curiosity continued to grow the closer they came to the abandoned farm buildings, until finally Billy could hold in no longer.
“Hugh,” he said, “you’re meaning to do something, I take it, at that place, because you’ve headed straight this way from the time we left shore; but look as hard as I can I’ve failed to see a sign of life about the farmhouse.”
Hugh smiled, because he had been anticipating some such remark, having noticed the uneasy movements and puzzled looks of his chum.
“That’s where one of the men ashore lives,” he started to explain. “He was speaking to me about it, and begged me as a favor to come out here right away on an errand of mercy. They were away from home when the flood came, you see, and couldn’t get back here to do anything.”
“What does he want you to do for him? Was there any one left at home? Does he expect us to salvage some of his best furniture and clothes for him, Hugh?”
“Neither one nor the other, Billy. The fact of the matter is he wants me to do something to save a pair of valuable work horses that are shut up in the lower part of his stable, where they may drown there in their stalls if the flood rises a couple of feet more!”
Now, as Billy loved horses, he was ready to applaud the plan suggested by Hugh.
“It ought to be easy to open the door of the stable,” he observed. “Like as not the horses have broken loose from their mangers long before now, with the place filling with water and giving them a scare. But if they haven’t, why I’ll guarantee to get in there some way and cut them free.”
“That must be the stable yonder,” called out Stallings, who had heard what was passing between his friends.
“Yes,” Hugh assented, “it’s got a stone basement, he told me, which would be apt to hold out for quite some time against the water, because there’s little current up here, and only the sweep of the wind to fear.”
The launch was steered so as to come up alongside that part of the stable where they could see the door was situated. This was now half under water, and if found to be locked Hugh would have to use the key the farmer had thought to put in his hand before they left the land.
“First time a boat ever called at their door, I bet you!” said Tip. “I know the folks, and have been here at their place more than once.”
He and Monkey Stallings held the launch steady while Billy tried the door.
“Locked, Hugh, and here’s the padlock six inches under water,” he remarked, in a disgusted tone. “We’ll have to try and break in, I reckon.”
“No, take this key the owner gave me,” Hugh explained. “Be careful not to let it slip out of your grip, or we will be in a hole.”
Billy promised to be cautious, and after a little fumbling managed to undo the big padlock.
“Wait and we’ll get the boat out of the way so the door can be drawn back,” Tip Lange told him. “Then the poor animals can wade or swim out as they please, if it happens they’re loose.”
A number of whinnies had come from inside the stable, showing that the imprisoned horses recognized the presence of human beings, and perhaps understood that a way would be opened for their exit.
“I can hear them thrashing about a good deal,” Monkey announced, “which I would take to mean they might be free from their halters and hitching ropes.”
Billy maintained his grip on the door, and as the others pushed the launch slowly along an opening began to appear. Hardly had the door swung halfway open before a horse’s head appeared in sight, and out came an animal, swimming like a muskrat, only its head, neck, and a small portion of its back being visible.
“There’s the second old chap, all right!” exclaimed Billy, as another head followed the tail of the first horse. “Did he say there were only two of them, Hugh?”
“That’s the extent of the misery here,” came the prompt reply. “But look over yonder, will you, at the chickens perched on that coop; yes, and turkeys, too. Poor things, they’re apt to be pretty hungry before they get a meal again.”
“Oh! what’s that swimming around over there?” demanded Tip. “I do believe it’s a dog; yes, and Farmer Jones did have a fine watch dog. I remember he had him chained to a kennel somewhere about there.”
“We can’t pass by without trying to give the poor fellow a chance for his life,” Hugh declared, as he headed toward the spot where the moving object had been observed.
“He sees us now,” said Tip. “But, say, the poor fellow is so rank tired swimming that he just can’t give even a yelp, let alone a joyful bark. Chances are he sat on top of his kennel till the water got so deep he had to swim; and as he’s fastened with a chain he’d soon have been drowned if we hadn’t come along.”
When they came up to the dog Tip spoke kindly to him, calling him Carlo. Then he took hold and managed in some way to unfasten the animal’s collar. Of course this freed Carlo from the detaining chain that had come very near being his death. Tip and Monkey Stallings assisted the big dog to clamber over the side.
The very first thing Carlo did was to scatter showers of drops all around him, which called for loud protestations from the boys. But after that the rescued dog seemed to want to show his affection by licking any one of the boys’ hands he could find. What better proof could they have of his gratitude than that?
“There are those horses swimming after us,” said Billy. “If we keep on, we’ll be like a traveling circus coming to town, with all the queer things we rescue. I suppose now the next job is to gather in all those fowls there, eh, Hugh?”
“Well, we’ll have to forego that pleasure just now, Billy. There may be human beings in need of our coming. I’m afraid the chickens and turkeys will have to take their chances.”
“If any hungry coons happen along this way, the chickens won’t be apt to die a lingering death, or one by drowning either. A twist of the neck would see their finish,” said Billy.
“I don’t like the way those horses keep swimming after us, Hugh,” protested Tip.
“Oh! they want to be sociable,” laughed Billy, “but we’re leaving them in the lurch faster now, and soon they’ll give it up. When that happens they’ll most likely swim to the nearest shore, eh, Hugh?”
“No question about it,” the pilot assured him. “Horses and cows have some sense about them. Even on a black night they’d know where the shore lay. It must be what we call intuition, and which takes the place of reasoning powers with animals and birds.”
“Yes, and with frogs and toads, too,” said Billy. “I’ve picked up a toad many a time and thrown him as far out in the lake as I could; but let me tell you I never yet saw him strike out; he’d head for the shore every time, swimming for all he was worth, like he thought a black bass would snap him up.”
“What time do you think it is?” asked Monkey Stallings from up in the bow where he was keeping a lookout—he called it the “crow’s nest,” because he had read that on board a ship that is where a man is stationed to sweep the horizon with his marine glasses from time to time.
“Just three o’clock,” replied Hugh, and as there was no sun to tell him, he must have glanced at his watch in order to say it so positively.
“We’ve got two hours or so more of daylight to work in,” Tip remarked. “Then we’ll have the time of our lives crawling back home in the dark, without any of us knowing our bearings in the night.”
“Oh, it isn’t going to be quite that bad,” sang out Monkey. “Uncle always keeps plenty of lights aboard. There’s even a reflector that can be hung up here in the bow. It is one of those acetylene gas affairs, and makes a dazzling white light.”
“Good enough!” cried Billy. “If we’re hard pushed we can keep up our rescue work into the night. I’d hate to think we’d left a single poor chap to drown when we might exert ourselves a little extra and save him.”
“There, the horses have given us up as a bad job, and they’ve turned toward the land, you see!” announced Tip triumphantly. As he patted the head of Carlo, the dog pushed up close alongside him.
“Sorry to say, it’s raining again,” added Billy. “You can see it on the water.”
“That’s a bad thing all around for those who are without a shelter,” Hugh observed. “Of course it matters very little to us, because we have a canopy overhead, and curtains if we want to use them. I’m afraid the end is a long way off still.”
“But from now on the rise isn’t apt to be so rapid, you see,” Tip continued. “It takes a lot more water to make an inch when it’s spread over such a big lot of territory. Here are miles and miles covered, and it’s the same way in other low places. Half of the country up in this region must be afloat.”
Pushing on, they approached what seemed to be a nest of houses and outbuildings built for sociability’s sake at the adjoining corners of the farms, so as to make a little community in the dull winter time.
“Looks like there are some people left there, because I saw a signal flutter!” announced Monkey Stallings.
“It’s unusually low ground around here,” said Tip. “I remember the place well, and they have the finest garden and truck patches of any about town when things are going on naturally. But the whole place looks now like it had been struck by lightning, and then by a cloudburst. The Williams live in the near house, and you can see that the water is up over the top of the lower story. There’s some one on the rooftree waving to us.”
“But I saw a white thing moving in that tree nearby,” declared Billy, “and if you listen you’ll hear them screeching right now.”
“Help! help! we’re all drowning! Oh! hurry and come to save us!”
Tip was seen to be smiling.
“Say, I know who that is, all right,” he told the others. “There’s a queer little old woman at the Williams house, the sassiest and quickest with her tongue you ever did hear, and they say she’s that set in her ways nobody ever can make her do a thing she’d opposed to. Yes, that must be Miss Maria screeching, and she’s perched up in that tree, all right, like a guinea hen. We’re going to have a fine time of it gettingherdown, let me tell you, if she happens to be afraid of the limb breaking.”
When the launch drew up alongside the house it was found that three persons had perched on the ridgepole of the roof, and were clinging there in great distress of body and mind. One of them was a brawny farm hand, another a heavy-set woman, while the third was a small negro.