AN AWKWARD PREDICAMENT
It is said that some, and indeed all, animals possess a certain waggery of disposition which shows itself on rare occasions. The bear inflicted no injury on Bob, but the scraping of those long, sharp claws did considerable damage to his trousers, while keeping his fears at the boiling point.
It certainly was a grotesque scene.
There sat bruin, with his right paw raised, regularly tapping Bob, while the latter, with his hands and feet close together, and his body doubled up like a jack-knife, swung up and down with a steady motion, in response to the impetus given by the brute.
Of course the latter was silent, though if he had possessed the capacity to laugh, there can be no doubt that he would have done so, for, aside from the ever-present peril threatening the fellow, a more amusing sight cannot be imagined.
Even Tom and Jim, when they saw their companion was suffering no harm, broke into mirth, which grated on the nerves of the victim of a most unprecedented combination of circumstances.
But sooner than Jim or Tom suspected the moment came when the laugh was “on the other side of the mouth.”
Bob Budd played the part of pendulum to the bear for perhaps ten minutes or less, during which he kept up his outcries, and Tom and Jim laughed till they were in danger of falling from their perch in the tree.
“If Bob had only known what was coming,” said Tom, “he could have had his trousers lined with sheet iron, and then he might have joined in the laugh too.”
“Why don’t he give the bear a kick with his foot and knock him over? He ought to have knowed enough to climb a big tree like us.”
“Helloa! what’s up now?”
Without any apparent reason bruin at this moment dropped down on all fours, and, leaving Bob Budd to himself, lumbered over under the refuge of the other two fugitives.
They felt no special fear, for it seemed impossible that the animal could do them harm.
Bob’s experience was not lost upon him. He realized the mistake he made when he took refuge in the sapling, and he now repaired it before the opportunity passed.
Letting go, he dropped lightly on his feet and ran for another tree double the size of the hickory, up which he hurriedly climbed to where the limbs put out a dozen feet above the ground.
Here, as he flung one leg over the strong support, he felt that at last he was safe against a regiment of bears.
Meanwhile, bruin was giving attention to Messrs. James McGovern and Thomas Wagstaff.
He first walked deliberately around the tree several times, as if searching for some vulnerable point, occasionally looking up at the grinning youngsters and snuffing like one impatient to secure his dinner.
“I wonder what he means by that” said Jim, with a vague feeling of alarm.
“He wants us to see what a big fellow he is.”
“He is a bouncer and no mistake,” was the truthful comment of Jim.
“I wouldn’t care if he was ten times as large—good gracious! look at that!”
Well might the boys start in alarm, for at that moment the brute began climbing the tree!
They had lost sight of the fact, if indeed they ever knew it, that the black bear is a famous climber when the trunks are big enough to be grasped without his paws interfering.
While Tom and Jim were congratulating themselves on being safe beyond all possible harm, they discovered they were not safe at all.
Bruin was on the point of ascending to their perch, when he was tempted aside by the shouting of Bob Budd in the sapling, and he went off to have some sport with him.
Why the brute should have left Bob at the time he had him within reach it would be hard to say. It may have been he concluded that the single lad had afforded him enough entertainment, and the moment had come for the other two to take a hand.
The consternation of Tom and Jim may be imagined when they saw those massive paws embrace the shaggy bark, which began to crumble beneath the vigorous clawing of the nails, while the huge black body slowly but steadily ascended toward the limbs, where the white-faced youngsters watched his terrifying action.
Bob’s turn had come to laugh, and he called out:
“Wait till he gets up among the branches, then drop and run for a tree that is too small for him to climb.”
This was good advice perhaps, though it occurred to the boys, for whom it was intended, that if they allowed their foe to approach that near it would be too late for them to flee.
Bruin had not very far to ascend when his huge, pig-like head was thrust among the limbs, and he slowly drew his ponderous body after him.
He was now close to the fugitives, one of whom was perched above the other, and both as far out on the branches as they could get without breaking them.
The big, shaggy form being fairly among the limbs, at the point where they put out from the tree, bruin paused a minute, like a general surveying the battle plain before him.
There were the two cowering boys about a dozen feet off, apparently without any hope of escaping his wrathful appetite. All he had to do was to make his way out on the branches and gather them in.
It will be seen that there was some difficulty in the bear’s path, since his weight would not allow him to advance clear to his victims, unless he used some other limb for his support.
As ill-luck would have it, the very means required was at his command.
Directly beneath Tom and Jim was another branch, broad and strong enough to support two large bears. It was so near the ground that the boys used the limbs immediately above, with a view of making sure they were beyond the reach of the biggest kind of animal on terra firma.
“Here he comes!”
It was Tom who uttered the exclamation, and he spoke the truth, for at that moment bruin began cautiously moving out on the heavy limb just under them.
“It’s a good time to leave,” whispered Jim, who, while the words were in his mouth, let go and dropped to the ground.
Tom was but an instant behind him, imitating him so quickly, indeed, that he struck directly upon his shoulders.
But no harm was done, and they were instantly up and off.
It will be seen from this that the couple adopted substantially the advice of Bob Budd, which contained more wisdom than most of his utterances.
Like their leader, the fugitives heeded the dearly bought lesson, and, instead of taking refuge in a large tree or sapling, they chose one of precisely the right size, each perching himself where he was as far beyond reach as Bob Budd himself.
The lads were given plenty of time in which to take their new departure, since the bear, instead of leaping to the ground as they did, picked his way back to the body of the tree, and slid down that to the earth, tearing off a lot of the bark in his descent.
This required so much time that when he once more stood on solid earth all three of the boys were out of his reach, and could afford to laugh at his anger.
Halting a short distance from the tree, bruin looked at the boys in turn with such an odd expression that they laughed.
Gradually the idea appeared to work itself into the thick brain of the animal that there was nothing to be made by remaining in that particular part of the country, though his reluctance to leave caused no little misgiving on the part of all three of the youths.
If he should decide to stay until the party were compelled to choose between starving to death and coming down, the situation, to say the least, would have its inconveniences.
“There he goes!” exclaimed Jim, a quarter of an hour after this possible complication had been discussed by the youngsters from their different perches.
The bear seemed to have decided that it was useless to hang around the neighborhood, and began moving off in his lumbering fashion. He was attentively watched until he vanished in the dense wood.
“We’re all right now” called Bob.
“Maybe he is trying to fool us,” suggested Tom; “you had better stay where you are awhile longer.”
“Who’s afraid?” defiantly called back Bob, sliding nimbly down the sapling; “you don’t catch me running from a bear again; all I want is a chance to get hold of my gun and load it—Jewhilakens!”
A roar of laughter broke from Jim and Tom, who at that moment caught sight of the brute coming back at a faster rate than he had departed.
Bob was equally quick in descrying his danger, and the manner in which he shinned up the sapling would have surprised a trained athlete, who could not have surpassed it.
“When is the fraud going to leave?” he growled, looking down on the intruder that had stopped directly under him; “I don’t know whether bears are good waiters, but I hope he won’t try to keep us here more than a week.”
Bruin went snuffing around the spot, clawing the guns curiously, gazing up at each lad in turn, and finally starting off once more.
The boys hoped his departure was for good, but you may be sure they did not discount it. When, however, a half-hour went by without his being seen, all felt there was ground for hope.
It seemed safe to experiment a little, and so Bob once more slid down the sapling, after carefully reconnoitering all the forest in his field of vision. He held himself ready also to climb again the instant the beast reappeared.
The boys were too frightened to attempt any jokes on each other, and when Tom and Jim reported that bruin was not in sight, Bob believed them.
His gun was lying not far off, and he began timidly making his way toward it. Step by step he advanced, glancing in every direction, and ready to dart back the instant he saw or heard anything suspicious.
Finally he stooped over and picked up the weapon. Still the bear was invisible, and Bob hurriedly reloaded his gun, though it cannot be claimed that he felt much more secure than before.
Thus encouraged, Tom and Jim ventured to descend from their respective trees, and they also recovered their weapons without bringing their enemy down upon them.
“It must be he’s gone for good,” said Jim, in a guarded undertone.
“It looks that way,” replied Tom, “and the best thing we can do is to follow suit.”
This was the unanimous sentiment, and it was acted upon without delay.
It cannot be said that a single member of the Piketon Rangers breathed freely until fully a half-mile from the scene of their adventure with the bear.
The slightest noise caused them to start and gaze around with rapidly-beating hearts; they spoke only a few words and they were in undertones, while they paused a half-dozen times in the belief that some stump or dark-colored boulder was the dreaded brute awaiting their approach.
But by the time the half-mile was passed they grew more confident. They spoke in ordinary tones, and did not start at the sound of every rustling leaf.
“That’s the last hunt I ever make up there,” said Jim McGovern, turning about and glaring at the mountainous slope as though it had done him a personal injury.
“I’m with you,” replied Tom Wagstaff; “them as like to have their brains banged out by bucks ten feet high or chawed up by bears as big as an elephant are welcome, but not any for me.”
“I feel sort of that way myself,” assented Bob; “it’s the first time I’ve tried it since I was a tot of a boy, but I’ve had enough to last me for the next three hundred and eighty-five years. I hope Uncle Jim won’t ask too many questions about Hero, because he thought a good deal of that hound.”
“He needn’t ever know that he departed this life through a mysterious dispensation of Providence,” replied Jim; “all that it is necessary to learn—and I don’t know that there’s any need of that—is that Hero went off on an exploring expedition and hasn’t yet returned. The particulars of his shipwreck are unobtainable, as is often the case with other explorers.”
“Oh! I can manage it, I’ve no doubt, for I was never yet caught in a scrape that I couldn’t get out of,” was the cheerful response of Bob Budd.
The day was well gone when the three reached their tent at the base of Mount Barclay, and they were glad enough to get back again.
During their absence Aunt Ruth had sent one of the hired men, as was her custom, with a liberal supply of delicacies, which were disposed of in the usual vigorous style of the three, who were honest when they agreed that they had had enough hunting of bears and deer to last them a lifetime.
“If we could only manage the thing without so much work,” said Bob, “we might find some fun in it; but we had to climb up that mountain, which is three times as high as I supposed, and when the danger came, why we hadn’t our usual strength.”
“I think we did pretty well,” replied Tom Wagstaff, “but all the same I don’t believe it would read very well in print.”
“Who’s going to put it in print?” asked Bob; “we know too much to tell any one about it, or, if we did, we would get it in a shape that would do us proud.”
“Well, being as we have had all we want of hunting, the next thing will be—what?”
“Doing nothing,” replied Wagstaff.
“We can do the next thing to that, which is just as good.”
“What’s that?” asked Bob.
“Fish; stretch out along-shore in the shade, where there’s no danger of rolling in, or go out in a boat and wait for the fish to bite, not caring much whether they do or not. The best thing about fishing is that you never have to tire yourself—”
“Hark!”
At that moment the three heard a prodigious roar, rapidly increasing in volume, until the air seemed to be filled with one continuous reverberating peal of thunder.
“Heaven save us!” exclaimed Bob Budd; “the dam has burst!”
“And it is coming down on us and we can’t get out of its path!” added white-faced Wagstaff.
He spoke the truth!
Those who have been so unfortunate as to be placed in the path of an overwhelming flood, which after slowly gathering for weeks and months finally bursts all barriers, need not be told that the awful roar caused by the resistless sweep can never be mistaken for anything else.
The mill-dam, to which we have made more than one reference, had not been erected, like that at Johnstown, to afford fishing grounds for those who were fond of the sport, but was reared fully twenty years before to provide water-power for a company of capitalists, who proposed erecting a series of mills and manufactories in the valley below. They progressed as far in their enterprise as the formation of a substantial dam when the company collapsed, and that was the end of their scheme.
The dam remained, with its enormous reservoir of water, which, in summer, furnished excellent fishing and, in the winter, fine skating; but during all that time the valuable store of power remained idle.
The sudden breakage of the dam, without apparent cause, was unaccompanied by the appalling features which marked the great disaster in Pennsylvania a short time since. The town of Piketon was not in the course of the flood, nor were there any dwelling-houses exposed to the peril with the exception of the home of a single humble laborer.
The water became a terrific peril for a brief while, but such masses speedily exhaust themselves, though it was fortunate indeed that the topography of the country was so favorable that the uncontrollable fury was confined in so narrow a space.
But the camp of the Piketon Rangers lay exactly in the course of the flood. Bob Budd and his friends had pitched their tent there because the spot was an inviting one in every respect, and no one had ever dreamed of danger from the breaking of the reservoir above.
It was night when that fearful roar interrupted the conversation of the Rangers. The young men were silent on the instant, and stared with bated breath in each other’s faces.
“Great Heaven!” exclaimed Bob Budd, rising partly from his seat, “the dam has burst!”
“And I can’t swim a stroke!” gasped the terrified Wagstaff.
“Nor me either!” added McGovern; “I guess the end has come, boys.”
“I can swim,” replied Bob, trembling from head to foot, “but that won’t help me at such a time as this.”
“Are we going to stay here and be drowned?” demanded Jim, rousing himself; “we might as well go down fighting; every one for himself!”
As he uttered this exclamation he dashed through the tent and among the trees outside, where the rays of the moon could not penetrate, and it was dark as Egypt.
A strong wind seemed to be blowing, though a few minutes before the air was as still as at the close of a sultry summer afternoon. The wind was cool. It was caused by the rush of waters through the dense forest.
It was evident to McGovern and the rest that there was but one possible means of escape—possibly two—and he attempted that which first occurred to him: that was by dashing at right angles to the course of the torrent. If he could reach ground higher than the surface of the water, as it came careering through the wood, he would be safe; but he and his companions knew when the awful roar broke upon them that the waters were close, while it was a long run to the elevated country on either side.
But if anything of the kind was to be attempted there was not a moment to spare. One second might settle the question of life and death.
“Maybe I can make it!” was the thought that thrilled McGovern as he began fighting his way through the wood, stumbling over bushes, bumping against trunks, and picking his way as best he could; “it isn’t very far to the high ground, but I have to go so blamed slow—great thunder! my head’s sawed off!”
At that moment a stubby limb caught under the chin of the frantic fugitive and almost lifted him off his feet. He quickly freed himself and dashed wildly on again with feelings that must have resembled those of the multitude fleeing from before the sweep of the overwhelming lava.
A vine enclosed the ankle of the fugitive and he fell headlong; he was instantly up again and collided with a tree, which he did not detect soon enough in the gloom; at any other time McGovern would have taken his own time in rising and vented his feelings, but he did not do so now; his single thought was one wild, desperate hope that he might escape.
He never exerted himself so before, for, despite the stirring experiences through which he had passed in his short life, he had never encountered anything like this.
Those who have hovered on the verge of death have made known that in the few seconds when life was passing, the whole record of their former lives has swept like a panorama before them. The events of months and years have clustered in those few fearful moments.
Jim McGovern’s experience was somewhat similar. There were mighty few seconds at his command, while struggling with the whole energy of his nature to reach the rising ground beyond reach of the flood; but in some respects that brief interval of time was as so many years to him.
How well it will be if, when we reach that supreme moment which must come to all of us, the hasty retrospect brings us pleasure and hope rather than remorse and despair!
There was nothing of this nature in the review that surged through the brain of the miserable fellow. Broken promises, disobedience to parents, wrangling, thievery, drinking—these were the scarlet tints of the picture which memory painted for him in vivid colors.
“If you’ll only save me,” he gasped, addressing the sole One who could rescue him, “I will stop the bad things I’ve been doing all my life, and do my best to live right always.”
Would he never pass the boundary of this narrow valley? It had always seemed straight to him before, but now its width was expanded not to yards and rods, but to miles. And never were the trees so close together or the bushes, vines, and undergrowth so dense, or his own wind so short, or his muscles so weak.
Suddenly something cold was felt against his ankle.
He knew what it was—it was water!
The fringe of the flood had reached him. Where the bursting away was so instantaneous and the released volume was so enormous, the flow could not be like that of an ordinary torrent, which rises rapidly because of the swiftly-increasing mass behind it. The awful rush at Johnstown resembled the oncoming of a tidal wave or wall of water, so high, so prodigious, so resistless that nothing less than the side of a granite mountain could check it.
It would have been the same in the case we are describing, though of course to a less degree, but for the interposing wood, which, beginning at the very base of the dam, continued the entire length of the valley, which was several miles in extent.
Some of these trees were uprooted as if by a cyclone, others were bent and partly turned over, while the sturdiest, which did not stand near the middle of the path, held their own, like giants resisting death tugging at their vitals.
The woods also acted as a brake, so to speak, on the velocity of the terrific rush of waters. The flow could not be stopped nor turned aside, but it was hindered somewhat, and, as it came down the hollow, was twisted and driven into all manner of eddies, whirlpools, and currents, in which the most powerful swimmer was as helpless as an infant.
“It’s no use!” panted McGovern, when he felt the cold current rising about his ankles like the coiling of a water-snake; “I must die, and with all my sins on my head! Heaven have mercy! do not desert me now when a little farther and I will be saved!”
Never was a more agonized appeal made to his Creator than that by the despairing McGovern.
Within a few seconds after McGovern felt the water about his ankles it touched his knees. He was still able to make progress, and with the same despairing desperation as before, struggled onward.
At the next step he went to his waist, and fell with a splash.
“I’m drowning!” he gasped; but fortunately for him he had plunged into a small hollow, out of which he was swept the next moment, and, with no effort on his part, flung upon his feet.
The roar was overpowering. It seemed as if he were in the appalling swirl of Niagara, with the raging waters all around him clamoring for his life. He grasped a limb which brushed his face, and the next step showed that he had struck higher ground.
But the torrent was ascending faster than he. It was gaining in spite of all he could do, but hope was not yet dead. Another step and the water was below his waist, and he was able to make progress with the help of his hands. When he lifted one foot it was swept to one side, and only by throwing his full weight upon it was he able to sustain himself.
He had now reached a point where the trees were not so near together. While this enabled him to see something of his surroundings, it gave the sweeping volume greater power, and he was in despair again.
But the dim light of the moon showed that at that moment the boundary of the current was only a few paces beyond him. Could he pass that intervening distance before it further expanded he would be safe.
Rousing his flagging energies he fought on, cheered by the view of a figure on the margin, which had evidently caught sight of him.
“A little farther and you will be all right!” shouted the stranger, stepping into the torrent and extending his hand.
“I can’t do it!” moaned McGovern, struggling on, but gaining no faster than the terrible enemy against which he was fighting.
“Yes, you will! don’t give up! take my hand!”
McGovern reached out, but he was short of grasping the friendly help. Then the brave friend stepped into the rushing torrent at the risk of his own life, and, griping the cold hand, exerted himself with the power of desperation, and dragged the helpless youth into the shallow margin.
“Don’t stop!” he shouted, still pulling him forward; “we are not yet out of danger!”
Helped by the stranger who had appeared so opportunely, the two splashed through the flood, which seemed striving to prevent their escape, and would drag them down in spite of themselves.
But the rescuer was cool-headed, strong, and brave, and he kept the weak McGovern going with a speed that threatened to fling him prostrate in spite of himself.
The ground rose more sharply than before. A few more hurried steps and their feet touched dry land. Still a few paces farther and they were saved.
The torrent might roar and rage, but it could not seize them. They had eluded its wrath, like the hunter who leaps aside from the bound of the tiger.
McGovern stood for a minute panting, limp, and so exhausted that he could hardly keep his feet. His companion did not speak, but kept his place beside him, curiously gazing into his countenance, and waiting until he should fully recover before addressing him.
The youth speedily regained his self-command, and for the first time looked in his rescuer’s face. They were now beyond the shadow of the trees, and could discern each other’s features quite distinctly in the favoring moonlight.
“Well!” he exclaimed, “I think you and I have met before.”
“I shouldn’t be surprised if we had,” was the reply; “you tried to destroy my bicycle last night.”
“And you saved me from drowning in the mill-pond.”
“I believe I gave you a little help in that way.”
“And now you have saved my life again.”
“I am glad I was able to do something for you, for you seemed to be in a bad way.”
“I should think I was! If you had been a minute later it would have been the last of Jim McGovern, and I tell you, Dick Halliard, he was in no shape to die.”
No person escaping death by such a close call could throw off at once the moral effect of his rescue. The bad youth was humbled, frightened, and repentant. He was standing in the presence of him who had twice been the instrument of saving his life in a brief space of time, and that, too, after McGovern had tried to do him an injury.
“I don’t know whether you can forgive me,” he said, in the meekest of tones, “but I beg your pardon all the same.”
“I have no feeling against you,” replied Dick, “and though you sought to do me an injury, you inflicted the most on yourself; but,” added the young hero, starting up, “where are Bob Budd and Tom Wagstaff?”
“Heaven only knows! They must be drowned,” replied McGovern, glancing at the raging waters so near him with a shudder, as if he still feared they would reach and sweep him away.
“Where did you leave them? How did you become separated?”
“We were in our tent when we heard the waters coming. We felt we couldn’t help each other, and all made a break, some in one direction and some another. They must have been drowned, just as I would have been but for you.”
But what could he do to help them? He was standing as near to the torrent as he dare. It had already submerged the spot where the tent had been erected to the depth of twenty feet at least. Bob and Tom could not have stayed there had they wished, nor was there any means of reaching them.
“I wish I could do something,” said Dick, as if talking with himself, “but I see no way.”
“There is none,” added McGovern, who was speedily recovering from the ordeal through which he had passed, “but it is too bad; I would do anything I could for poor Bob and Tom.”
It seemed hopeless indeed, but Dick could not stand idle, knowing that others near him might be in most imminent need of help.
“If they are alive, which I don’t believe,” said McGovern, “they must have drifted below us by this time.”
“I agree with you,” replied Dick, moving slowly along the margin of the torrent, which, on account of the unevenness of the ground, encroached at times and compelled them to retreat for a brief space; “I should think if they were alive they would call for help.”
“Did you hear me?” asked McGovern, looking round in the face of his companion.
“Yes, though I happened to be quite near when the flood came, and had to scramble myself to get out of the way—”
“Hark!” interrupted McGovern, “that was a voice!”
“So it was, and it is below us!”
As he spoke he broke into a run, with the larger youth at his heels. They had caught a cry, but it was so smothered and brief that it was impossible to tell the point whence it came, except that it was below them.
“Help! help! for the love of Hiven, help!”
“That’s the voice of Terry Hurley,” said Dick, who recalled that the Irishman lived with his family a short distance away, and in the path of the flood. In the whirl of events young Halliard had forgotten this man and his wife and their two little girls.
But that cry showed they were in imminent extremity, and possibly aid might reach them in time. McGovern, since his own rescue, was as anxious as the brave Dick to extend assistance to whomsoever were in peril.
The calamity had come with such awful suddenness that not the least precautionary step could be taken. It was too early for neighbors to arrive, but all Piketon and the vicinity would be on the spot in the course of a few hours.
A brief run brought the boys in sight of the imperiled family. The humble home of Terry Hurley did not stand in the centre of the valley, like the tent of the Piketon Rangers, but well up to one side. Thus it escaped the full force of the current, which, however, was violent enough to fill the lower story in a twinkling, and threaten to carry the structure from its foundations.
The two little girls, Maggie and Katie, had just said their prayers at their bedside in the upper story, and Terry was in the act of lighting his pipe when the shock came. The husband and wife might have escaped by dashing out of the door and fleeing, but neither thought for an instant of doing so. Both would have preferred to perish rather than abandon the innocent ones above them.
Calling to his wife to follow, Terry bounded up a few steps and dashed to the bedside. At the same instant that he seized one in his arms, his wife caught up the younger.
“Whither shall we go, Terry?” asked the distracted mother, starting to descend the stairs.
“Not there! not there!” he called, “but to the roof!”
By standing on a chair the trap-door was easily reached and the covering thrown back. Then he pushed Maggie through, warning her to hold fast, and the rest would instantly join her.
Next little Katie was passed upward.
“Now,” said Terry, “I will jine the wee spalpeens and thin give ye a lift, Delia.”
The Irishman was a powerful man, and the task thus far was of the easiest character. He drew himself through the door on the roof, and extending one brawny hand to his wife, was in the act of lifting her after him, when a scream from Maggie caused him to loose his hold and look round.
“What’s the matter wid ye, Maggie?” he asked.
“Kate has just rolled off the roof!” was the terrifying reply.
The horror-stricken Terry thought no more about his wife, whom he was in the act of lifting through the trap-door, but let go her hand, allowing her to drop with a crash that shook the whole building.
“Where is the child?” he asked, facing the elder daughter.
“Yonder; I was trying to hold her when she slipped away and rolled down the slope of the roof—”
But the father waited to hear no more. Just then the cry of his baby reached his ear, and he caught a glimpse of the white clothing which helped to buoy her up. Like an athlete, running along a spring-board to gather momentum for his tremendous leap, he took a couple of steps down the incline of the roof to the edge, from which he made a tremendous bound far out in the muddy torrent.
It was the energy of desperation and the delirium of paternal affection itself which carried him for a long way over the water, so that when he struck, one extended arm seized the shoulder of his child, while the other sustained both from sinking.
Poor Katie, who had been gasping for breath, now began crying, and the sound was welcome to the parent, for it proved that she was alive. Had she been quiet he would have believed she was drowned.
The trees which grew so thickly in the little valley served another good purpose in addition to that already named. The most powerful swimmer that ever lived could not make headway against such a torrent, nor indeed hold his own for a moment.
Terry would have been quickly swept beyond sight and sound of the rest of his family had he not grasped a strong, protruding limb by which he checked his progress.
“Are ye there, Terry?”
It was his wife who called. She had heard the frenzied cry of the elder girl at the moment she went downward herself with such a resounding crash. She was as frantic as her husband, and did that which would have been impossible at any other time. Grasping the sides of the trap-door, she drew herself upward and through with as much deftness as her husband a few minutes before. She asked the agonized question at the moment her head and shoulders appeared above the roof.
“Yis, I’m here, Delia,” he called back, “and Katie is wid me.”
“Hiven be praised!” was the fervent response of the wife; “I don’t care now if the owld shanty is knocked into smithereens.”
The speech was worthy of an Irishwoman, who never thought of her own inevitable fate in case the catastrophe named should overtake her dwelling while she was on the roof. She could dimly discern the figures of her husband and child, as the former clung to the friendly limb.
“If yer faat are risting so gintaaly on the ground,” said the wife, who supposed for the moment he was standing on the earth and grasping the branch to steady himself, “why doesn’t ye walk forward and jine us?”
“If my faat are risting on the ground!” repeated Terry: “and if I were doing the same, I would be as tall as a maating-house wid the staaple thrown in.”
“Thin would ye loike to have us join ye?” persisted the wife.
“Arrah, Delia, now are ye gone clean crazy, that ye talks in that style? Stay where ye be, and I would be thankful if I could get back to ye, which the same I can’t do.”
The wife had been so flustered that her questions were a little mixed, but by the time she was fairly seated on the roof, with one arm encircling Maggie, who clung, frightened and crying, to her, she began to realize her situation.
“Terry,” she called again, “are ye not comfortable?”
“Wal, yis,” replied the fellow, whose waggery must show itself, now that he believed the entire family were safe from the flood, “I faals as comfortable, thank ye, as if I was standing on me head on the top of a barber’s pole. How is it wid yerself, me jewel?”
“I’m thankful for the blissing of our lives; but why don’t ye climb into the traa and take a seat?”
“I will do so in a few minutes.”
There was good ground for this promise. Although Terry had been sustaining himself only a brief while, he felt the water rising so rapidly that the crown of his head, which was several inches below the supporting limb, quickly touched it, and as he shifted his position slightly it ascended still farther. While sustaining his child he could not lift both over the branch, but, with the help of the current, would soon be able to do so.
Requesting his wife to hold her peace for the moment, he seized the opportunity the instant it presented itself, and with comparatively little outlay of strength, placed himself astride the branch. This was all well enough, provided the flood did not keep on ascending, but it was doing that very thing, and his perch must speedily become untenable.
His refuge, however, was a sturdy oak, whose top was fully twenty feet above him, and, like its kind, was abundantly supplied with strong branches, so near each other that it was not difficult for the father to climb to a safe point, where he was confident the furious waters could never reach him.
Having seated himself in a better position than before, he surveyed his surroundings with some degree of composure.
“Delia,” he called, “I obsarve ye are there yit.”
“I’m thankful that yer words are the thruth, and if ye kaap on climbing ye’ll be in the clouds by morning.”
Now, while the rising torrent had proven of great assistance in one way to Terry and his infant child, it threatened a still graver peril to the mother and Maggie, who remained on the roof.
The house, being of wood, was liable to be lifted from its foundations and carried in sections down-stream. In that event it would seem that nothing could save the couple from immediate drowning.
Neither the husband nor wife thought of this calamity until she called out, under the stress of her new fear:
“Terry, the owld building can’t stand this.”
“What do ye maan, me darling?”
“I faal it moving under me as though its getting onaisy—oh! we’re afloat!”
The exclamation was true. The little structure, after resisting the giant tugging at it as though it were a sentient thing, yielded when it could hold out no longer. It popped up a foot or two like a cork, as if to recover its gravity, and the next moment started down the torrent.
It was at this juncture that Terry uttered the despairing cry which brought Dick Halliard and Jim McGovern hurrying to the spot on the shore directly opposite.
But unexpected good fortune attended the shifting of the little building from its foundations. Swinging partly around, it drifted against the tree in which Terry had taken refuge with his child. His wife and Maggie were so near that he could touch them with his outstretched hand.
“Climb into the limbs,” he said, “for the owld shebang will soon go to pieces.”
He could give little help, since he had to keep one arm about Katie, but the wife was cool and collected, now that she fully comprehended her danger. The projecting limbs were within convenient reach, and it took her but a minute or two to ensconce herself beside her husband and other child.
Quick as was the action it was not a moment too soon, for she was hardly on her perch and safely established by the side of all that was dear to her when the house broke into a dozen fragments, the roof itself disintegrating, and every portion quickly vanished among the tree-tops in the darkness.
“Helloa, Terry, are you alive?” called Dick Halliard.
“We’re all alive, Hiven be praised!” replied the Irishman, “and are roosting among the tree-tops.”
“It will be all right with you then,” was the cheery response, “for I don’t think the flood will rise any higher.”
“Little odds if it does, for we haven’t raiched the top story of our new risidence yit.”
Just then a dark object struck the ground at the feet of the boys, swinging around like a log of wood. Seeing what it was, Dick Halliard stooped down and drew it out of the current.
“What is it?” asked McGovern, in a whisper, seeing as he spoke that it was a human body. “Great Heavens! it is Tom Wagstaff!”
“So it is,” replied Dick, “and he is dead.”
“And so is Bobb Budd!”
It was a shocking sight, and for a minute or two Dick Halliard and Jim McGovern did not speak.
Tom Wagstaff had been cut off in the beginning of his lawless career, and his dead body lay at the feet of his former companion in wrong-doing, with whom he had exchanged coarse jests but a short while before.
It was as McGovern declared, and as the reader has learned. When the Piketon Rangers heard the rush of the flood, each broke from the tent, thinking only of his own safety, which was just as well, since neither could offer the slightest aid to the others.
We have shown by what an exceedingly narrow chance McGovern eluded the torrent. But for the hand of Dick Halliard, extended a second time to save him from drowning, he would have shared the fate of Wagstaff. The particulars of the latter’s death were never fully established. He probably fled in the same general direction as McGovern, without leading or following in his footsteps, since his body was carried to the same shore upon which McGovern emerged. His struggles most likely were similar, but, singularly enough, he knew nothing about swimming, which, after all, could have been of no benefit to him, and he perished as did the thousands who went down in the Johnstown flood.
Terry Hurley overheard the exclamation of McGovern, the roar of the torrent having greatly subsided, and he called out to know the cause. Dick explained, and the sympathetic Irishman instantly quelled the disposition to joke that he had felt a short time before.
The boys were not slow in observing that the water was falling. When they first laid down the body the current almost touched their feet. In a short while it was a considerable distance away.
“I believe he was an old friend of yours,” said Dick, addressing his companion, who was deeply affected by the event.
“Yes,” replied McGovern; “him and me run away from home together.”
“Why did you do that?”
“Because Satan got into us; we both have good homes and kind parents, but we played truant, stole, fought, and did everything bad. Bob Budd came down to New York some time ago, and we made his acquaintance; we were fellows after one another’s heart, and we took to each other right off. We showed Bob around the city, and then he made us promise to come out and visit him. It was his idea to form the Piketon Rangers.”
“I don’t know as there was anything wrong in that,” said Dick, who felt for the grief of his companion and was awed by the fate that had overtaken the others; “camping out is well enough in its way, and I would do it myself if I had the chance.”
“It isn’t that which I mean; it’s the way we have been going on since we have been together. I daresn’t tell you all the bad we did, Dick Halliard.”
“Never mind; don’t think of it.”
“I am going home as soon as I can; this will break up Tom’s folks, for they thought all the world of him.”
“It is bad,” said Dick, who saw how idle it was to try to minify the dreadful incidents; “but sad as it is, it will not be entirely lost if you do not forget it.”
“Forget it!” repeated McGovern, looking reproachfully in his face; “it will haunt me as long as I live.”
“I have been told that people often feel that way when great sorrow overtakes them; but,” added Dick, seeing his companion was grieved by his words, “I do not believe it will be so with you.”
“I have run away from home before, but I think this was a little the worst, for my father had everything arranged to send me to college, and I know his heart is well-nigh broken.”
“Not so far but that you can mend it by doing what you say you mean to do,” said Dick, thinking it wise to emphasize the truth already spoken.
McGovern made no reply, but stood for a minute as if in deep thought. Dick was watching him closely and saw him look down at the inanimate form at his feet. He sighed several times, and then glancing up quickly, said in an eager voice:
“Dick Hilliard, I wish I was like you.”
The words sounded strange from one who had been so reckless of all that was right, but never was an utterance more sincere—it came directly from the heart.
“Don’t take me for a model, for you can be a great deal better than I; you tell me you have good parents; all you have to do is to obey them.”
“You seem to doubt my keeping the pledge,” said McGovern, looking with curious fixidity in the countenance of Dick.
“I believe you are in earnest now, but what I fear is that you have become so accustomed to your wild life that you will forget this lesson.”
“Well,” sighed the stricken youth, “that must remain to be tested; all that I can now do is to ask you to suspend judgment, as they say.”
“You can give me your hand on it, Jim.”
It was a strange sight, when the two boys clasped hands on the bank of the subsiding flood, with the lifeless body at their feet, and one of them uttered his solemn promise that from that hour he would strive to follow the right path and shun the wrong one.
But that pledge, uttered years ago, remains unbroken to this day.
Dick Halliard was thrilled by the scene, which will always remain vivid in his memory. Despite the sorrowful surroundings a singular pleasure crept through his being, for conscience whispered that he had done a good deed in thus exhorting the wayward youth, and that it was on record in the great book above.
It was not the impressiveness of that silent form that so wrought upon the feelings of the youths, but the recollection of the missing one, whose body they believed was whirling about in the fierce currents of the torrent that was speedily exhausting itself in the deeper parts of the valley, or perhaps was lodged somewhere in the lower limbs of a tree, awaiting the morning for the shocked friends to claim it.
Considerable time had passed since the bursting of the dam, and the news of the calamity spread rapidly. People began flocking hither from the neighborhood, and before long there were arrivals from Piketon itself. These gathered at the scene of destruction and viewed it with bated breath. Some brought lanterns, but the broad space where the waters had reposed for so many years was clearly shown in the moonlight and made a striking sight.
The striking feature about the calamity, which, as we have stated, was never satisfactorily explained, was that the dam, which looked strong enough to resist tenfold the pressure, had not yielded in a single spot, as would be supposed, but had been carried away almost bodily. That is to say, three-fourths of the structure was gone, its foundations being on a level with the bottom of the pond in the immediate vicinity.
Perhaps the most probable explanation of the accident was that offered by an old fisherman, to the effect that muskrats had burrowed under and through the dam until it had been so weakened throughout most of its extent that when a giving way began at one point it was like knocking the keystone from an arch. Its results resembled those often shown by the explosion of a steam boiler, when only a few fragments remain to show what it once has been.
Before long a party reached the place where Dick and Jim were standing by the dead body of Wagstaff. When it was proposed to remove it the suggestion was made that it should not be disturbed until the arrival of the coroner, who could be called by morning to view the body. This practice, as the reader doubtless knows, prevails in nearly every portion of the country, and was adopted in the instance named.
Meanwhile Terry Hurley and his family, perched among the branches of the trees, were not forgotten. As soon as the waters subsided sufficiently, parties waded out, and by means of ladders that were quickly brought, soon placed the homeless ones safely on terra firma.
The haste of the flight had prevented the couple from doing much in the way of bringing needed garments, and the children, who were in their night clothes, suffered considerably. But they were now in the hands of good friends, who did everything possible. They were looked after, and it is a pleasure to say that no serious consequences followed.
Captain Jim Budd, the indulgent uncle of Bob, happened to be away from Piketon on the night of the great accident, but was expected back in the morning. Fortunately no one was so thoughtless as to hasten to Aunt Ruth with the news of her nephew’s death, and therein she was more favored than most people placed in her sad situation.
Dick Halliard made his employer his confidant as far as was necessary concerning Jim McGovern. The good-hearted merchant took hold of the matter at once.
Having obtained from McGovern the address of Wagstaff’s parents, word was telegraphed them and their wishes asked as to the disposition of their son’s remains. The father appeared that afternoon, and with the permission of the coroner took charge of them.
Mr. Wagstaff proved to be a man of good sense and judgment. He told Mr. Hunter that his life purpose had been to educate and bring up his five children, with every advantage they could require. He and his wife had set their hearts on preparing Jim for the ministry, but his wayward tendencies developed at an early age. He was the only one of the family to cause the parents anxiety, and he brought them enough sorrow for all.
This parent was one of those rare ones who saw his children as other people saw them. His boy had been as bad as he could be, and though the youngest of the three, no excuse was offered for him on that account.
“He has sown the wind and reaped the whirlwind,” remarked the father; “he chose the wrong path instead of the right, and no one is blamable beside himself.”
Mr. Wagstaff manifested deep interest in young McGovern, when he learned what the young man had said to Dick Halliard. His father was a prominent lawyer in New York, who had cherished the same hopes for his son as he, but he would not be controlled, and he, too, had run off to seek forbidden pleasures.
But the caller was touched by what he had heard as to the youth’s change of feelings. He sought him out, and was pleased with his talk. The same train which bore the remains of Wagstaff to New York carried also Jim McGovern on his way to join his parents who had known nothing of him for days.
There were hopes until the following morning that Bob Budd might have escaped the flood. The fact that one of the Piketon Rangers had managed with help to extricate himself gave slight grounds for belief that a second had been equally fortunate.
This hope grew less and less as the night passed, and the people wandering up and down the valley, hallooing and calling the name of Bob, received no response. Only a few retained the slightest expectation of ever seeing him again.
Long before morning broke the flood had spent its force. Such a vast outlet as the sweeping away of most of the bank was like the sliding doors which admit passengers to the ferryboat. It was of such extent that the supply quickly ran out.
In the middle of the valley, where the whole force of the torrent was felt, large trees had been uprooted and hurled forward with a momentum which helped to uproot others in turn.
The prodigious power rapidly diminished as the ground rose on either side, until it was seen that the trunks were able to hold their own. There was considerable dislocation of vegetation, so to speak, but nothing to be compared to that in the middle of the valley.
The sheet of water had been plentifully stocked with fish, which were now scattered everywhere along the valley, napping in little pools of water as they did on the muddy bottom of the pond itself. It was a veritable picnic for the small boys.
Captain Jim Budd was on the ground as soon after he heard of the loss of Bob as he could reach the place. He was thoughtful enough to arrange matters so that his wife should learn nothing of the occurrence until his return. He placed a trusted friend on guard to keep busy mongers from her.
Captain Jim was the contrast of Mr. Wagstaff as regarded the youth in whom he was interested. He proclaimed to every one that Bob was not only the brightest, but the best principled boy in Piketon and the neighborhood. Had he lived he would have made his mark in the law or ministry or whatever profession he chose to honor with his attention. He had always been truthful, honest, and obedient, and his loss was in the nature of a general calamity.
It seems incredible that a man of sense should talk in this fashion, and not only utter such words, but believe them. The reader, however, who has heard other parents talk, can credit the statement that such was the fact.
The first thing that Captain Jim did, after learning the facts, was to offer a reward of one thousand dollars for the recovery of the body of his nephew. No doubt, he said, the whole neighborhood would insist on attending his remains to the grave, that they might render a fitting tribute to one thus cut off in the prime of his promising young manhood. The Captain, therefore, felt it his duty to defer to so proper a desire. He would erect a monument over the remains, to which parents might impressively point, as they urged their offspring to emulate the virtues of Robert Budd.
The large reward offered for the recovery of the body resulted in the employment of fully a hundred and sometimes more people, who roamed up and down the narrow valley through which the flood had swept from early morning until darkness forced a cessation of the search.
Some three miles below the bursted dam the valley widened to fully double its width. There naturally the current expanded and lost the tremendous power displayed above. Most of this portion, like the rest, was covered with trees, so that places innumerable existed where a body might be hidden, thus making it almost impossible to find it unless by a fortunate accident.
The surprise was general that the search should be prosecuted so long and so thoroughly without result. It seemed that every foot of ground had been covered and no spot left unvisited. The bushy tops of trees, prostrate trunks, timbers, undergrowth, shrubbery, rifts of leaves, and, indeed, everything that looked as if it could hide a body as large as a dog were examined again and again, but without the slightest success.
An excitement was roused by the report, the second day after the search had been instituted, that the body had been recovered, but it proved to be the remains of a heifer that was unfortunately caught in the swirl and was unable to save herself.
Gradually the belief spread that Bob Budd’s remains would never be found, and most of the searchers gave up the task. A few, prompted by the promise of a still larger reward, kept at it, hoping that some lucky chance might give them the opportunity to earn more money than they could do otherwise in several years.
The disappointment was a sorrowful one to Captain Jim Budd and his wife Ruth, the news having been broken to the latter. They could not reconcile themselves to the thought that their beloved nephew should be denied the last rites that were paid to the humblest individual; and while all knew the character of the missing young man, they deeply pitied his relatives.
Dick Halliard returned to his duties in the store of Mr. Hunter more thoughtful than ever before. He was grateful that McGovern had shown so strong a resolution of reforming his life and turning from his evil ways, but it was shocking to recall that Wagstaff and Bob Budd were placed beyond the power of undoing the evil they had committed.
Bob, as we have shown, was a native of Piketon, and had spent most of his life there. He was an only son, who was left a considerable fortune by his father, who appointed Uncle Jim Budd his guardian. This old gentleman, though he sometimes flared up and threatened Bob because of his extravagance and waywardness, was foolishly indulgent. Whatever firmness he might have shown at times in dealing with his nephew was spoiled by his wife, who refused the young man nothing that was in her power to grant. Bob was not naturally vicious, and his relatives were largely responsible for his going wrong.
One cause for deep satisfaction on the part of Dick was the wonderful proof of the truth of the words spoken by Dr. Armstrong, when the youth summoned him hastily to the bedside of his parent. From that evening there was a marked improvement in his condition, and his convalescence was steady until, in the course of a few months, he was completely restored to health and vigor.
After thinking over the question for a day or two, Dick decided to tell his parents everything. They had learned of what had occurred, and he believed it would be a pleasure to them to be told that one result of the blow was the reformation of McGovern.
Such was the fact, but the greatest happiness that could come to the father and mother was that of learning the nobility of their boy, who had conducted himself so admirably through more than one crisis, more trying than most youths older than he are ever called upon to face.
Matters stood thus at the end of a week after the flood, when Dick Halliard was surprised by the reception of a letter from New York. He did not recognize the handwriting, and broke the seal with no little curiosity. A glance at the bottom of the page showed the name of Jim McGovern as the writer.
“My dear Dick,” he said, after giving the particulars of the funeral over the remains of Wagstaff, “I can never tell you how deeply grateful I am to you; I am not one of those who gush, and will not say more except to repeat a remark which my father made when I had told him all. ‘There is no earthly honor,’ said he, ‘which could be given me, that I would not surrender for the sake of having a son like Richard Halliard.’ Considered strictly as a compliment, I think you will admit, Dick, that that has some weight. I know your modesty, but I must beg you as a favor to me to read all my letter up to this point, when you must stop, for here comes something which is a secret for the present between you and me. You will not give a hint of it to any one.
“Come to think, however, there is no secret that I’m going to reveal in the letter, but I will tell you the next time we meet that will make your hair lift your hat. I want you to get permission right away from Mr. Hunter to come to New York for a couple of days. Telegraph me what time you will reach here, and I will meet you at the station and take you home. If anything should happen to prevent my being there on time come to No. — Madison Avenue, give your name, and wait for me. My folks will be delighted to receive you, and you will not be kept long waiting.
“I have arranged to enter Yale at the next term. I shall need to brush up in my studies, but I’m confident I’ll get there all the same, if you’ll excuse a little slang which still clings to me. But above all things, come to New York as soon as you can. I promise you will not regret it.”
As may be supposed, Dick Halliard found more than one cause for surprise in this letter. The first was the fact that the writer possessed a much better education than he suspected. The composition was not only correct as regards grammar, punctuation, and spelling, but the statement of his decision to enter Yale College showed the advantages the youth had received, and which were far superior to what would be supposed by one who heard McGovern discourse when a member of the Piketon Rangers.
But Dick was shrewd, and, although he respected the request of the writer that nothing should be revealed about the letter, he suspected the nature of the “secret” to which he referred in such strong language.
“Jim is in the flush of a mistaken sense of gratitude to me,” he said to himself, “and he has persuaded his father to feel very much the same way. They want to get me down there to their home, that they may all see and tell me how thankful they are, and perhaps they mean to make me a present of some kind. I don’t think I’ll go.”
Nothing could be more distasteful to young Halliard than a proceeding of the kind he had in mind. It is no misstatement to say that he would have preferred to receive personal chastisement to that of being made a lion of by any one.
And yet he disliked to disappoint Jim, who was so strenuous in his invitation. He would be grieved and repeat it more urgently than before until further refusal would offend him.
“I’ll go!” finally concluded the youth, “but I will give Jim to understand from the beginning that, if he attempts to show me off or to tell others anything about me, or tries to force a testimonial on me, I will take the next train home and forever afterward keep him at arm’s length.”
With this resolution in his mind, he went to Mr. Hunter’s private office and asked him whether he could be spared from the store a couple of days.
“We should miss you at any time,” said the genial merchant, resting his hand affectionately on his shoulder; “but there is no request that Richard Halliard can make of me which I will not cheerfully grant if it is in my power to do so. Yes, take a couple of days off, and a week if you wish, and may you have as good a time as you deserve, young man.”
Dick blushed under this warm compliment, and, thanking his employer, went home, where he told his parents of McGovern’s request, and secured their consent to his departure.
Jim met him at the station with a carriage, and drove him hurriedly homeward. After the warm greeting Dick wanted to warn him about the lion and testimonial business, but reflected that it would be in bad taste, since it was possible that Jim held no such intentions. In that event he would resemble the politician who declines the honor that has never been offered him.
McGovern seemed restless and uneasy on the way, often forcing an unnatural gayety, which did not deceive his friend, of whom he showed such extreme fondness.
Dick admired the handsome residence before which the carriage halted, and it was with considerable awe that he followed Jim up the broad stone steps, and was ushered into his father’s library. McGovern showed commendable taste in not presenting his visitor to the members of the household immediately on his arrival.
“But I have a friend in the library,” he said, as he led the way thither, “that I think you will be glad to meet.”
A young man rose to his feet, and came briskly forward.
“How are you, Dick?”
“Heaven save me!” gasped Dick Halliard, in amazement, recognizing the smiling youth as no other than Bob Budd himself!