undering roar of the
never-ending war of the waters at Elbow Rock came louder and more
menacing, but strangely unreal, as if the mist itself were filled with
threatening sound.

But to Judy, the morning was only the beginning of another day;--she
looked, but did not see. To her, the many ever-changing moods of Nature
were without meaning. With her basket in hand, she went down to the
lower end of the garden, where she had dug potatoes the time before, and
where she had left the fork sticking upright in the ground.

A few minutes served to fill the basket; but, before starting back to
the house, the mountain girl paused again to look out over the river.
Perhaps it was some vague memory of Auntie Sue's talk, the night
before, that prompted her; perhaps it was some instinct, indefinite and
obscure;--whatever it was that influenced her, Judy left her basket, and
went to the brink of the high bank above the eddy for a closer view of
the water.

The next instant, with the quick movement of an untamed creature of her
native mountain forests, the girl sprang back, and crouched close to
the ground to hide from something she had seen at the foot of the bank.
Every movement of her twisted body expressed amazement and fear. Her
eyes were wild and excited. She looked carefully about, as if for
dangers that might be hidden in the fog. Once, she opened her mouth as
if to call. Half-rising, she started as if to run to the house. But,
presently, curiosity apparently overruled her fear, and, throwing
herself flat on the ground she wormed her way back to the brink of the
river-bank. Cautiously, without making a sound, she peered through the
tall grass and weeds that fringed the rim above the eddy.

The boat, which some kindly impulse of the river had drawn so gently
aside from the stronger current that would have carried it down the
rapids to the certain destruction waiting at Elbow Rock, still rested
with its bow grounded on the shore, against which the eddying water had
pushed it. But the thing that had so startled Judy was a man who was
lying, apparently unconscious, on the wet and muddy bottom-boards of the
little craft.

Breathlessly, the girl, looking down from the top of the bank, watched
for some movement; but the dirty huddled heap of wretched humanity
was so still that she could not guess whether it was living or dead.
Fearfully, she noted that there were no oars in the boat, nor gun, nor
fishing-tackle of any sort. The ma