nd twisting, as if still suffering agonies after
its frightful plunge over those dizzy heights to be rent and torn to
tatters on the rocks below.

Inza's gloved hand crept into Frank's, and he felt it quiver a little in
his grasp.

With a single exception, every one on the car seemed to regard the
falls with interest. Even the motorman and conductor took a look at
them.

The exception was an old man, who wore a long cloak and carried a
crooked cane. His hands rested on the handle of his cane, and his gray
head was bowed on his hands. He did not once look up or turn his face
toward the falls while passing over the bridge. To Frank this seemed
remarkable, but Merry decided that he must be some one who was familiar
with the spectacle and to whom the sight no longer appealed.

Having crossed the bridge, the car turned upward toward the falls, and
at the point where the wonderful horseshoe began they got off.

Approaching the iron railing, they leaned on it and gazed in continued
and increasing wonderment. They were now where they could hear something
of the continuous thunder of the falls, and at intervals a little of the
spray fell in misty rain upon them.

"Oh, see!" breathed Inza, grasping Frank's arm. "Look at the beautiful
rainbow."

In the mist of the American Falls a gorgeous rainbow could be seen.

"I see it," said Frank; but at that moment his eyes were following the
strange old man in the black cloak, who had left the car with them and
was walking toward the very brink of Horseshoe Falls, leaning heavily on
his crooked cane and seeming quite feeble.

"I was wrong about him," thought Merry. "He is interested in the
falls--he is fascinated by them."

The old man pressed forward until he was within the very edge of the
cloud of mist that rose from the depths below. He seemed totally
unconscious of the presence of others in the vicinity. At that point
there was no iron railing, and he leaned forward, planting his cane on
the wet stones beneath his feet, and peered downward, apparently
watching the little steamer, _Maid of the Mist_, which now came swinging
out of the spray at the foot of the American Falls and headed toward the
Canadian side.

"If he should slip there," thought Frank, "it would be all over with him
in a moment. I wonder that he ventures so near."

A sudden feeling of anxiety for the old man possessed him, and he
suggested to Inza that they should move up toward the brink of the
falls.