"Who is it?" he asked.

"Me--Koku," was the answer.

"Well, what do you want, Koku?"

"Man here say him must see Master."

Tom and Ned looked at each other, suspicion in their eyes.

"Maybe it's that spy again," whispered Ned.

"If it is, we'll be ready for him," murmured his chum. "Show him in,
Koku, and you come in too."

But the man who entered at once disarmed suspicion. He was evidently a
workman from the dam above, and his manner was strangely excited.

"You folks had better get out of here!" he exclaimed.

"Why?" asked Tom, wondering what was going to happen.

"Why? Because our dam is going to burst within a few hours. I've been
sent to warn the folks in town in time to let them take to the hills.
You'd better move your outfit. The dam can't last twenty-four hours
longer!"

CHAPTER XVII

THE BURSTING DAM

"Bless my fountain pen!" exclaimed Mr. Damon. "You don't mean it!"

"I sure do!" went on the man who had brought the startling news. "And
the folks down below aren't going to have any more time than they need
to get out of the way. They'll have to lose some of their goods, I
reckon. But I thought I'd stop on my way down and warn you. You'd
better be getting a hustle on."

"It's very kind of you," spoke Torn; "but I don't fancy we are in any
danger."

"No danger!" cried the man. "Say, when that water begins to sweep-down
here nothing on earth can stop it. That big gun of yours, heavy as it
is, will be swept away like a straw, I know--I saw the Johnstown flood!"

"But we're so high up on the side of the hill, that the water won't
come here," put in Ned. "We had that all figured out when we heard the
dam was weak. We're not in any danger; do you think so, Tom?"

"Well, I hardly do, or I would not have set the gun where I did. Tell
me," he went on to the man, "is there any way of opening the dam, to
let the water out gradually?"

"There is, but the openings are not enough with such a flood as this.
The engineers never counted on so much rain. It's beyond any they ever
had here. You see, there was a small creek that we dammed up to make
our lake. Some of the water from the spillway flows into that now, but
its channel won't hold a hundredth part of the flood if the dam goes
out.

"You'd better move, I tell you. The dam is slowly weakening. We've
done all we can to save it, but that's out of the question. The only
thing to do is to run while there's time. We've tried to make
a