river was all of thirty feet below, and just there
the water looked unusually unpleasant, because it had considerable foam
on the surface, there being a shallow rift above the wider stretch.

By the merest accident in the world, Tubby's clutching hands had
succeeded in fastening upon a loose steel stay that hung downward for
ten feet. It must have given the fat boy a considerable wrench when he
gripped this, but he had clung with the tenacity of despair.

When Rob turned around, the first thing he saw was Merritt kneeling
there on the violently agitated girder over which they were making their
crossing. He was staring downward, and, of course, Rob instantly focused
his gaze in the same quarter.

He had expected to see Tubby splashing about like a porpoise in the
stream far down below; but, instead, was astonished to discover him
clinging desperately to that loose piece of steel wreckage.

Tubby had his face turned up toward his chums. There was not a particle
of the rosy color to be seen that as a rule dyed his ample face; in
fact, he was as white as a ghost. A beseeching look was in his eyes.
Tubby knew that swinging there he was in a serious predicament, from
which there would be only one escape if he were left to his own devices.
That would mean he must release his frantic clutch on the swaying steel
rope, and drop down into the river, a possibility he shuddered to
contemplate.

"Hey! get me up out of this, fellows, can't you?" he whined, for, after
his recent gymnastic efforts, he no longer had sufficient breath to
shout.

"Clasp your legs around the thing, can't you, Tubby?" said Rob, who saw
that the strain on the other's arms must be tremendous, judging from the
way he was hanging there.

The advice struck Tubby as well worth following; so he immediately began
to work his short legs violently until he found that he could, as Rob
suggested, twist them around his slender support.

When that had been accomplished it was much easier for him. He began to
suck in some encouragement once more.

"But won't you try and get me up again, Rob?" he asked piteously. "I
can't hang on here for very long, like a regular old pendulum to a
clock. I'm not wound up for a seven-day-goer. And say, I'd hate to have
to drop kerplunk into all that water down there. Think up some way to
grab me out of this, won't you, Rob?"

"I'm trying to, Tubby. Keep still a bit, and let me think," he was told.

In one way, of course, it was