o rain as hard as ever, while
the sky remained dark and the wind blew with more or less violence.
Time and again Dave went to the cabin door, to peer out into the
storm, but each time he turned back disappointed. His chums were not
yet in sight.

"They'll be surprised to see me," he thought. "I wonder if they will
listen to reason and go back with me? Supposing they refuse to return?
I'd hate to go back alone."

Then he questioned Jerry Blutt about the dam above the Falls. The man
shrugged his shoulders.

"It ain't safe, so they tell me," he said. "But it's been that way a
long time, so maybe it won't break away yet awhile. But I'd hate to be
on the river when she does go."

"Are there any other camps on this island?" went on our hero.

"Not now. There was some other folks, two or three parties, I was
told, but they all moved out yesterday an' the day before. Maybe they
got afraid o' the dam," concluded the camp-worker.

CHAPTER XXIV

OUT IN THE STORM

"This is getting to be something fierce!"

It was Dave who uttered the words, about five o'clock in the
afternoon. He was looking out of the door of the cabin, and beside him
stood Jerry Blutt.

The storm had kept up without intermission, the rain coming down in a
perfect torrent, and the wind blowing in fitful gusts from the east.
It was raw and depressing, and our hero could not help but shiver as
he looked out on the turbulent waters of the river.

"It's a pity them fellers ain't got back," said the camp-worker, with
a slow shake of his head. "It ain't nice to be out in sech a downpour
as this, an' with sech a wind! Might a tree blow down on 'em!" And he
shook his head again.

Dave was even more distressed than the man. He could not get that dam
out of his mind. Such a heavy fall of rain would certainly cause a
great flow of water, and if the structure was weak, most anything bad
was liable to happen.

"As soon as the boys get back I'll urge them to leave here," he told
himself. "If that dam breaks we want to be on high ground, where the
flood can't reach us."

"'Pears to me like the river was gittin' putty high," remarked Jerry
Blutt, a little later, as he watched the water in the cove closely.

"Well, it would rise some with all this rain coming down," returned
Dave.

"So it might,--but I don't know. I wish this camp was on the shore,
instid o' this island."

"So do I," answered Dave, bluntly.

A fire had been started in the stove an