full of tossing branches, came rushing down the
gorge, as if in chase of our enemies, and before I had more than time to
realise the danger, the water had leaped by us, swelling almost to our
place of refuge, and where, a minute before, there had been a rocky
shelf--the path along which we had come--there was now the furious
torrent tearing along at racing speed.

I turned aghast to the doctor, and then made as if to run, expecting
that the next moment we should be swept away; but he caught me by the
arm with a grip like iron.

"Stand still," he roared, with his lips to my ear. "The storm--high up
the mountains--flood--the gorge."

Just then there was another crashing peal of thunder, close upon a flash
of lightning, and the hissing rain ceased as if by magic, while the sky
began to grow lighter. The dull boom of the tremendous wave had passed
too, but the river hissed and roared as it tore along beneath our feet,
and it was plain to see that it was rising higher still.

The noise was not so great though, now, that we could not talk, and
after recovering from the appalling shock of the new danger we had time
to look around.

Our first thought was of our enemies, and we gazed excitedly down the
gorge and then at each other, Jack Penny shuddering and turning away his
head, while I felt a cold chill of horror as I fully realised the fact
that they had been completely swept away.

There could not be a moment's doubt of that, for the ware spread from
rocky wall to rocky wall, and dashed along at frightful speed.

We had only escaped a similar fate through being on the summit, so to
speak, of the rocky path; but though for the moment safe, we could not
tell for how long; while on taking a hasty glance at our position it was
this: overhead the shelving rock quite impassable; to left, to right,
and in front, the swollen, rushing torrent.

The doctor stood looking down at the water for a few moments, and then
turned to me.

"How high above the surface of the water were we, do you think, when we
came here?"

"I should say about twenty-five feet?"

"Why, we ain't four foot above it now; and--look there! it's a rising
fast. I say, Joe Carstairs, if I'd known we were going to be drowned I
wouldn't have come."

"Are you sure it is rising?" said the doctor, bending down to examine
the level--an example I followed--to see crack and crevice gradually
fill and point after point covered by the seething water, which crep