he water poured faster and faster from the ceiling.

We looked at each other and turned pale, and Noel said:

"Hadn't we better call Mrs. Pettigrew?"

But Oswald simply couldn't consent to this. He could not get rid of the
feeling that this was our fault somehow for meddling with the river,
though of course the clear star of reason told him it could not possibly
be the case.

We all devoted ourselves, heart and soul, to the work before us. We put
the bath under the worst and wettest place, and the jugs and basins
under lesser streams, and we moved the beds away to the dry end of the
room. Ours is a long attic that runs right across the house.

But the water kept coming in worse and worse. Our night-shirts were wet
through, so we got into our other shirts and knickerbockers, but
preserved bareness in our feet. And the floor kept on being half an inch
deep in water, however much we mopped it up.

We emptied the basins out of the window as fast as they filled, and we
baled the bath with a jug without pausing to complain how hard the work
was. All the same, it was more exciting than you can think. But in
Oswald's dauntless breast he began to see that they would _have_ to call
Mrs. Pettigrew.

A new water-fall broke out between the fire-grate and the mantel-piece,
and spread in devastating floods. Oswald is full of ingenious devices. I
think I have said this before, but it is quite true; and perhaps even
truer this time than it was last time I said it.

He got a board out of the box-room next door, and rested one end in the
chink between the fire-place and the mantel-piece, and laid the other
end on the back of a chair, then we stuffed the rest of the chink with
our nightgowns, and laid a towel along the plank, and behold, a noble
stream poured over the end of the board right into the bath we put there
ready. It was like Niagara, only not so round in shape. The first lot of
water that came down the chimney was very dirty. The wind whistled
outside. Noel said, "If it's pipes burst, and not the rain, it will be
nice for the water-rates." Perhaps it was only natural after this for
Denny to begin with his everlasting poetry. He stopped mopping up the
water to say:

"By this the storm grew loud apace,
The water-rates were shrieking,
And in the howl of Heaven each face
Grew black as they were speaking."

Our faces were black, and our hands too, but we did not take any notice;
we only told him not t