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Ebook has 1773 lines and 70355 words, and 36 pages

THE BOY WITH THE U. S. WEATHER MEN

ADRIFT ON THE FLOODED RIVER

"What is it, Rex, old boy? What are you after? Somebody else in trouble, eh?"

Ross looked down through the pouring rain at his Airedale, who was pulling at his trouser leg with sharp, determined jerks. The dog looked far more like a seal than a terrier, his hair dripping water at every point, while a cascade streamed from his tail. The boy was every whit as wet. Here and there, through the slanting lines of rain, could be seen the smoky gleams of camp-fires, around which, shivering, gathered the hundreds of people who had been rendered homeless by the flooded Mississippi.

The lad turned to his father, who was bandaging a child's wrist, which had been broken during the work of rescue.

"Go ahead, then, son," his father agreed, "the dog's got sense enough for a dozen. Watch out for yourself, though, and don't get foolhardy," he added warningly, as the lad disappeared in the darkness; "you've got to be right careful when the Mississippi's in flood."

"I'll watch out," Ross answered reassuringly, as he started off with the dog, and, a moment later, the glow of the camp-fire was blotted out in the falling rain.

"This is your hike, Rex," announced the lad; "you lead and I'll follow."

The Airedale cocked up one ear on hearing his young master's voice, then, putting his head knowingly on one side, as if he understood every word that had been said, he trotted to the front and splashed through the pools of mud and water, his stump of a tail wagging with evident satisfaction.

Ross was used to all kinds of weather, but a downpour such as this he had never seen before. The rain fell steadily and relentlessly, with never a pause between. The night was too dark to see clearly, as the sheets of water were swept before the wind, but their force was terrific. Several times the boy had to turn his back to the driving storm and gasp, in order to get his breath.

"Where are you going, old boy?" again queried Ross.

The terrier paused, shook himself so that the drops flew in all directions, looked up in his master's face, gave a short sharp bark and trotted on.

Suddenly the dog stopped and looked back as though for guidance. Before them was a swirl of water. In the darkness it was impossible to say how deep the wash-out might be, or how wide. Ross hesitated. His father had warned him against foolhardiness, and here he was facing the crossing of a swift current of unknown depth on a pitch-black night. Should he venture?

Rex barked, a short excited "yap" of urgency.

"I'll go as far as I can wade, anyhow," said Ross in response; "maybe it isn't so deep after all. I'm not particularly anxious to have to swim."

The terrier watched his master, and as soon as the boy started to cross the wash-out in the road-bed, the dog plunged in. The current swept him down rapidly, but Rex was a powerful swimmer and the lad had little fear for him. It took all his own strength to keep him from being swept off his feet, but the break in the road was not more than six yards across, and the boy was soon safe on the other side. He whistled shrilly and a moment or two later, Rex came bounding up and jumped on his master with clumsy delight. Then, with another cock of his head, as though to make sure of himself, he took up his position in front of the lad and trotted ahead.

How it rained! The water had gone down Ross's neck and inside his shoes, so that they sloshed and gurgled with each step. Little rills of water trickled coldly down his back and legs. The wind was dropping, so that the rain drove less in slanting sheets, but it seemed to pelt down all the more heavily for that. Even in the darkness, Ross could see the plops, where the drops fell, standing up from the surface of the flooded water like so many spiny warts. It was lonely, even with Rex for company, so dark and so wet was the night, and Ross was glad when the glow of a fire in the distance told him that he was approaching an encampment, probably, he thought, that of another group of settlers who had been driven from their flooded houses and were shivering, homeless, in the night.

When he arrived near enough to take in a full view of the scene, however, he found it very different from what he expected. True, there was a large camp-fire burning, such as the one he had left, and around it were gathered a number of women and children, cold, hungry and wet. A rough, lean-to tent, made of a sheet of tarpaulin, had been stretched in order to try to keep off the worst of the downpour, but no shelter availed.

A few steps farther, on the river bank, was a scene of excitement and commotion. A large gasoline torch flared into the night, defying the efforts of the storm to extinguish it, and by the light of this torch, scores of men were working busily, almost crazily, repairing a cave-in that threatened every moment to make a new break in the levee.

"Who's that? Another man?" rang out a clear, strong voice, as Ross came near. "Good! We need men badly, right now."

"It's me, Mr. Levin," answered the boy promptly, as he recognized the voice, and hurried into the circle of light, "it's me, Ross Planford."

"Howdy, Ross," came the greeting in reply, "all your folks safe?"

"Yes, sir," the boy answered. "It was a narrow shave, though. Rex got us out just in time."

"Good dog, that," was the terse comment. "I always did like Airedales. Well, Ross, it's time you got busy. Bring me a pile of empty bags from Dave's sugar-mill, there."

"Yes, sir," answered the lad, and darted off towards the factory.

Rex followed at his heels, and when, staggering back with his load, Ross dropped one of the empty bags, the terrier picked it up and came trotting after, carrying it in his teeth.

"I dropped one, Mr. Levin," said the boy, "I'll go right back for it."

"You don't need to," replied the Weather Forecaster, "your pup retrieved it for you. See?" and he held up the missing bag.

The engineer in charge of this section of the Mississippi, whose duty it was to guard the artificial banks or "levees" of the river, was working on the main break in the levee, with a huge gang of men. In this crisis, one of the planters, who formerly had been the local Weather Bureau official, had offered to take charge of the new threatened source of danger.

At his request, Ross busied himself for some time in bringing empty bags, which were then filled up with sand and dumped into the cave-in. Being in bags, the washing action of the water could not carry away the sand, and the gradually crumbling bank again was made firm. After a while, however, Ross again felt the dog tugging at his trouser leg and he realized that the mission on which he had started had been forgotten in the excitement of mending the crack in the levee.

"That's right, I was forgetting," said Ross aloud, and he appealed to his friend the Forecaster.

"Mr. Levin," he said, "can you spare me for a bit? I left Father's camp because we thought there was something wrong. Rex kept on tugging at my leg, as though he wanted to lead me somewhere. He's worrying again, now. Do you mind if I go ahead and see?"

"Not a bit," was the hearty answer, "a dog doesn't generally go on like that without some reason of his own. I'll send one of the roustabouts with you, if you like?"

"No, thanks, sir," the lad answered, "if I really need help I'll come back and ask for it. Right now, I just want to find out what it is that's bothering Rex."

"Off with you, then," said the other, kindly, "but go easy. Oh, and Ross!" he added, "if you're going down stream, just keep your eye on the levee, won't you? If you see any signs of trouble, get back on the double-quick. Don't try any of that story-book business about sitting down with your back to a hole in the bank. That sort of thing may be all very well in Holland but it wouldn't work with the Mississippi."

Ross grinned, remembering the story.

"All right, Mr. Levin," he answered, "if I see anything that looks like trouble, I'll come right back and report."

For a short distance down the river, Rex led the boy along the levee, then he branched away from the river bank towards a large stretch of low-lying land. This was familiar territory to Ross, for one of his best chums, a little crippled lad, lived in a house in the hollow.

"I hope Anton got out all right!" suddenly exclaimed Ross, half aloud, as the thought swept over him of the plight in which his chum might have been.

This fear became more poignant when, as Rex reached the path that led up to Anton's house, he turned up it, half trotting and half splashing his way through. Ross followed him closely, breaking into a run himself, as the dog galloped ahead.

There was a slight rise of the ground, near the wood below which lay the house, and from this shallow ridge the rain ran off in muddy gullies that were miniature torrents. This ridge reached, Ross looked down over the hollow toward the house. The entire plantation was a sheet of water, and, in the middle, still stood the house, the water half-way up its first story.

Rex set his forelegs firmly on the ground and barked fiercely, with loud, explosive barks that rang through the storm like the successive discharges from a small cannon.

Then, out of the rain, faintly through the distance, a shout was heard. It sounded like a boy's voice.

"It's Anton!" cried Ross. "He's been left behind! And that house is apt to go to pieces any minute!"

The first thought that sped across his mind, as he peered through the darkness to the dim outlines of the white house, was to hurry back to the Forecaster for help. Even as this thought came to him, however, Ross realized that such action might be of little use. Already the waters of the flood, swirling around the house, undermined it every moment, and it would take a long time to portage a boat all the way from the levee to the hollow, now in the wild sweep of the torrent.

Then Ross remembered that, a couple of years before, when a wet summer had caused a considerable quantity of water to gather in the hollow, forming a small lake, Anton and he, together with the rest of the boys, had built a rough boat. They had played the whole story of "Treasure Island" in this craft, Anton, with his crutch, taking the part of Long John Silver. The boat was a rough affair, as he remembered it, something like an ancient coracle, but it had been water-tight, at least. Perhaps it would be sea-worthy, still. At least, it was worth a trial.

Turning his back on the building that was islanded by the flood, Ross raced as fast as he could to the little block-house on the ridge that the boys had built two years before, near which he hoped to find the boat. Twice he stumbled over a root in the darkness and fell headlong into the mud and water. Still, as he could not be any wetter than he was already and as he did not hurt himself, a few falls were no great matter.

On the ridge, fast to the block-house, to which level the water had not yet reached, Ross found the boat. Moreover, to his great delight, he saw that Anton had been patching it up, so that it was now more serviceable than ever.

It was a different matter, punting this home-made boat around the waters of a pond on a calm summer's day, and striking out with it in a blinding storm across the flooding lowlands of the Mississippi River. Again his father's warning not to be foolhardy, came to Ross's remembrance, and, together with it, the Weather Bureau man's caution. None the less, the boy knew well that his father would never bid him hold back from a piece of work that was dangerous or difficult when life was at stake.

The boat was half full of water from the pouring rain. Ross bailed it out with a cocoanut-shell to which a handle had been affixed, evidently a home-made bailer of Anton's manufacture, and, as soon as it was clear of water, dragged it to the border of the current and launched it. The craft floated crankily, it was true, but it floated, and, so far as the boy could tell, it seemed fairly water-tight.

Jumping out again, Ross swung himself into the water and shoved the boat along beside him. He saw the value of wading as far as possible, for he knew that, as long as his feet were on the bottom, he could govern his direction. To what extent he might be able to stem the current by the use of oars in a boat of that character, he did not know.

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