The Boy with the U. S. Weather Men | Page 4

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