“Tell me about that, will you!  Was there ever such an indefatigable—­hey, Bluff!  Is that the word I want?—­artist as our meek little pard here?  Sometimes he seems so timid, and then again he shows more nerve than the whole bunch put together.  I thought I knew him to a dot, but I confess I’m puzzled,” grunted Jerry.

“The rain has stopped, fellows,” announced Frank a little later.

“But just look at the river!  Must have been a cloudburst, as they call it out in the Rockies, Mr. Mabie says.  It’s just rising right before our eyes!”

“Then they’ll have to change the camp, because by this time the water must be up to where the tents were pitched.  Why, see there, Frank!  Isn’t that water over yonder, too, on the right of us?” asked Bluff, pointing through the woods.

“As sure as you live, and rushing madly on, too.  We are between two rivers, it seems, with the water rising like a tidal wave.  Perhaps we may have to take to a tree yet, fellows,” announced Frank after a long look.

“H’m!  These trees are sure handy to have around!  We shin up one to avoid all sorts of dangers, it seems to me.  And by the looks of that wall of water coming down on us just now, the sooner we climb, the better for us!” cried Jerry, suiting his actions to his words, and seizing the lower limb of a friendly oak, into which he clambered hastily, followed by his three chums, just as a five-foot wave swept under them, for all the world resembling a “curler” rolling in from the ocean and up the beach.

CHAPTER XXIII

THE STAMPEDE

“What d’ye call this, anyway?” exclaimed Bluff, panting with his exertions.

“I’d say it was crowding the mourners, for these things to chase each other so fast, and the elements to make playthings out of four confiding chums,” said Frank.

“Tell me about that, will you!  First a scorching, then put to soak, after which comes another hot experience, and now treed by a flood!  Upon my word, things are happening a little too rapid even for me,” put in Jerry.

“There!” remarked Will, with a satisfied chuckle.  “I think you three fellows will make a splendid showing, perched along that limb like a lot of crows, and the water rolling along below.”

“Talk to me about the industrious photographer!  If that chap hasn’t taken our pictures in this ridiculous attitude!  Why, they’ll believe we’ve gone back to the old days, when our ancestors used to live in trees.”

“Speak for yourself, Jerry.  I refuse to admit that I am descended from a monkey,” declared Bluff indignantly.

“How long do you suppose we may have to hang out here?” asked Will.

“Oh, a day or so, I suppose,” replied Jerry, keeping a straight face.

“A day or so!  Listen to him say that without a show of feeling!  Why, long before that time elapsed I’d grow so weak from fatigue that I’d have to be strapped to my limb to keep from falling into the treacherous water,” stammered Will.