naMWMHMHH

Kebw Steel

-rngtr

temtorarj (Um Wi'ttoe top of the roafl^ay bore, to turn the flow orer to the (ut bank and make the apIII way do

more work."

“Bat the rain baa atopped.’

1 “And In all TwobaWllty will stay atopped—ati 11 y..u never ran tell, few more bourn of r*lu Uke that we've 1 had and the whole thin? would jro. If ! the water were at With as the top k’d only be two feet of head In the »pfcted aptUway, and that Mat be enough to dlacharge It at

the rate tt*a been cmnlng In.' a." aald Vanueventer "And If the dam goea,'

he added, "there are tan miles of back r Tip there and millions of cubic yards Impounded, which would sweep down the valley. There wouldn't be a thing left of the camp, the town, the new railroad bridge, or anything else.'' “(Joining on top of the International, the toae of this big and expensive viaduct would about finish the Martlet compear," said Meade thoughtlessly. Vrndeventer looked at him sharply. An Idea suddenly come to him. Meade had tur=«d away bis head as he realised his slip, so he did not observe die

FER n—At fflaMT tha ai—m> h jht to Vandeventer's eyes. However,

i »• “*">«» ™

— “lou are right" be aald qdlckl/. _ ; hate to call out the men, but we’ve got » toldie to the Teoeangtil'sad ■ Uttle chance, row the rain tov^sSa ther'ao rto PI > ^- * nd we c* 0 w ° r k to advantage lonat who approvea their roar- In eplte of all this awful mud”—he 11ftn the bridge u finished. ed his foot up and disclosed It caked * rv—Abbott the eoastruetion wM clogged with masses. “Til take

charge lu the center here, and Stafford

8YNOWI8.

t engineer re nan Meeds. «

ctnre the wortd'tou ev?‘ i, president of the Martlet B

r’the °b the left, and I'm going to give you • *ha charge of the east end of the dam. over

• *nd ^on t! trT*to , preW2t*dIa~ g JT-ade only reaches ontk with » a «^TW 1 uS»river.

s drills

by the splllwsy. If only had been here alx weeks ago."

“Wa might set the men to work on _ that rock now." said Meade.

__ 7 .7 “** wonld *>« naeleas. There's too fTproStoTbnt w«S nluch 01 ,L No ' ,f "«’>* r»>B* to aave C-tt-R the lacings the dam, we've got to build It up and U n»en*en*U»a t £aJliM ^ to ke *P 01 the waters If

| they rise any more. The higher we I pan build It the greater will be the on the spillway, and the more ha dlacharged. I’ll turn the men

I—Toting Maade baa | ' * ib£aeu b |w^e a toen farf | ; l K s: Bru C.

> rtfiri* P H<r , fiBds *tSStSr eart failure. Ho aaaumes enIbiuty for the eatostrepbe. lea to. a HC-ta her father's preeesoe tor^gxg^Meato breaks bis

thS-KS^JfSJ

ate of himself. KpSoB

xrv - tom be. o cany off surplus water. F "It's risen eight or ten feet since we r it, and with th's r aln—" It's not coming ' >wn so hard as f was whan I first came out hare," “I think you can ace It rkenlng course*." ^ “Tea," aald the resident eofdneer. ' g a moment. “I believe it Is. If t stops now," he continued thought- . “we ought to be safe." I “Tea. I think so." answered Meade. In the night alone, together in that i in their fortunes, the two men e Interchanging thoughts and Ideas I terms of perfect equality. It did t occur to Yandeventer to question and that they were doing ao

"Of course." continued Meade, "even I It doe- stop raining well continue f runoff from the witer-

d for some time.*

"Tea," aald the resident engineer, aat of course, but If the rain stupe Prywhere we can scarcely have a e of more than five or tdr feet, and f that i - — - - -

"But what are you going to do?" *Tm going to palisade the top of the dam. There** plenty of timber already cut down, and we will cut a lot of young pines and build a palisade wall of timber across the top three or four feet back from the edge. Well banked on the downstream side. It may hold." “I might be worth while to 1'ne that pallaadk with galvanised Iron sheets from the house*" said Meade. "A good Idas.'' hald Yandeventer, "and well pile what underbrush and small stuff we have In front of the palisade .and heap what rocks wa can find on top of that, and we'll bank It up on the rthsr aide with earth. If* a poor dependence, bnt It will hold for a while anyway, and e»-ery moment of time may be precious." "How about sandbags, sir?” “Weve got a few hundred cement bags, but not enough. I wish we had a few thousand; however, we will fill what we have, and If the water rises and begins to trickle over the top end through the palisade, we’U jam those down at the danger points. Can you suggest anything merer

'Nothing."

*Oood. Well turn out the men. Tt»eT*vs had six hours' sleep anyway." CHAPTER XV.

Tbs Battle.

It wrs now three o'clock in the loralng. In about half an hour the men, naturally grumbling and protesting at being deprived of any of their sleep, ware oct and at work. Lanterns were lighted everywhere. The rain had fortunately not resumed, and the filled with noise and confusion. Men with axes were busy on the hillside cutting the young pines, lones were hitched to the dump wagthe steam shovel began tearing ew/' to-. ..illside. Some of the men were detailed to knock down some of the galvanized Iron houses and the battering of the hammers on the metal added to the din. Under Yandeventer'* personal direction a row of stakes was driven Into the top of the dam about three feet from the front of It. Big sheet* of

would still be a little below the overlapping galvanized Iron were spillway." ; nailed roughly to the fronts of the stopping here now." pointed out finnly bedded stakes and the small Meade, and. Indeed, the force of the tranches and brushwood were thrown downpour was greatly diminished. down before It Bowlders and big The two stood watching the dam and * ,0 n«* wre carried out on the dam in the black lake beyond It in silence for Ule »«*«*« thrown down on the a few momenta until the rain practical- brushwood : spare timbers, broken ly < eased. The air was misty and heavy * *k°c beds, old wheels. Joists of dlswlth moisture, but the rain was cer- membered house* were driven Into the ••Inly over for the time at any rate. ‘••r^ 10 •« r ve as braces behind the

_ “’trnnk goudnsas." aald the reridect P«Heads; a bank of earth waa piled f engineer lu great relief. "Now If It's u l' behind it. on which every man who stopped everywhere well be all Hgf.:." be spared from other tasks, even 1

“Tea." aald Maade. "and I'm Inclined ‘be chief* themselves, labored with !

to think '« has stopped everywhere, breathless eoc-r.y. The water was stMl;

Whoever thought It wnald rain In Jan- «**•«• although the rain Lad stopped;

uary here? There hasn't a drop, to ‘b* natural drainage would cauae that. :

spsak of. fallen to January for tweoty but the rise was slower, jeere. or elnce there have been any At daa-n Yandeventer personally records. Why lu Lonveu’s name It carefully measured the depth of the | had to come now I don't see." water and gauged It again. It was a "Look here. Roberta." aald Vande- 1 scant alx and a half feet below the top venter suddenly, “you know you're a 1 of the dam If the water rooe above Orel-class engineer." the lop It was gravely questionable ! Meade about nls head. 1 whether the palisade would hold It at "Tou can't fool me," said the older aU. yet there was no outer way of Inaian. "I've watched you. Tou know creasing the depth of the spillway uiorer aboiu the gaute than anybody enough to discharge the fiood volume, here except myself. You doot choose i Working as hard as they could, they to confide to me although 1 like y>u. had barely succeeded to raising the aud I am to a position to help you ' earth bank bark of It a foot high. "t appreciate what you asy. Mr. Van- j They kept at It unremittingly, although devruter." returned the other; "there It did not seem lu be of much use. Is mo one to wkupi I should rather tell ! Vandeveuter, Stafford and Meade gmh(he a bole «a.*ry than to you. hut 1 ered together 104 acanaed the sky. rant—not J«A." seeking to discern the signs of the “Well, keep your omn counsel, bat ' time, the purpose at the heaven* It tf you ever want a fm-nd. ronnt on me; | was dearer In the east. The clouds to meanwhile, as a man of experience and I the northv. -stward were In violent ncnbtnty. What Would you tor tloa apparently. Lightning Cashed Ttot nut thn mta ajd build up a | iff-'g" them and over the grew I rangw

tome down from the peaks lost to sight la the blackness overhead. They observed nil this carefully and Ynnrfuventer turned away, slinking bis bead. “1 don’t know." he began—the three of them wire over on the east side the better to see np the valley—"It looks pretty bed. doesn’t It?" “It does." answered Meade, while StafTord nodded his bead. “And, by the way, Stafford, have you noUfled the town and the bridge people of the danger and bid them prepare for itr “I tried to telephone them a while ago, but the connection baa been broken ; the storm has played havoc with the line probably,” answered the assistant engineer. “Well, what did yon do then?" asked Yandeventer a little Impatiently. “I sent a man down on horseback '.n a hurry to warn them that If it rains again the dam might go. find If It did H would go with a rush; that the water was now only six feet below the level, and that they had better gut «p on the hills. Of conroe. last night's ruin mnst have made the road almost impassable, hot he ought to get there by nine o’clock. I told him to tell the Martlet people to take whatever steps they could devise to hold their viaduct and their machinery," answered Stafford, as be turned and walked toward his own part of the dam. “Good," exclaimed Yandeventer. left for ns to do but

The resident engineer looked white and haggard. .Although It was cold and nrw in the wet air, be wiped the sweat from his forehead. “Ihe men are doing splendidly, sir," aald Meade. "Tea," aalf Yandeventer, "many of them Rave their wive* and children u«ck In the town. Some of the Italians Lave bought land on the prairie and are going to aettle here. They're fighting for everything they've got on earth. What do yau think of the chancea of this palisade of ours?" Meade shook his head. “It's all wa can do, air, hut If the water rises more than seven or right feet—" "Say it," aald Yandeventer. "The dam would go lies a house of cards." “Exactly. And look at that cloudbank over there in the northwest It's spreading." “What wind there Is," said Meade, moistening his finger and holding It np to feel the direction. “Is blowing the opposite way down hare, but you can't tell what la happening up there. Well, all we can do la to fight on." And fight they did. It was almost at first sight like the hand of man against the hand of God. There was no more room for engineering expedient. It was chop and bew, break and pound, dig and drive, carry and pi la Throwing off his coat, Yandeventer seized a spade and began to work Uke any other laborer, and the rest of the higher men followed his example. At six o'clock the black new hanging in the northwest began to turn their way. It wax coming down the mountain. It was beaded for the valley. Yandeventer aaw It, every teamster, every common laborer saw it It wa* coming. Unless heaven Itself Interfered there would be more rain. Tbey had worked desperately before, but now they applied themselves to thrir tasks with a kind of wild fury. A sort of Insanity took poroearion of them. They would not be beaten. They cried, at first shrilly and then hoarsely and raucously, encouraging words and phrases from one to another: In word* vivid, profane, desperate. They Mood there and they heaved and dug and piled and hammered find hurled and drove fiercely. It was a battle madthat came Into them. They saw red like the berserker of old. Ye*. It was not unlike a battle In other ways, for with the rush of the northwest roaring mighty thunder and vivid and terrifying lightning. It as If great darts of light literally were hurled by some gigantic hand behind the black screen of sweeping cloud down upon the granite moun tains. They aaw M>hn>rs of fire where the thunderbolts struck. The pealing <f thunder waa appalling. Their frail palisade backing waa not ha’f completed. It must be raining aom "whera, for the water was still *!owl.’ rising. It was five and a half feet now from crewt. It eras hoperain fell, and the rain lera waa an added chill In the stU! air of the valley as the storm drove down upon them. A few of the fainter hearts flung down pick and shovel and ax and Mood craven. Oaths, curse*, blows even, from those of the braver sort shamed them Into work again. These brave bean* and true might he swept away with the dam if It gave way, but they wouid not give up. and no man working with them should flee hi* task or shirk hi* duty. By the living Ood, whose sport and plaything they seemed to be. they • wore It; and ao weak and strong, bold and timid labored on--des|H-r-ate, resolved, godlike In their courage and perstoteoce. The clouds were moving swiftly now. To the east It had boon clear, but now it was also black, and then with a mar greater even than u thousand thunderclap*, the wind tore down the uoanuius, through the narrow canyon*. Into the valley*, shrieking lu the pine*, and fell upon them and huri<-4 them town and brushed them back. And after ike wind, the rain. A drop or two (truck Vandeventer's cheek; another, anotli •f. and tbrei the flood. He lifted hi* head and stared and shook hi* flat at the Sky and turned to the human ter-

"Carry on. carry on. hoys." he cried,

shrieking to be heard above the thun-

der peals, “well beat It yet" A rheer rose about him and was

ought up and ran along the top of the great dam. The ha’f-manlacal yell wa* such a cry as men might give vent to In the heat of battle, the excitement of wild charge, and then they fell to It again. The more Ignorant unaware of the feebleness of the pell-

i war* In a fever of excitement They had got their aeconfi wind. They were too enthused, too desperate, to feel their wtorioeea. They had not worked before as they did then, wa* the bi»t poawibt* nervous outbi with nioKt of them. The* coaid keep

i It np a little longer—till they dropped i doad. As the mad thoroughbred fall*

In hi* stride on the track, pushed beyond his power of endurance, as the common carthorse can be made to go until be drops, so these men, white, haggard, nervous, drawn-faced, sweat mingling with the* rain on their sodden bodies, would go till they broke. They had nst quite reached that point yet. There were some five hundred heavy

I cement bag* which had been fflled with i snnd and piled np on the roadtvay at | convenient points. As a forlorn hope. 1 as a la»t try. Tandeventer called all

the diggers and ditchers, and hewers and drivers, and bade them tackle the sandbag*. The timber wall that rose

to four or five feet was now packed to

a bright of three wKh an unequal wall

The wavea '

► roll

—And Shook Hit Fiat at the Sky. sode, the more knowing Indifferent to It. Feeing only the Job. alike realised only their duty to fight on. to answer the appeal to their manhood, to refuse to admit defeat even when life trembled In the balance. I’es, to use the ancient simile again, . the fountains of the great deep were ' broken open. What had befallen them before waa nothing to this. The hard rain of the night reemed trifling compared to this avalanche of water. This was a cloudburst Indeed. And to make It worse, to make their task harder, to render their efforts useless, the high wind rosrin; down the valley 1 plied the water up and drove It in tbenderous assaulting waves against the great mound of earth on which ths men struggled and labored frantically Yandeventer, shc-vel In hand—he did not dare to throw It down, lest his action be misconstrued—went from gang to gang, from man to man, talking tc them, upneatlng to them, pointing oul weaknesses here and there, Inspiring them, holding them up as a man might hold a stricken line against the onslaught of a victorious and overwhelm Ing force. Ana against wind and rain In that thick darkness, blinded by thi flash lug lightning, stunned by the pealing thunder, with zeal superhuman they tolled on and on and on. Ruck and forth went the chief, showing hlmwlf a leader of leaders, ami wherever he stopped the fury and dea perutlou of the effort to stem the tide increased. When he came plodding along the muddy roadway to the pari committed to Meade be did not flm, : the euglneer. "Where'* Roberts?" he yelled above the noise of the storm. “He and two men have gone, sir." “Gone?" cried Yandeventer. cut to the heart at what he thought was s desertion. “Well," he shouted, reallz Ing there waa nothing he could do then and that he had neither breath noi time to waste, "there’s more need foi the rest of us to take their places." He drew a man or two from th« other gangs to re-enforce this dangei jHilut and himself directed thrir work. Now it take* time for water to riM five feet, even lu a cloudburst or a ■urcesrioa of them. The rain constantly Kcemcd to Increase as the wind drove it on. Vundeventei knew that the dam was doomed, that the sluice ami the half-finlidled spillway com-bim-d could discharge only a small |>aii of the flow, but he knew that he would have two hours o' least to work before the water could i>asa the crest, umh-rmlne. and batter down the pall ride and begin to trickle over. Just u* soon a* It did roll over the top, unless they could stop It, the whole thing waa gone. For those two hours the sup* rmeu laboied unremittingly In ghe downpou. with a persistent and heroic courage that should have been recorded In song and story but which was not. It wa* remembered afiei a while by none rave a few. To the many It was only “all In the day's

work!"

The undersluice In the side of the dam which would later serve as headgate for the canal had been intended to pass the smaller floods which might occur during the construction and had been open since the rain began. II carried off a great volume cf water, hut hopelessly little In comparlaon with the flood. Foot by foot to the terreutlal downpour the water rose. At half after right It reached 'he level of the spillway and commenced to rush through lu ever-increasing volume, but the flow Into the reservoir was far greater than the spillway's capacity. Still the sight of the rushlug water em-ountged the men. Every one of them felt that if the pallrade held the discharge would he Increased enough to stop the else, hut at present the atfeet wa* small. By nine o'clock It was wl'hln a foot of the top. They began to mi i.sure Its rise by Inches. Although the «lnm had been carefully kept level as It wa* built, the trample of horse* ami men. the present digging and palisading end revetting had caused iltda d.-p csstou*. Now the water rose to ibi- lev*L Here and there It began to The ruin coming down from the aso-'-iitaln tops was a* cold .'a 1c*. IM

against the rampart, although their force as yet was broken by the brushwood. Yandeventer Jumped up on the palisade near the center. There werc some large logs there where he could stand, and whence he could get a* clear a view of the whole top of the dam as was possible through the driving rain. “There." shouted the engineer, pointing to a red trickle—It seemed to him Uke blood, taking Its hideous hue from the red clay of the backs—where the water had found a low spot and was washing across the top and | trickling through the new wall and down on the other side. Even as he | pointed, the trickle became a stream and the stream hade fair to be c flood. Men ran and dropped sandbags over In front of the palisade, right where the leak bad occurred. Other heaped up the earth behind the wall, seeking to smother It and Mop It. The water checked there, they were forced to do the same thing at another place. Desperately they dropped their sandbags. sturdily they piled their shovels In the mud; scrambling and yelling, they ran from leak to leak. They lifted the heavy bags of sand as if they had been loaves of bread and Jammed them down. Tbey swung pick and shovel like toys, although the rain made all the earth sticky mud and the work all the harder. The water wa* clear over the top of the dam now, and streaming through the revetment of brush and surging against the palisade. Where Is did not let the water through, the line of stakes was beginning to bend backward. The men who had expended their sandbags and coaid get no more. In one final effort ran to the pallaade, dug their heels madly in the wet. allmy earth and put thrir Mtoulders against the bending stakes as if to hold them up by main strength. Thin stream* were flowing here and there, now unheeded. Checked and held In one spot, the water broke through at another. The spillway could not control the

rise.

"She's gone, she’s gone!" gasped Yandeventer nnder his breath. He had fought a good fight. He could do no more. There were no more hags of rand. Save for the men straining at the wall here and there and everywhere. there waa left nothing but to stand and wait, having done alt As one man n<v another the whole hundred and fifty caught the con'aglon and threw themselves against the palisade, wet and chilled from the ra'n, but jet madly, recklessly, Americans a-.d foreigners alike. They would hold It by main strength for another minute. thej swore, oblivious to the fact that Just as soon as it went It would go with a rush. The Mockade would be swept away first, and they would go with It. What of that? The men back of it matched their brawny arms against rain and wind, the powers of man against the powers of God, but not mockingly. It Is perhaps doubtful If tbey realized what they did. It waa Instinct, habit, blind desperation now. If tbe flimsy wall failed under the terrific water pressure, they would be hurled beneath It, swept down the slope of the dam. buried In the debris as It was swept away, caught up If they by any chance survived so far. and burled, broken and battered, down the valley In the terrible flood that would ensue. What did they know about that, or knowing, what did they care, as they strained at the wavering timber wall? And still they held as the rain poured down on them, soaking through their soggy clothes, the colder on thrir exhausted bodies for the keen wind that blew across them. Well, they had dene everything they could. Yandeventer Jumped down and pressed himself against the nearest timber with the men and waited, silent. He had ne-er sustained such a pressure In aU his life. Like Atlas, he felt as If be were holding up a world. And the mocking thing about It all was hla feeling, nay his reel ration, that he was not really holding anything. that If the pnltrades failed, his preraure. his resistance and that f all tbe other men amounted to nothing. Yet he held on. and they, too—demi-

gods.

CHAPTER XVI. Tbe Ancient Art of Fascination. And much of tn* last wild hurricane of work took place anoci the cbeervaUoa of a woman t From the top of the Mg mm* there was a deer view of tbe new reservoir. far back Into In **te of

posed to both attacks, and. Indeed. Indifferent to them—albeit protected by Mlckcr and boots and sou'weatapclnated by the titanic struggle beti nature and man of which she was a

The general Investigation by Bodnay and Miss Illingworth hod produced no results. A careful study of Rodney's notes npcs the subject had only served the more thoroughly to convince

Helen Illingworth Stood I Both Attack*, them that Meade waa blameless. But the most assiduous effort with the heartiest will in the world and that promptings of devotion and affection could not make a case out of theaa suggestions and their Inference* that 1 would hold water. Tbey could cot establish their contention beyond perndventure In the face of Meade's direct admission and ShurtllfT* corroboration. They could not establish It In the public mind by any evidence at all If Meade and Shurtllff remained alient. If either one or the other of tha two conspirators could be brought to tell the truth. Meade could be restored, at least sufficiently so for the purpose of argument; tne argument that Helen Illingworth sooner or later must make her father. It was that to which she gave the most thought It was for that she planned and longed. Two people cannot resolve, even by mutual consent* to dismiss from their daily thought and conversation any subject whatsoever without Introducing In place of It a certain constraint It Is as futile to attempt to dismiss anything absolutely from the human mind as Is the oft-suggested cure for rheumatism — doing certain thing* without thinking of the disease sought to be cured! Colonel Illingworth had dlsmloed Meade from his mind because he hated him. Helen Illingworth refrained from talking about him to her fxtbar because she loved him. Fo they were never In each other's presence without thinking of tbe man. This was a source of great Irritation to the father. On occasion lie almost found Mm ■ate tbe point of shouting at his daughter to talk about him. And that she ao carefully avoided the subject and aa tbe avoidance was so obviously Li accordance with his own wish, the restraint Irritated him the more. The fact that they both sought so carefully to maintain the old relationship made It more Impossible. For relationships which are primarily founded on love cannot he maintained by constraint vithout the weakening of the great force upon which their tenure had previously depended. There Is nothing like concealment to Impair and weaken a tie unless It be a ban 1 Prohibitions rarely prohibit. ijtlll there remain'd a deep and abiding affection between father and daughter and they managed somehow get along outwardly much as before. Indeed Colonel llllngw-orth waa more kind and considerate than ever to his daughter, and she repaid him with more than unub! care end devotion. The very fact that *ho seemM to have accepted the situation and obeyed the law be had laid down gave him some compunctions of con^-l.-ncti. On that account, perhaps, he hud been the more willing to accede to her request to take Shurtllff Into his employ, la no way wa* Shurtllff responsible for the failure of the bridge or for any mistake la the calculations of the Mosdrs, and Shnrtliff was an Invaluable m*n not only for an engineer but for the president of the Martlet Bridge company. He was familiar with the subjects that Colonel Illingworth discussed and wrot'i about. He was Intelligent and reliable to the last degree, his reputation for steadiness and discretion unquestioned. and he was marvelously afOrient In his «ulH>nilnate position. Thu colonel, having rtr-t tried him out, had advanced him rapidly after learning his worth. He was now his private secretary. Shurtliff bring ao old bachelor without Mill or kin. and not originally fond ’i women, found himself suddenly In touch with one of the sweetest and kindest, as Well as the youngest and m.-t beautiful of a sex about which be knew nothing.

., n **^' h | e Cape May Coi

tbe

a Uiacvenh stood *»

Snbsevib* for th •Y Time* SLM c