Nothing could have saved the boys and animals but the steady ascent which they made. A river was sweeping down the valley like that which wiped out Johnstown in the Conemaugh Valley nearly a century later. Few comprehend the appalling power of a great volume of water, which in the disaster referred to tossed locomotives about as if they were so many corks. The moonlight showed the muddy torrent carrying limbs, trees and even rocks, tumbling and rolling together in one fearful swirl down the valley. The stream was already more than a hundred feet wide, and gathered width and volume with terrifying rapidity. In a few minutes—though it seemed ten times as long—boys and horses paused on the crest of the ridge. They were now fifty feet higher than their camp, and the torrent steadily pursued them until within a dozen paces of where they stood. If it climbed that interval nothing could save them. They watched the rushing river for a time in silence. “Is it coming any higher?” asked Victor in an awed voice. “I think it is creeping up, but not so fast as at first.” “Won’t it be safer to keep on running?” “No; we shall have to go down into the lowland beyond, and if the water comes over this ridge we shall be caught.” “And if it does that we shall be caught _here_.” “It’s likely to pass round at some point above, and then it will be all up with us—_it has done so!_” added the startled George. As he spoke he pointed down the other side of the slope which they had climbed. He was right; the muddy current had forked above and was flowing down on both sides of them. Boys and horses were standing on an elongated island which might be overflowed at any moment. The destructive cloudbursts that sometimes break with cyclonic suddenness in the West are as short-lived as they are violent. It is impossible that it should be otherwise, for they consist simply of a sudden precipitation or fall of an enormous mass of water from the skies, which naturally hunts with the utmost swiftness for the lowest level. That found, the frightful flurry is speedily over. It was with unspeakable relief that George and Victor Shelton finally saw that the torrent had ceased to climb the slope. A few minutes later they uttered a prayer of thankfulness when they perceived that the volume was diminishing and the margin of the torrent was steadily retreating down the incline again. All danger for the time was over. “How is it that Mul-tal-la is on the other side of the valley?” asked George. “I don’t know. He left camp soon after you lay down, telling me he wouldn’t be gone long. He must have had some business or pleasure to look after. I thought maybe he had gone to make a call on some of his people. It was lucky for us that he saw what was coming and gave us warning in time.” ------------------------------------------------------------------------ CHAPTER XIV SHOSHONE CALLERS.