It was a terrifying moment for those who could do no more than stand helplessly watching. The jacks by this time were well out on the cap-log, with Willy Horse in the lead and red-headed Spike close at his heels. They were suddenly halted by a report that sounded like an explosion of heavy artillery. An advance log, rushing straight towards the gates, swerved when within a few feet of them, and, rearing half its dripping length, hurled itself against the gate-lever at which Hippy and Tom were tugging. Both saw the giant rise from the boiling flood. "Too late! Save your--" Tom did not finish. Hippy and Tom at that instant were catapulted into the air, hurled by the gate-lever, and fell into the river below the dam with a splash. Without an instant's hesitation, Willy Horse, followed by Spike, leaped to the rescue, knowing well that only a few seconds lay between them and the cataract of logs that was about to tumble over into the Little Big Branch below the dam. The rest of the jacks hesitated only for an instant, then they too leaped into the river and made their way towards Tom and Hippy, both of whom were unconscious. Willy Horse grabbed up Hippy with apparent ease, and raised him to his own back just as he would shoulder a dead deer. "Git Big Boss!" he shouted, and began struggling shoreward with his burden. In the meantime Spike had sprung to Tom Gray, but despite his great strength he did not succeed in shouldering Tom. "Give a hand here!" he bellowed. The lumberjacks reached him at this juncture and, together, Spike and his companions brought the unconscious man towards the shore. Then the spiling gave way under the strain that for several minutes had been put upon it, and the dam went out with a crash and a roar, accompanied by a series of terrifying explosions. It would have been an awesome sight to the Overland Riders had not their attention, at that moment, been centered on the lumberjacks. The jacks reached the shore only a few seconds before the structure gave way and the logs, hurtled into the air, fell splashing into the flood below the dam. Hippy and Tom were borne up the bank and laid on the ground. "Are--are they dead?" gasped Emma. "No," answered Miss Briggs, who had placed a finger on the pulse of each. "Please carry them to the bunk-house," directed Grace in a strained voice, after Willy Horse had run quick fingers over the heads of the two victims. "Big Friends bump heads! Much all right soon, mebby," he grunted, walking along beside Hippy as the jacks started with him and Tom towards the house. It was but a short time after their arrival there, however, when both regained consciousness. Neither Tom nor Hippy knew whether they had been hit by the log that struck the gate-lever, or whether they had been made unconscious by their fall into the water. Both came to in a severe chill and were put to bed in the bunk-house, warmed with hot drinks and blankets, and soothed until they fell asleep.