A log careened down. He stopped swimming, in order not to be struck. The current flung him round. Just below him were the spires of rock for which he was making. In another moment the current was driving him past. A long pole stuck out into the water from the wreck of the house and rose and fell with the swell. He caught hold of this and flung his body across it. Precariously he clung, several times almost losing his hold. He edged along it, carefully, until he had worked into the shell of the house. One wall was gone entirely. Another had been partially ripped out. Through these openings the river raced. Tug let go the telephone pole to which he had been clinging and swam to the stairway. Here he found a foothold and sank down, half in the water and half out. Again the strength had gone out of him. Then, marvelously, as he lay there panting, the icy chill clutching at his heart, there came to him a clear, warm voice raised in a hymn. Betty’s voice! His heart exulted. He listened to the brave words, gallantly sung. She was singing, “Hold the Fort.” CHAPTER XXXVIII BEYOND A SHADOW OF A DOUBT “Do you fink Jesus will come, Betty?” a small voice inquired anxiously. “I think he’ll send some one, dear--Dad or Lon or--some one.” Ruth considered. “Do you fink he’ll send him in time for bweakfast? I’m offul hungwy.” Betty did not know about breakfast, but aloud she quite confidently thought so. Hope was resurgent in her heart. The worst of the flood was over. Its level had already receded two or three inches. She had just discovered that. Within the past hour its fury had beaten in and torn away one wall of the house. Another had been partially destroyed. The shell of a building that was left could not much longer endure. But she did not believe that much time would pass before a rescue was attempted. A few minutes since she had heard Dusty’s cheerful shout, and, though he was probably marooned himself, it was a comfort to know that her party was not the only one in the devastated valley. “My fry-pans an’ my cook-stove an’ my kitchen are plumb scattered every which way. I reckon I nevah will see them no mo’,” Mandy mourned. “An’ las’ week I done bought dem luminous dishes frum dat peddler.” “Aluminum, Mandy.” “Das all right. Luminous or luminum, I ain’ carin’ which. What I wuz sayin’ is--” Mandy stopped, to let out a yell of fright. A dripping figure, hatless, coatless, shoeless, was standing at the head of the stairs. The face was white and haggard. The body drooped against the door jamb for support. Straight from Betty’s heart a cry of joy leaped. He had come to her. Through all the peril of the flood he had come to her. “Tug!” she cried, irradiate, and moved to him with hands outstretched. He was profoundly touched, but his words reflected the commonplace of the surface mind. “I’m wet,” he warned.