"Oh, we'll get sailing, too," answered Henry Burns. "We're going to try the pond, you know. Hello, there's a wheel, now. Looks like a ship's wheel, at that--only rougher. You can stand your trick at that, if you want to, while I sit by the fire." He was sorry he spoke, the next moment, for Harvey--never too cautious--gave a roar of delight, and darted over to where his friend had pointed. There, attached to a small shaft that protruded from the wooden partition which divided the two lower rooms of the mill, was a large, wooden wheel, with a series of wooden spokes attached to its rim, after the manner of a ship's wheel. "Hooray!" bawled Harvey, seizing the wheel and giving it several vigorous turns, "keep her off, did you say, skipper? Ay, ay, we'll clear the breakers now, with water to spare. "Here you," addressing an imaginary sailor, "get forward lively and clear that jib-sheet; and look out for the block. Hanged if we want a man overboard a night like this, eh, Mister Burns?" "Say, Jack, I wouldn't do that," replied Henry Burns, laughing at his comrade's antics. "You don't know what that may turn." "Don't I, though!" roared Harvey, jamming the wheel around with a few more turns. "Why, you land-lubber, it turns the ship, same as any wheel. This is the good ship, _Rattle-Bones_, bound from Benton to Boston, with a cargo of meal--and rats. We've lost our pilot, Bess--what's her name--and we've got to put her through ourselves. "Hello!" he cried suddenly, checking himself in the midst of his nonsense and listening intently. "What's that noise? Henry, no joking, I hear breakers off the port bow. We're going aground, or the ship's leaking." Henry Burns sprang up, and both boys stood, wondering. Out of the darkness of the other part of the mill there came in a sound of rushing water, plainly distinguishable above the roar of the water flowing over the dam, and the dashing rain and the gusts of wind. Then, as they stood, listening curiously, there came a deep, rumbling sound out of the very vitals of the old mill; there was a gentle quivering throughout all its timbers; a groaning in all its aged structure; a whirring, droning sound--the wheels of the mill were turning, and there was needed only the pushing of one of the levers to set the great mill-stones, themselves, to grinding. "Jack," cried Henry Burns, "you've opened the gates. The wheels are turning. We've got to stop that, quick. Someone might hear it." He sprang to the wheel, gave it a few sharp whirls, turned it again and again with all his strength, and the rushing noise ceased. The mill, as though satisfied that its protests against being driven to work at such an hour had been availing, quieted once more, and the place was still.