The fringe of the flood had reached him. Where the bursting away was so instantaneous and the released volume was so enormous, the flow could not be like that of an ordinary torrent, which rises rapidly because of the swiftly-increasing mass behind it. The awful rush at Johnstown resembled the oncoming of a tidal wave or wall of water, so high, so prodigious, so resistless that nothing less than the side of a granite mountain could check it.
It would have been the same in the case we are describing, though of course to a less degree, but for the interposing wood, which, beginning at the very base of the dam, continued the entire length of the valley, which was several miles in extent.
Some of these trees were uprooted as if by a cyclone, others were bent and partly turned over, while the sturdiest, which did not stand near the middle of the path, held their own, like giants resisting death tugging at their vitals.
The woods also acted as a brake, so to speak, on the velocity of the terrific rush of waters. The flow could not be stopped nor turned aside, but it was hindered somewhat, and, as it came down the hollow, was twisted and driven into all manner of eddies, whirlpools, and currents, in which the most powerful swimmer was as helpless as an infant.
“It’s no use!” panted McGovern, when he felt the cold current rising about his ankles like the coiling of a water-snake; “I must die, and with all my sins on my head! Heaven have mercy! do not desert me now when a little farther and I will be saved!”
Never was a more agonized appeal made to his Creator than that by the despairing McGovern.
CHAPTER XXVIII—A CRY FROM THE DARKNESS
Within a few seconds after McGovern felt the water about his ankles it touched his knees. He was still able to make progress, and with the same despairing desperation as before, struggled onward.
At the next step he went to his waist, and fell with a splash.
“I’m drowning!” he gasped; but fortunately for him he had plunged into a small hollow, out of which he was swept the next moment, and, with no effort on his part, flung upon his feet.