“Yes,” he said, “here we are.”
He pointed to a sort of raft formed of a couple of planks placed about five feet apart and across which a dozen short pieces of wood had been nailed, forming a buoyant platform, on which no doubt our enemies had floated themselves down from the head of the dam, where there was a timber yard.
“All plain enough now,” said Uncle Jack, grinding his teeth. “Oh, if I could have had hold of those two fellows by the collar when they fell in!”
“Well,” said Uncle Bob, “what would you have done—drowned them?”
“Not quite,” said Uncle Jack; “but they would have swallowed a great deal more water than would have been good for them.”
“Never mind about impossible threats,” said Uncle Dick. “Let’s examine the powder canister now.”
This was taken from its resting-place during the time the men were at breakfast and carried into the office, where the dangerous weapon of our enemies was laid upon the desk and examined.
It was a strong tin canister about ten inches high and six across, and bound round and round, first with strong string and afterwards loosely with some soft black-looking cord, which Uncle Dick said was fuse; and he pointed out where one end was passed through a little hole punched through the bottom of the canister, while the loosely-twisted fuse was held on by thin wire, which allowed the soft connection with the powder to hang out in loops.
“Yes,” said Uncle Dick; “if that is good fuse, the very fact of any part touching a spark or smouldering patch of ash would be enough to set it alight, and there is enough, I should say, to burn for a quarter of an hour before it reaches the powder. Yes, a good ten pounds of it,” he added, balancing the canister in his hands.
“But it may be a scare,” said Uncle Bob: “done to frighten us. We don’t know yet that it is powder.”