They were already looking at a great wave sweeping down the furious river, which was covered with boughs and trees, the latter rolling over and over in the swift current, now showing their rugged earth and stone-filled roots, now their boughs, from which the foliage and twigs were rapidly being stripped.
“Why, it’s right over our kitchen now.”
“And will carry away my pots!” cried Rob, running away to save the treasures which had caused him so much trouble to make.
“Look sharp, sir!” cried Shaddy; “here’s quite a torrent coming. We’ll make for the tree at once, or we shall be lost once more.”
“All right!” cried Rob, as he ran to the far edge of their fireplace, where the boughs and pieces of wood collected for fuel were beginning to sail away, and he had just time to seize one great rough pot as it began to float, when a wave curled over toward the other and covered the lad’s feet.
But he snatched up the vessel and hurried toward the tree in which the puma was curled up, Brazier and Shaddy following, with the little food they had left, and none too soon. They handed Rob’s two pieces of earthenware up to him, and then joined him in the fork of the tree.
The water was by now lapping softly about its foot, but from time to time a wave came sweeping down the river as if sudden influxes of water kept on rushing in higher up to increase the flood, and in consequence ring after ring or curve of water swept over the land, gliding now up amongst the trees of the forest, penetrating farther and farther each time, and threatening that the whole of the country through which the river passed would be flooded for miles.
The puma snarled and looked fierce as the two men followed Rob, but it contented itself with a fresh position, higher up in a secondary fork of the tree, where it crouched, glaring down at those below, but hardly noticed, for, after recovering their belongings, the attention of those on the fork was divided between the rising of the water and the uneasy movements of the great occupant of the next tree.
“I suppose we may confess to being afraid of a reptile like that,” said Brazier, measuring the distance between the trees with his eyes and looking up to see if the branches of either approached near enough to enable the reptile to make its way across.
“No fear, sir!” said Shaddy, with a smile, as he read his companion’s thoughts. “We’ve only the water to trouble us now.”