"We looked at each other in dismay, as the water crept up, deeper and deeper. Pieces of wood and branches of trees were now floating on it, and Bradhurst said, 'Boys, there must be a heavy rain outside, and this stream is feeling its effects. If we don't get to some place where it widens out very soon, we might as well write each other's epitaphs. We've got to hurry like—listen! What was that?'"
"From the blackness in back of us came a sudden loud, menacing roar, growing in volume every second."
"Come on, boys, quick!" yelled Bradhurst, setting us the example by forging ahead faster than before. "There's a big wave coming that'll fill this place up to the roof, and the Lord help us if it overtakes us here."
"We stumbled along as fast as we could, but could make but slow progress, burdened as we were by the helpless form of our comrade. The water was almost to our waists, and the awful wave back of us approached with horrible rapidity. We were about ready to give up, when Bradhurst, who was a little in the lead, came ploughing back to us.
"Come along for your lives, boys," he shouted above the noise of the water. "This infernal hole widens out a little further on, and if—here, you fellows are tired out. Hustle along, and I'll carry Bob."
"We tried to stop him, but he paid no attention to us, and, stooping over, lifted the unconscious form of our companion on his broad back. Thus relieved, we put all our ebbing strength in one last mad dash, pulling Brad and his burden along with us. At last we reached a place where the cavern widened, and struggled up on a strip of sandy beach. But we were not out of the water's power yet, by any means. We knew that our only salvation lay in finding some refuge above the highest level the stream would be likely to reach, and so began a frantic hunt along the walls of the cavern.
"By the greatest good fortune, my eye caught sight of a rocky projection, quite a way up the side of the cave, and I yelled to my companions. They hurried over, and we climbed desperately up the rocky wall. I was the first to reach the platform, and I helped the others over its edge. Bradhurst waited until we were all up, and then hoisted Bob up over his head. I leaned over as far as I could, and was just able to get a grip on the unconscious man. Assisted by the others, I pulled him up, and then in a twinkling we had Brad up, too.
"And not a second too soon, either. Even as we hauled our friend over the edge, a great foaming wall of water leaped out of the tunnel from which we had emerged not three minutes before, and boiled out over the floor of the cave in which we were. It washed against the walls, and we thought for a few seconds that it would even reach our place of refuge. It did lap up to within a foot of us, but then spread out more and subsided a little.
"We would have been as helpless as so many chips of wood if it had caught us while in the narrow tunnel, and we shuddered as we thought of our narrow escape.
"The ledge on which we found ourselves was amply supplied with driftwood, probably left there at the time of some former flood that had been even fiercer than this one. We made a fire, and waited for the water to subside with as much patience as we could muster. We knew that Bob would probably die unless we could get him to a doctor soon, and this made the waiting all the harder. At times he would rave in delirium, and at others lie so quiet that more than once we thought him dead.