“Give me every second you can,” said Orde, without looking up. He was just making the last turns.
The mass toppled slowly, fell into the swift current, and leaped with a roar. The Rough Red watched with cat-like attention.
“Jump!” he cried at last, and his right arm descended.
With the shout and the motion several things happened simultaneously. Orde leaped blindly for the rail, where he was seized and dragged aboard by the Rough Red; the axes fell, Marsh whirled over the wheel, Harvey threw open his throttle. The tug sprang from its leash like a hound. And behind the barrier the logs, tossing and tumbling, the white spray flying before their onslaught, beat in vain against the barrier, like raging wild beasts whose prey has escaped.
“Close call,” said Orde briefly.
“Bet you,” replied Marsh.
Neither referred to the tug's escape; but to the fortunate closing of the opening.
XLI
Orde now took steps to deflect into the channel recently dredged to Stearn's Bayou the mass of the logs racing down stream from Redding. He estimated that he had still two hours or so in which to do the work. In this time he succeeded by the severest efforts in establishing a rough shunt into the new channel. The logs would come down running free. Only the shock of their impact against the tail of the jam already formed was to be feared. Orde hoped to be able to turn the bulk of them aside.