"We could finish it in two days if this rain would only let up," replied the man.
"Well, let's hope that it will," observed Tom.
"If it doesn't, there's likely to be trouble up above," went on the foreman, nodding in the direction of the great dam.
"What do you mean?"
"I mean that the water is getting too high. The dam is weakening, I heard."
"Is that so? Why, I thought they had made it to stand any sort of a flood."
"They evidently didn't count on one like this. They've got the engineer who built it up there, and they're doing their best to strengthen it. I also heard that they're preparing to dynamite it to open breeches here and there in it, in case it is likely to give way suddenly."
"You don't mean it! Say, if it does go out with a rush it will wipe out the village."
"Yes, but it can't hurt us," went on the foreman. "We're too high up on the side of the hill. Even if the dam did burst, if the course of the water could be changed, to send it down that other valley, it would do no harm, for there are no settlements over there," and he pointed to the distant hill.
It was near this hill that Tom intended to direct his projectiles, and on the other side of it was another valley, running at right angles to the one crossed by the dam.