let the tree go by, he would infallibly be swept past the house and
all hope of rescuing Anton would be gone. He saw, too, that if the tree
struck the frail boat, it would sink it as a battleship's ram sinks a
fishing-boat in a fog at sea. He might win through, but if it struck--

The oars creaked with the sudden strain thrown on them.

On came the tree, but, just as it was about to strike the boat, it
checked and turned half over, as the projecting stump of a broken bough
caught on the ground below. For an instant, only, the tree halted and
began to swing.

The halt gave a moment's respite, one more chance for an extra pull with
the oars. The big log, thus poised, made a backwater eddy on the surface
of the river, checking the force of the current. Ross reached back for
another stroke, with every ounce of his muscle behind it.

The tree turned over sullenly and charged down the river anew. Yet that
brief pause, that second of delay, that back-water ripple as the log
hung in suspension, had given Ross just the advantage that was needed.
The branches of the upper part of the tree swept round, one of them
catching the stern of the boat and almost pulling it under. Peril had
been near, but victory was nearer. The bow of the boat touched the wall
of the house.

The current, swirling around the rocking walls, carried the boat to the
lee of the house, and, as it spun round, Ross leaped on to the porch,
chest-deep in water, and took a quick turn with the boat's painter
around the corner post of the porch.

The torrent took his feet from under him, and swept him down-stream,
floating, but Ross held a firm grip on the rope and dragged himself
back. There, clasping the post tightly, he got back his breath. After a
moment's groping he found the railing of the porch. By standing on this
and holding fast to the corner post, he was, for the moment, out of
danger.

He had reached the house, but how was Anton to be rescued?

The crippled boy was on the second story and the upper window could not
be reached from the boat, even if the boat could have been held in place
directly under it. Fortunately, Ross knew the arrangements of his chum's
house as well as he did those of his own. Stepping gingerly along the
porch railing, he came close to the window of the sitting room. The
glass was still in the window frame, but as the front door was swinging
wide open, though partly choked with debris, Ross knew that the sitting
room must b