t, when despair seemed to settle on the group, Macavoy, having
spoken a low word to Pierre, said: "There's wan way, an' maybe I can an'
maybe I can't, but I'm fit to try. I'll go up the river to an aisy p'int
a mile above, get in, and drift down to a p'int below there, thin climb
up and loose the stuff."

Every man present knew the double danger: the swift headlong river, and
the sudden rush of rocks and stones, which must be loosed on the side of
the narrow ravine opposite the little house. Macavoy had nothing to say
to the head-shakes of the others, and they did not try to dissuade him;
for women and children were in the question, and there they were
below beside the house, the children gathered round the mother, she
waiting--waiting.

Macavoy, stripped to the waist, and carrying only a hatchet and a coil
of rope tied round him, started away alone up the river. The others
waited, now and again calling comfort to the woman below, though their
words could not be heard. About half an hour passed, and then someone
called out: "Here he comes!" Presently they could see the rough head and
the bare shoulders of the giant in the wild churning stream. There was
only one point where he could get a hold on the hillside--the jutting
bole of a tree just beneath them, and beneath the dyke of rock and
trees.

It was a great moment. The current swayed him out, but he plunged
forward, catching at the bole. His hand seized a small branch. It held
him an instant, as he was swung round, then it snapt. But the other hand
clenched the bole, and to a loud cheer, which Pierre prompted, Macavoy
drew himself up. After that they could not see him. He alone was
studying the situation.

He found the key-rock to the dyked slide of earth. To loosen it was to
divert the slide away, or partly away, from the little house. But it
could not be loosened from above, if at all, and he himself would be in
the path of the destroying hill.

"Aisy, aisy, Tim Macavoy," he said to himself. "It's the woman and the
darlins av her, an' the rose o' the valley down there at the Post!"

A minute afterwards, having chopped down a hickory sapling, he began to
pry at the boulder which held the mass. Presently a tree came crashing
down, and a small rush of earth followed it, and the hearts of the men
above and the woman and children below stood still for an instant.
An hour passed as Macavoy toiled with a strange careful skill and a
superhuman concentration. His bod