he matter?" asked Orde.

"It isn't safe," replied the captain; "and I don't intend to risk my men
or my driver."

Orde stood for a moment stock-still; then with a snort of anger he
leaped to the deck, seized the man by the neck and thrust him bodily
over the side to the bank.

"Safe, you white-livered skunk!" he roared. "Safe! Go over in the middle
of that ten-acre lot and lie down on your face and see if you feel safe
there! Get out; the whole pack of you! I'm in charge here now."

Captain Aspinwall picked himself up, his face red with anger.

"Get off my driver," he snarled. "Put that man off."

Orde seized a short heavy bar.

"This driver is requisitioned," said he. "Get out! I haven't time to
fool with you. I've got to save my logs."

They hesitated; and while they did so Tom North and some others of the
crew came running across the jam.

"Get a cable to the winch," Orde shouted at these as soon as they were
within hearing. "And get Marsh up here with the SPRITE. We've got to get
afloat."

He paid no more attention to the ejected crew. The latter, overawed
by the rivermen, who now gathered in full force, took the part of
spectators.

A few minutes' hard work put the driver afloat. Fortunately its raft of
piles had not become detached in the upheaval.

"Tom," said Orde briskly to North, "you know the pile-driver business.
Pick out your crew, and take charge."

In ten seconds of time the situation had changed from one of comparative
safety to one of extreme gravity. The logs, broken loose from the upper
temporary booms, now jammed against the swing and against the other logs
already filling the main booms. Already the pressure was beginning to
tell, as the water banked up behind the mass. The fifteen-inch cables
tightened slowly but mightily; some of the piles began to groan and rub
one against the other; here and there a log deliberately up-ended above
the level.

Orde took charge of the situation in its entirety, as a general might.
He set North immediately to driving clumps each of sixteen piles, bound
to solidity by chains, and so arranged in angles and slants as to direct
the enormous pressure toward either bank, thus splitting the enemy's
power. The small driver owned by the Boom Company drove similar clumps
here, there and everywhere that need arose or weakness developed.
Seventy-five men opposed, to the weight of twenty million tons of logs
and a river of water, the expedients invented by det