the cry. "There's a big flood! The
river is rising! Get up and get out, everybody!"

CHAPTER VII

THE RESCUE

For a few moments after this wild shouting in the street there was no
sound in the negro basement where the China Cat and the Cloth Dog
without any tail were perched on the shelf. The rain pelted down harder
than before, a regular flood in itself, and to the noise of the drops
was added the roar from the flooded river.

Presently there came a pounding on the basement door of the tenement
where Jeff, the colored boy, lived.

Bang! Bang! Bang! came the loud knock.

"Who's dat?" asked Jeff's mother from the bedroom where she was
sleeping. "Who's dat knockin' at de do'?"

Bang! Bang! Bang! came the sound again.

"Can that be thunder?" whispered the China Cat to the Cloth Dog.

"No, this isn't a thunderstorm," answered the Dog. "It is much worse
than any thunderstorm I ever heard. There is going to be a bad time
here, with a flood and everything."

"Who's dat?" asked the voice of Jeff's mother again, as the pounding at
the door sounded a second time.

"The police!" was the answer.

Jeff, who had been awakened, heard this answer. He covered his head with
the clothes, and cowered down in the bed.

"Oh, mah good land!" thought Jeff when he heard this. "De p'lice has
done come to git me 'cause I took de China Cat! Oh, good land! I ain't
so smart as I thought! Oh, dey's gwine 'rest me suah!"

But the police had not come to get Jeff. Once more the officer pounded
with his club on the basement door.

"Come there!" he cried. "Get up and dress and skip out if you don't want
to be drowned! The river is rising. It will flood all these basement
tenements! You'll have to clear out--all of you! Wake up and get out!
We'll help you! Open the door!"

"Oh, massy me! A flood!" cried Jeff's mother. "Does yo' heah dat,
Rastus?" she called to her husband. "Dere's a flood an' we's done got to
run out! Git up an' open de do' an' I'll roust up de chilluns!"

"I'll open the do,' Ma," said Jeff, slipping out of his bed, and as he
swung the door open there stood a policeman.

"Come, boy; lively!" cried the officer. "You were long enough answering
my knock. You've all got to leave here! How many of you are there?"

"Ten," answered Jeff, and he looked over the mantel shelf to see if the
officer noticed the China Cat.

But the policeman had something else to do just then. He and others had
been sent to the tenemen