Help!" came hoarsely from the man. Evidently his exertions were beginning to exhaust him.
"Save me! Save me!" screamed the boy, who seemed to be about Jack's age. "Save me! Don't let me drown!"
The two unfortunate victims had caught sight of the cadets, who had by this time come as close to them as the rocks on the bank permitted. The man waved his arm frantically toward them.
"Can't you swim?" yelled Jack, to make himself heard above the wind and the rushing of the water.
"I'm caught fast!" the man gasped out. "And my son is caught fast too."
"Both of my feet are fast!" screamed the boy. "Oh, please help us! Don't leave us here to be drowned!"
"It's a couple of logs of wood that are holding us," went on the man in a hoarser tone than ever. "They are jammed in between us and some rocks and a floating tree. If you can only start the tree, maybe we can get out of here."
Both the man and the boy were in the rushing water up to their armpits, and occasionally the dashing element would fly over them in a spray that hid them completely from view.
"Oh, boys, this is awful!" groaned Fred. "Can't we do something for them?"
"We've got to do something," answered Jack. "We can't leave them there to drown."
"But what are we going to do?" demanded Andy soberly.
"He said something about loosening the tree that has drifted up alongside them," came from Randy. "Do you think we can do it, Jack?"
"I don't know. But we can have a try at it, anyway. And if we can't push the tree, maybe we can get at the logs that are holding them down."
Jack was looking up the river as he spoke, and at a distance saw a series of rocks jutting out for a considerable distance into the stream.
"I am going out on those rocks and then trust to luck to get over to the other side," he said. "We can't get at that fallen tree from this side."
"All right, I'm with you, Jack," said Randy. And together they made their way out on the rocks mentioned and the others slowly and cautiously followed.
I know it will not be necessary to introduce the Rover boys to my old readers. But for the benefit of those who are now meeting them for the first time a few words of introduction will not come amiss.
In my first volume, entitled "The Rover Boys at School," I related how three brothers, Dick, Tom and Sam Rover, were sent to Putnam Hall Military Academy, where they made a great number of friends, including a cadet named Lawrence Colby.
After passing through Putnam Hall, the boys attended Brill College, and then joined their father in business in New York City, with offices on Wall Street. They organized The Rover Company, of which Dick was now president, Tom secretary and general manager, and Sam treasurer. The three youths were married and lived in three connecting houses on Riverside Drive, overlooking the Hudson River.
About a year after their marriage Dick and his wife became the parents of a son, who was named John, after Mrs. Rover's uncle, Mr. John Laning. This son was followed by a daughter, named Martha, after her great-aunt Martha of Valley Brook Farm. The boy Jack, as he was commonly called, was a sturdy youth with many of the qualities which had made his father so successful.
It was around this time that Tom Rover and his wife Nellie came to the front with a great surprise. This was in the nature of a pair of lively twins, one of whom was named Anderson, after his grandfather, and the other Randolph, after his great-uncle Randolph of Valley Brook Farm. Andy and Randy, as they were always called, were exceedingly active lads, in that particular being a second edition of their father, Tom.
About the time Tom's twins were born Sam Rover and his wife Grace became the parents of a little girl, whom they called Mary, after Mrs. Laning. Then, a year later, the girl was followed by a boy, who was christened Fred after Sam Rover's old school chum, Fred Garrison.
Residing so close together, the younger generation of Rover boys, as well as the sisters, were brought up very much as one family. When they were old enough all were at first sent to private schools in the Metropolis. But soon the boys, led by Andy and Randy, showed such a propensity for "cutting loose" that their parents were compelled to hold a consultation.
"We'll have to send them to some strict boarding school – some military academy," said Dick Rover.
At that time Lawrence Colby, the Putnam Hall chum of the older Rovers, was at the head of a military academy called Colby Hall. To this institution Jack, Fred and the twins were sent, as related in detail in the first volume of my second series, entitled "The Rover Boys at Colby Hall." This military school was located about half a mile from the town of Haven Point, on Clearwater Lake. At the head of the lake was the Rick Rack River, running down from the mountains and woods beyond.
The school consisted of a large stone building facing the river at a point not far from where the stream emptied into the lake. Close by was a smaller building occupied by Colonel Colby and his family and some of the professors, and at a short distance were a gymnasium and a boathouse, and likewise bathing pavilions.
On arriving at Colby Hall the younger Rovers found several of their friends awaiting them, including Dick Powell and Gifford Garrison. They also ran into Nappy Martell, who had been far from friendly with them while in New York, and likewise had trouble with an overgrown bully named Slugger Brown, who was Nappy's crony.
As mentioned, Colby Hall was located about half a mile beyond Haven Point. On the opposite side of the town was Clearwater Hall, a boarding school for girls. During a panic at a fire in a motion picture house the Rover boys became acquainted with several girls from Clearwater Hall, including Ruth Stevenson, May Powell, Alice Strobell and Annie Larkins. They discovered that May was Dick Powell's cousin, and the whole crowd of young people soon became friends. Later on Mary and Martha Rover became pupils at the girls' school.
Ruth Stevenson had an old Uncle Barney. The Rover boys, while out hunting one day, did the old man a great service, and for this he was so grateful that he invited them to spend their Winter holidays with him; which they did, as related in "The Rover Boys on Snowshoe Island."
On this island the lads met their former enemies, Nappy Martell and Slugger Brown, as well as Asa Lemm, a discharged teacher of Colby Hall. The boys exposed a plot against old Uncle Barney, and in the end caused the old hunter's enemies to leave Snowshoe Island in disgust.
"I guess we haven't seen the last of Nappy and Slugger," said Jack; and he was right. Those two unworthies turned up once again, as related in the volume entitled "The Rover Boys Under Canvas." In that book I told how the cadets went into their annual encampment and how after a Spring election for officers Jack was made captain of Company C and Fred made first lieutenant of the same command.
Among the cadets who wished to become a captain was one named Gabe Werner, a great chum at that time of a lad named Bill Glutts. Having failed of election, Werner did all he could to make things uncomfortable for the Rovers, and in his actions he was aided by Glutts. But these two young rascals were discovered in some of their nefarious doings, and, becoming alarmed, Gabe Werner left the school camp and did not return. Glutts was brought before Captain Dale, the teacher in charge of the camp, and received a stern lecture and was deprived of many liberties.
While the Rover boys were at Colby Hall the great war in Europe opened and our country was overrun with German spies and sympathizers. During their time under canvas the boys made several surprising discoveries, and in the end helped the secret service men to capture a hidden German submarine. They likewise helped to round up the fathers
