After this the men appeared to work better for Dale; perhaps still somewhat sulkily whenever he pressed them, continuing to be more or less afraid of him, but not so keenly regretting the loss of their white-haired old master.
The storm had brought back the floods, and they were now worse than anything that anybody remembered having ever seen. The feeding sources of the Rod River had broken all bounds; the lower parts of Hadleigh Wood had become a quagmire; and the volume of water passing under the road bridge was so great that many people thought this ancient structure to be in danger of collapsing. Over at Otterford Mill, the stream swept like a torrent through a chain of wide lakes; Mr. Bates' cottage was cut off from the highroad, and the meadows behind the neighboring Foxhound Kennels were deep under water.
In these days Dale took to riding as the easiest means of getting about; and one afternoon when he had gone splashing across to see Mr. Bates, thence to pay a visit of polite canvass at the Kennels, and was now returning homeward by the lanes, he heard a dismal chorus of cries in the Mill meads.
Forcing his clumsy horse through a gap in the hedge, he galloped along the sodden field tracks to the shifting scene of commotion. Three or four idle louts, a couple of children, and a farm-laborer were running by the swollen margin of the mill-stream, yelling forlornly, pointing at an object that showed itself now and again in the swirling center of the current. Plainly, somebody had chosen this most unpropitious season for an accidental bath, and his companions were sympathetically watching him drown, while not daring, not dreaming of, any foolhardy attempt at a rescue.
"'Tis Veale, sir. A'bram Veale, sir. Theer!" And all the cries came loud and hearty. "Theer he goes ag'in. I see 'un come up and go under. Oo, oo! Ain't 'un trav'lin'!"
"Catch th' 'orse!" shouted Dale; and next moment it was a double entertainment that offered itself to hurrying spectators.
The water, charged with sediment from all the rich earth it had scoured over, was thick as soup; its brown wavelets broke in slimy froth, and its deepest swiftest course had a color of darkly shining lead beneath the pale gleams of March sunshine. In this leaden glitter the two men were swept away, seeming to be locked in each other's arms, their heads very rarely out of the water, their backs visible frequently; until at a boundary fence they vanished from the sight of attentive pursuers who could pursue no further; and seemed in the final glimpse as small and black as two otters fiercely fighting.