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When the supports had reached out over half of the river’s span, and the water was dotted with the shoulders of men gracefully slanted against the current, Jimmy gave orders to begin placing the flash-boards. Heavy planks were at once slid across the supports, where the weight of the racing water at once clamped them fast. Spikes held the top board beyond the possibility of a wrench loose. The smooth, quiet river, interrupted at last, murmured and snarled and eddied back, only to rush with increased vehemence around the end of the rapidly growing obstruction.

The policeman, passing back and forth on Canal Street, heard no sound of the labour going on. If he had been an observant policeman, he would have noted an ever-changing tone in the volume of sound roaring up from the eddy below the dam. After a time even he remarked on a certain obvious phenomenon.

“Sure!” said he; “now, that’s funny!”

He listened a moment, then passed on. The vagaries of the river were, after all, nothing to him. He belonged on Canal Street, east side; and Canal Street, east side, seemed peaceful.

The river had fallen absolutely silent. The last of Jimmy’s flash-boards was in place. Back in the sleeping town the clock in Pierce’s Tower struck two.

Jimmy and his men, having thus raised the level of the dam a good three feet, emerged dripping from the west-side canal, and cheerfully took their way northward to where, in the chilly dawn, their companions were sleeping the sleep of the just. As they passed the riffles they paused. A heavy grumbling issued from the logs jammed there, a grumbling brutish and sullen, as though the reluctant animals were beginning to stir. The water had already backed up from the raised dam.

Of course the affair, from a river-driver’s standpoint, at once became exceedingly simple. The slumbering fifteen were aroused to astounded drowsiness. By three, just as the dawn was beginning to differentiate the east from the west, the regular clank, clank, clink of the peavies proclaimed that due advantage of the high water was being seized. From then until six was a matter of three hours more. A great deal can be accomplished in three hours with flood-water. The last little jam “pulled” just about the time the first citizen of the west side discovered that his cellar was full of water. When that startled freeman opened the front door to see what was up, he uttered a tremendous ejaculation; and so, shortly, came to the construction of a raft.

Well, the papers got out an extra edition with scare-heads about “Outrages” and “High-handed Lawlessness!” and factory owners by the canals raised up their voices in bitterness over flooded fire-rooms; and property owners of perishable cellar goods howled about damage suits; and the ordinary citizen took to bailing out the hollow places of his domain. Toward nine o’clock, after the first excitement had died, and the flash-boards had been indignantly yanked from their illegal places, a squadron of police went out to hunt up the malefactor. The latter they discovered on a boom-pole directing the sluicing. From this position he declined to stir. One fat policeman ventured a toppling yard or so on the floating timber, threw his hands aloft in loss of equilibrium, and with a mighty effort regained the shore, where he sat down, panting. To the appeals of the squad to come and be arrested, Jimmy paid not the slightest heed. He puffed periodically on his “meerschaum” pipe, and directed the sluicing. Through the twenty-foot gate about a million feet an hour passed. Thus it happened that a little after noon Jimmy came peaceably ashore and gave himself up.

“You won’t have no more trouble below,” he observed to McGann, his lieutenant, watching reflectively the last logs shoot through the gate. “Just tie right into her and keep her hustling.” Then he refilled his pipe, lit it, and approached the expectant squad.

At the station-house he was interviewed by reporters. That is, they asked questions. To only one of them did they elicit a reply.

“Didn’t you know you were breaking the law?” inquired the Eagle man. “Didn’t you know you’d be arrested?”

“Sure!” replied Jimmy, with obvious contempt.

The next morning the court-room was crowded. Jimmy pleaded guilty, and was fined five hundred dollars or ninety days in jail. To the surprise of everybody he fished out a tremendous roll and paid the fine. The spectators considered it remarkable that a river-boss should carry such an amount. They had not been present at the interview between Jimmy and his principal the night before.

The latter stood near the door as the little man came out.

“Jimmy,” said Mr. Daly, distinctly, so that everyone could hear, “I am extremely sorry to see you in this trouble; but perhaps it may prove a lesson to you. Next time you must understand that you are not supposed to exceed your instructions.”

Thus did the wily Daly publicly disclaim his liability.

“Yes, sir,” said Jimmy, meekly. “Did you get the logs in time, Mr. Daly?”

They looked at each other steadily. Then, for the first and only time, the black and white mask of Jimmy’s inscrutability melted away. In his left eye appeared a faint glimmer. Then the left eyelid slowly descended.