away than he had calculated, and it took him fully five minutes to
get in the vicinity of it. The sky had clouded over a bit, hiding
the stars, so he could see little or nothing on the water. On the
shore he could see the two torches that the doctor's son was waving
and that was all.

At last Snap saw the dark object directly ahead of him. By this
time he was somewhat exhausted by his swim and he was glad to
think that he would soon be able to rest. Then he made a discovery
which did not please him at all.

The object was nothing more than a part of a fallen tree, the
trunk resting half in and half out of the water and several branches
sticking out in as many directions. At a distance it looked a
little like the rowboat but the resemblance faded completely as
he got closer.

"Too bad! I thought it was the boat sure!" he murmured. "Well,
I'll have to rest on the log a bit, before I strike out for shore."

He swam up to one of the branches and caught hold of it. He was
on the point of reaching for the tree trunk when an unusual sound
came to his ears.

Then Snap made a discovery that almost took his breath from him.
On the tree trunk rested a big wildcat, it's eyes gleaming fiercely
at the youth in the water!