If anything should happen to the dam, if it should burst, the enormous
quantity of water held in leash by the structure would pour over the
village and cover half the houses to their chimney tops.

Two bridges crossed the river at Elmvale; one at the village proper and
the other just below the dam itself and about half a mile from the first
mill, Barron & Brothers' Thread Factory.

"Let's take the upper road," proposed Frenchy, as the car came within
sight of the chimneys of the Elmvale mills. "We've plenty of time before
the noon whistle blows. I haven't been up by the dam since before we all
joined the Navy."

"Just as you fellows say," Al responded, and turned into a side road
that soon brought them above the mills on the ridge overlooking the
valley.

"I say, fellows," Whistler stopped whistling long enough to observe,
"there's a slue of water behind that dam. S'pose she should let go all
of a sudden?"

"I'd rather be up here than down there," Al said.

"Oi, oi!" croaked Ikey, "you said something."

"I wonder if they guard that dam as they say they do the munition
factories," Frenchy put in.

Al turned the machine into the road that descended into the valley by a
sharp incline. In sight of the bridge which crossed the river Whistler