"Well, I think we'd better clear out, anyhow. Let's go over to the mill.
Say, Dorothy, shan't we?"

"Wait. There comes another wave."

The second onset was not so violent; but they hastened to gather together
a few blankets, and the boys filled their pockets with cookies, with a
delightful sense of unusualness and peril almost equal to a shipwreck or an
attack by Indians. Dorothy took her unlucky chickens under her cloak, and
they made a rush all together across the road and up the slope to the mill.

"Why didn't we think to bring a lantern?" said Dorothy, as they huddled
together on the platform of the scale. "Will thee go back after one, Shep?"

"If Reuby'll go, too."

"Well, _my_ legs are wet enough now. What's the use of a lantern? Mighty
Moses! What's that?"

"The old mill's got under way," cried Shep. "_She's_ going to tune up for
Kingdom Come."

A furious head of water was rushing along the race; the great wheel creaked
and swung over, and with a shudder the old mill awoke from its long sleep.
The cogs clenched their teeth, the shafting shook and rattled, the stones
whirled merrily round.

"Now she goes it!" cried Shep, as the humming increased to a tremor, and
the tremor to a wild, unsteady din, till the timbers shook and the bolts
and windows rattled. "I just wish father could hear them old stones hum."