Drawing in their oars the two lonely, tired and hungry boys threw themselves in the bottom of the boat and too weary even to talk lay gazing up at the stars. The boat rocked gently to the tiny ripples on the lagoon; from the swamps came the droning chant of frogs and insects; fireflies flitted by like tiny meteors; the water lapped soothingly against the boat’s planks and lulled by the sounds and the soft night air the boys slept.
Tom was the first to awake. For an instant he lay still, dazed, not remembering where he was and dimly aware of a strange, monotonous, resonant sound that somehow seemed to vibrate and throb through his brain, the boat and the night air.
He nudged Frank. “Wake up!” he half whispered, “wake up! The moon’s out and we’ve got to be going on.”
Then, as Frank sleepily opened his eyes and yawned, Tom spoke again.
“Hear that noise?” he asked. “What is it?”
Frank, now wide awake, sat up. He too heard the sound, a noise so unlike anything else he had ever heard that he felt cold shivers chasing up and down his spine.
“I—I don’t know!” he stammered. “It’s uncanny—perhaps it’s a frog or a night bird or something. Say, where are we?”
Then, for the first time, Tom noticed their surroundings. No longer were they on the lagoon. On either side, rose tall trees looming black and gigantic against the moonlit sky and by the glint of the light upon the ripples the boys could see that the narrow waterway ran swiftly.
“Crickey, we’ve drifted while we were asleep!” cried Frank. “Now we are lost.”
“Well, we’re drifting with the tide anyway,” said Tom, trying bravely to be cheerful. “And it’s bound to take us out somewhere to open water.”