Biff couldn’t wrench those branches loose from their trunks in time to save Kamuka. In fact, to push anything out from the bank looked like a hopeless plan. The best way to help would be by a pull straight up. Biff realized that, when he saw Kamuka look up toward the lowest bough, six feet or more above his head.
Biff felt the soft bank giving way beneath him
If only Kamuka could reach that far!
That thought gave Biff the answer. Skirting the quicksand, he climbed one of the trees and started working out on its lowest thick branch, hand over hand, toward the spot where Kamuka, now nearly shoulder-deep in the muck, still looked up hopefully.
So far, Biff had been worrying whether the bough would prove strong enough. Now he was wishing that it would bend more. Biff was dangling near Kamuka, but not quite above him; and it was impossible for the Indian boy to shift his position in the quicksand. But Biff was able to do the next best thing.
Locking his hands over the thick branch, Biff began a pendulum swing, out and back—out and back—bringing his ankles closer to Kamuka’s reach. Kamuka made one clutch and missed, but on the next swing Biff practically placed his ankle in the Indian boy’s grasp.
Kamuka caught Biff’s other ankle in the same fashion, and Biff, slanting a glance downward, saw the other boy’s face smiling grimly from between those upstretched arms. Kamuka’s voice came calmly. “Hold tight, Biff. I will pull up slowly.”
Now Biff was glad that the bough was a stout one, for he could feel it give under Kamuka’s added weight. Biff tried to work himself higher by bending his arms and turning them along the branch, so that he could use his hands to grip his opposite wrists.
That helped at first, but Kamuka’s weight kept increasing as he emerged gradually from the ooze, and the strain made Biff’s shoulders feel as if they would pull from their sockets. But by then, Kamuka had worked clear of the quicksand’s suction. He caught Biff’s belt with one hand; then the other. Next, he was clamping Biff’s shoulder and finally the tree branch.