Bess, with a wild scream of fear, cast herself into Nan’s arms.
“We’ll be drowned! we’ll be drowned!” was her cry.
Nan thought so, too, but she tried to remain calm.
The water fairly boiled about them. It jumped and pitched most awfully. The water that came inboard threatened to swamp the canoe.
Peril, Nan had faced before; but nothing like this. Each moment, as the canoe staggered on and the waves rose higher and the wind shrieked louder, Nan believed that they were nearer and nearer to death.
She did not see how they could possibly escape destruction. The sea fairly yawned for them. The canoe sank lower and lower as the foam-streaked water slopped in over the gunnels. They were going to be swamped!
CHAPTER XIV
IN THE NICK OF TIME
Bess Harley clung to her chum in an agony of apprehension. Perhaps Nan would have utterly given way to terror, too, had she not felt herself obliged to bolster up poor Bess.
The wind shrieked so about the two girls, and the roar of the rain and sea so deafened them, that Nan could offer little verbal comfort. She could only hug Bess close to her and pat her shoulder caressingly.