“I’ll be glad to!” Allan cried, and ran indoors for his hat.
Reddy whistled again.
“We’re comin’,” called Jack. “We won’t be gone long,” he added to his wife, as they started down the path.
“All right, dear,” she answered. “An’ take good care o’ th’ boy.”
Reddy greeted Allan warmly, and thoroughly agreed with Jack that it was every boy’s duty to learn how to swim. Together they started off briskly toward the river—across the yards, picking their way carefully over the maze of tracks, then along the railroad embankment which skirted the stream, and finally through a corn-field to the water’s edge. The river looked very wide and still in the semidarkness, and Allan shivered a little as he looked at it; but the feeling passed in a moment. Reddy had his clothes off first, and dived in with a splash; Jack waded in to show Allan the depth. The boy followed, with sudden exhilaration, as he felt the cool water rise about him.
“This is different from a swimmin’-pool, ain’t it?” said Jack.
“Indeed it is!” agreed Allan; “and a thousand times nicer!”
“Now,” added Jack, “let me give you a lesson,” and he proceeded to instruct Allan in the intricacies of the broad and powerful breast stroke.
The boy was an apt pupil, and at the end of twenty minutes had mastered it sufficiently to be able to make fair progress through the water. He would have kept on practising, but Jack stopped him.
“We’ve been in long enough,” he said; “you mustn’t overdo it. Come along, Reddy,” he called to that worthy, who was disporting himself out in the middle of the current.