XXVIII
IN SIGHT OF SAFETY
Once more, as had now been their custom for several days, in their anxiety to get as far forward as possible each day, our party arose before dawn. If truth were told, perhaps few of them had slept soundly the night through, and as they went about their morning duties they spoke but little. They realized that, though many of their dangers now might be called past, perhaps the worst of them, indeed, they still were not quite out of the woods.
Moise, who had each night left a water-mark, reported that the river during the night had risen nearly a foot. Even feeling as they did that the worst of the rapids were passed, the leaders of the party were a trifle anxious over this report, Leo not less than the others, for he well remembered how the rising waters had wiped out such places as the Death Eddy, which once he had known familiarly. They all knew that the rise of a foot here in the broader parts of the river would mean serious trouble in any cañon.
“How far now, Leo?” asked John once more of the Indian guide, on whom they placed their main reliance.
“Maybe-so forty mile, maybe fifty,” said Leo. “Maybe not run far now. Down there ten mile, come Tom Boyd farm. Steamboat come there maybe. Then can go home on steamboat, suppose our boat is bust.”
“Well, the Bronco isn’t quite busted,” said Uncle Dick, “but she has sprung something of a leak, and we’ll have to do a little calking before we can start out with her this morning. Come on, Moise, let’s see what we can do.”
So saying, they two went down to repair an injury which one of the boats had sustained on a rock. Of course, in this lining down, with the boats close inshore in the shallower water, they often came in contact with the rocks, so that, although both the boats were practically new, the bottom boards were now ragged and furry. A long crack in the side of the Bronco showed the force with which a boat sometimes could be driven by the swift current, even when the men were taking the best of care to keep it off the rocks.
“Leo doesn’t tell much about his plans, does he?” remarked Rob. “I was thinking all the time we’d have to run the whole fifty miles to Revelstoke.”