“We must be getting close to the big portage now,” said Rob to Moise, as they reached this part of the river.
“Yes,” said Moise, “pretty soon no more water we’ll could ron.”
Moise’s speech was almost prophetic. In less than half an hour after that moment they met with the first really serious accident of the entire journey, and one which easily might have resulted disastrously to life as well as to property.
They were running a piece of water where a flat rapid dropped down without much disturbance toward a deep bend where the current swung sharply to the right. A little island was at one side, on which there had been imbedded the roots of a big tree, which had come down as driftwood. The submerged branch of this tree, swinging up and down in the violent current, made one of the dangerous “sweepers” which canoemen dread. Both Rob and Moise thought there was plenty of room to get by, but just as they cleared the basin-like foot of the rapid the Mary Ann suddenly came to a stop, hard and fast amidships, on a naked limb of the tree which had been hidden in the discolored waters at the time.
As is usual in all such accidents, matters happened very quickly. The first thing they knew the boat was lifted almost bodily from the water. There was the cracking noise of splintering wood, and an instant later, even as the white arm of the tree sunk once more into the water, the Mary Ann sunk down, weak and shattered, her back broken square across, although she still was afloat and free.
Rob gave a sudden shout of excitement and began to paddle swiftly to the left, where the bank was not far away. Moise joined him, and they reached the shore none too soon, their craft half full of water, for not only had the keel to the lower ribs of the boat been shattered by the weight thus suspended amidships, but the sheathing had been ripped and torn across, so that when they dragged the poor Mary Ann up the beach she was little more than the remnant of herself.
The others, coming down the head of the rapid a couple of hundred yards to the rear, saw this accident, and now paddled swiftly over to join the shipwrecked mariners, who luckily had made the shore.
“It’s bad, boys,” said Rob, hurrying down to catch the prow of the Jaybird as she came alongside. “Just look at that!”
They all got out now and discharged the cargo of the Mary Ann, including the heavy grizzly hide, which very likely was the main cause of the accident, its weight having served to fracture the stout fabric of the plucky little boat. When they turned her over the case looked rather hopeless.
“She’s smashed almost to her rail,” said Rob, “and we’ve broken that already. It’s that old grizzly hide that did it, I’m sure. We lit fair on top of that ‘sweeper,’ and our whole weight was almost out of the water when it came up below us. Talk about the power of water, I should say you could see it there, all right—it’s ripped our whole ship almost in two! I don’t see how we can fix it up this time.”