"No, indeed; I dug it up whole out of my literary imagination. If I should tumble overboard you want to be sure to save the pieces, if you ever hope to see a fire again. Are we all ready?"
Five minutes later they had taken their lives in their hands and were shooting the rapids. With the laden canoe the paddling was an entirely different proposition. Mile after mile the quick water held, with only the shortest of reaches between Scylla and Charybdis for the breath-catching. At first the keen strain of it keyed nerve and muscle to the snapping-point; but after a time the fine wine of peril had its due and exhilarating effect, and they shouted and laughed, calling to each other above the turmoil of the waters, gasping joyously when the spray from the white-fanged boulders slapped them in the face, and having the luck of the innocent or the drunken, since disaster held aloof and they escaped with nothing more serious than the spray wettings.
Though light-heartedness thus sat in the saddle—or knelt on the paddling-mat—prudence was not wholly banished. At noon, when they pulled out at the foot of a quiet reach to make a pot of tea, they found that they were at the head of a rapid too swift and tortuous to offer anything but certain catastrophe. While the tea water was heating Prime went ahead to reconnoitre.
"Too many chances," he reported on his return. "And, besides, the carry is only a few hundred yards. It means more hard work, but we can't afford to run the risk."
"Oh, dear me!" sighed the young woman in mock despair; "have we got to unload that canoe piece by piece, and then carry and load it all over again?"
"We shall doubtless have to do it so many times that we shall count that day lost when we are denied the opportunity," Prime laughed. "But, Heaven helping us, we shall make no more three-mile portages, as we did yesterday."
The task did not seem quite so formidable after they had broken their fast. Moreover, in the repeated packings and unpackings, they were gaining facility. With the dunnage transported they were ready to attack the birch-bark, and Lucetta had an inspiration.
"Haven't I seen a picture somewhere of the old voyageurs carrying their canoes on their heads?" she asked.
"Why, of course!" said Prime. "Why didn't we think of that last night? I believe I could carry it that way alone. Now, then, over she goes and up she goes; you set the pace, and for pity's sake don't stumble."
Nobody stumbled, and in due time the canoe was launched below the rapids, was reloaded, and the paddling was resumed. This day, which ended in a snug camp at the foot of a stretch of slow water which had kept them paddling all the afternoon, was a fair sample of their days through the remainder of the week. Night after night, after they had been shooting rapids, or making long carries, or paddling steadily through stretches where the current did not go fast enough for them, Prime found Lucetta's prophecy as to his growth coming true. Day by day he was finding himself anew, advancing by leaps and bounds, as it seemed, into a stronger and fresher and simpler manhood.