I met a fellow with an axe on his shoulder. I shouted to him before I reached him:
“Hello! did you see a boat—a house, I mean,—floating up the river?”
“A boat-house?” asked the man.
“No, a house-boat,” I gasped.
“Didn't see nuthin' like it,” said the man, and he passed on, to his wife and home, no doubt. But me! Oh, where was my wife and my home?
I met several people, but none of them had seen a fugitive canal-boat.
How many thoughts came into my brain as I ran along that river road! If that wretched boarder had not taken the rudder for an ironing table he might have steered in shore! Again and again I confounded—as far as mental ejaculations could do it—his suggestions.
I was rapidly becoming frantic when I met a person who hailed me.
“Hello!” he said, “are you after a canal-boat adrift?”
“Yes,” I panted.