“How do I know?” answered that worthy, or more properly, that unworthy.
“I thought you knew the river. You shipped as a pilot,” said the boy. “Hard on the starboard, boys; hard on the starboard! There, that’ll do. Let her float now!”
Then turning to Jim, he said again:—
“You shipped as a pilot. You pretended to know the river. Probably you do know it better than you now pretend. You deliberately ran us into this channel. You did it on purpose. You must know the chute then. What did you do it for? What do you mean by it?”
“Yes, I shipped as a pilot,” answered the surly fellow, “but I shipped without pay, you will remember. I was careful to assume no obligation for which I could be held responsible in law.”
Phil started back in amazement. Neither the sentence nor the assured forethought that lay behind it fitted at all the character of the ignorant lout that the man who spoke had pretended to be. Phil now clearly saw that all this man’s pretences had been false, that his character and his personality had been assumed, and that, for some purpose known only to himself, the fellow had been deceiving him from the start. Not altogether deceiving him, however, for Phil’s suspicions had already been so far aroused that it could not be said that he had been hoodwinked completely. But for these suspicions, indeed, he would not now so readily have observed the man’s speech and behavior. He would not so accurately have interpreted his truculence when he commanded him to “go to a sweep,” and the man answered, “Not if I know it!” and went to the cabin instead.
But at that moment Phil had no time to deal further with the fellow, or even to think of him. For just as dark was falling, the flatboat swung around a sharp bend in the chute, and came suddenly face to face with a great, roaring, glaring, glittering steamboat that was running the chute up stream at racing speed.
The steamboat whistled madly, and reversed her engines full force. The captain, the pilot, both the mates, all the deck-hands, all the roustabouts, and most of the male passengers on board shouted in chorus, with much of objurgation for punctuation marks, to know what the flatboat meant by running the chute down stream.
Phil paid no attention to the hullabaloo, but gave his whole mind to the problem of navigating his own craft. The steamboat’s wheels, as she backed water so mightily, threw forward great waves which, catching the flatboat under the bow, drove her stern-on toward the bank. By a vigorous use of the sweeps, and a great deal of tugging on his own part at the steering-oar, Phil managed to slew the boat around in time to prevent her going ashore; and fortunately there was just passageway enough to let her slip by the steamer, grazing the guards in passing.