For the young Frenchman had suddenly started up in the boat, to stand peering in the direction that they were about to take, and held up his hand as if to command silence.
“What’s that?” cried Rodd, leaping up too.
“What?” asked the doctor.
“Sounds like distant roaring of some kind of wild beast, sir,” said one of the men.
“That it aren’t, messmate,” said Joe, who had also risen to his feet, and stood with his hand behind his ear. “It’s another storm coming. Nay, it aren’t. It’s all bright and clear that way. Why, it’s water, gentlemen, coming with a rush from just the way we want to go.”
“Impossible!” cried the doctor. “Why, it would be against the stream.”
“I don’t care, sir, begging your pardon. I’ve been in the Trent and the Severn and the Wye. It was only when I was a boy, but I recollect right enough. It’s what they used to call a bore, with a great wave of water coming up the river like a flood and washing all before it.”
“Had we better land?” cried the doctor.
“And lose our boat, sir? No. Be smart, my lads. It can’t be very far away. All eight of you, oars out, and we must keep our head to it so as we can ride over the big wave and let it pass under us. I don’t suppose there will be much of it. It’s a sort of flood water coming down from yonder after the storm, and it will soon be over. Don’t you worry about it, gentlemen. It will be nothing to a big wave at sea.”
The men made ready with all the discipline of a trained crew, and heads were turned in the direction of the increasing sound, while it seemed hard to believe, in the midst of the brilliant sunshine, with the smooth river gliding onwards as if to meet the supposed wave, that there could be anything wrong.