They went on, keeping, so far as they could judge, midway between reef and beach, but after a time the lead showed shoaling water and Jake used the boathook instead. Then the sky cleared and a half-moon came out, and they saw haze and the loom of trees outshore of them. Slowing the engine, they moved on cautiously while the water gradually got shallower, until glistening banks of mud began to break the surface. Then they stopped the engine, but found the launch still moved forward.
“I imagine it’s about four hours’ flood,” Dick remarked. “That means the water will rise for some time yet, and although the current’s with us now I think we can’t be far off the meeting of the tides.”
Jake nodded. In places of the kind, the stream often runs in from both ends until it joins and flows in one direction from the shoalest spot.
“Then we ought to find a channel leading out on the other side.”
They let the engine run for a few minutes until the boat touched bottom and stuck fast in the mud. The wind seemed to be falling and the roar of the surf had got fainter. Thin haze dimmed the moonlight and there were strange splashings in the water that gently lapped about the belts of mud. The stream stopped running, but seeing no passage they waited and smoked.
“If we can get out on the other side, we oughtn’t to be very far from the lagoon,” Jake suggested.
Presently there was a faint rippling against the bows and the launch began to swing round.
“The tide’s coming through from the other end,” said Dick. “We may find a channel if we can push her across the mud.”
For half an hour they laboriously poled her with a long oar and the boathook between the banks of mire. Sometimes she touched and stuck until the rising water floated her off, and sometimes she scraped along the bottom, but still made progress. They were breathless and soaked with perspiration, while the foul scum that ran off the oar stained their damp clothes. Then Jake’s boathook sank a foot or two deeper and finding the depth as good after a few vigorous pushes, they started the engine.
Sour exhalations rose from the wake of the churning screw and there was a curious dragging feel in the boat’s motion, as if she were pulling a body of water after her, but this was less marked when Jake found three or four feet, and by and by he threw down the pole and they went half-speed ahead. After a time, the mangroves outshore got farther off, the air smelt fresher, and small ripples broke the surface of the widening channel. They went full-speed, the trees faded, and a swell that set her rocking met the boat, although there still seemed to be a barrier of sand or mud between her and open sea.