A breathless few minutes succeeded. Jack steered for the widest space he could see between the rocks. Those who were sitting down still could not see much of what was ahead, but the roar of the water was now sufficiently terrifying. Moving of a piece with the current as they were, it seemed as if they were not moving, but that the broken rocks were striding to meet them, not very fast, but inexorably. It was hard to sit and wait.
Then as they came close they saw how the water slipped silkily over the reef with the dark shadows showing like teeth beneath, and boiled up below. The women cried out sharply, and the men turned pale. It suddenly became evident how fast the heavy raft was moving.
"Throw yourselves flat and hang on!" Jack shouted.
They obeyed. There was a dreadful moment of waiting, while the roar of the water filled their ears. Then she struck. One side of the raft slid up on a submerged shelf, the floor tilted at a steep angle, and the current surged over the lower side, sweeping everything movable off. Jack stood up to his knees in the torrent, pushing desperately at the heavy sweep. He budged her inch by inch.
"Lie still!" he shouted. "For your lives! We'll make it yet!"
But panic seized upon his passengers. Somebody scrambled for the high side of the raft, and the rest followed. The strain was too great for the lashings. A rope parted somewhere, and the floor instantly heaved up beneath them. There was a brief, wild confusion of thrashing, tangled logs and feeble human bodies. Then the whole thing, logs, bodies, baggage, and playing cards was swept over into the deep, rough water below.
When Jack came to the surface he had a confused impression of bobbing heads and logs on every side. He seized the nearest log, and unstrapping the cartridge belt and the gun that were drowning him, buckled it on. Meanwhile, he was looking for the long hair of the women. He reached one of them in six strokes. A pair of clutching arms reached for him, but he dived, and seizing her by the collar, towed her to the nearest log. It was Linda.
Leaving her supported, he trod water looking for Kate. He saw more streaming hair not far away, and reached the spot as she rose again. There was sterner stuff here; her face was white and wild, but her arms were under control. She put her hands on Jack's shoulders as he commanded, and he brought her likewise to a log. A little brown box came bobbing by, Linda's jewel-case. Kate coolly put out her hand and secured it.
All this had taken but a minute. Jack looked about him. Everything was being carried down of a piece with the current, and they were all close together. It seemed to Jack as if the whole face of the river was littered with playing cards. He had a particular impression of the deuce of clubs. Vassall was helping Baldwin Ferrie to a log, and Humpy Jull had secured the log that bore Jack's cartridge belt. Only Sir Bryson was missing. Farther out Jack saw a feeble commotion, and no log near.
"See to the women!" he called to Vassall. "There's a backwater inshore. Humpy, save that belt as you value your life!"