"Can you steer into this opening?" called Harriet.
"I am afraid I can't," answered Miss Elting. "You will have to put me aboard, Jane, I'll have Hazel help you pull in; then we shall have to push the rest of the way."
Harriet Burrell sprang on board a few minutes later. She set Miss Elting and Margery at work with poles at the stern of the boat pushing, as soon as they entered the shallow water. Tommy had been posted on the upper deck, from which the awning posts had been removed. Tommy's business was to hold her arms out at right angles to her body and by moving them as directed indicate to Harriet which way to steer. It will be remembered that Harriet was unable to see over the deckhouse from where she stood when guiding the craft. She could see only by leaning out on either side.
They entered the narrow channel very slowly. But no sooner had they gotten well in than a cry from Tommy Thompson told them that the little lisping girl was in trouble.
Tommy had been swept from her feet by the foliage. Not only that, but in floundering about she had rolled over the side of the boat. A mighty splash and a second cry gave additional evidence that Tommy was in further difficulties.
"Help me! I'm in the water!" she screamed, coming up sputtering and coughing.
"Stay there and push," answered Harriet, laughing so that she bumped the nose of the houseboat into the bank on the right side of the creek. "You can't get any wetter. The water is shallow. Come. Don't hold up the ship."
Tommy had no intention of pushing. Her sole ambition at this moment was to get aboard.
"You may do your own piloting after thith," she declared, sitting down on the stern of the boat with a suggestion of a sob in her voice.
"There, there, Tommy. You must learn to take the bitter with the sweet. We must do that all through life," comforted Harriet wisely. "You aren't hurt."