"It sounds horribly close!" said Lisbeth.
"Sound is very deceptive, you know," I answered.
"Only last month a boat went over, and the man was drowned!" shuddered Lisbeth.
"Poor chap!" I said. "Of course it's different at night--the river is awfully deserted then, you know, and----"
"But it happened in broad daylight!" said Lisbeth, almost in a whisper. She was sitting half turned from me, her gaze fixed on the bend of the river, and by chance her restless hand had found and begun to fumble with the severed painter.
So we drifted on, watching the gliding banks, while every moment the roar of the weir grew louder and more threatening.
"Dick," she said suddenly, "we can never pass that awful place without oars!" and she began to tie knots in the rope with fingers that shook pitifully.
"Oh, I don't know!" I returned, with an assumption of ease I was very far from feeling; "and then, of course, we are bound to meet a boat or something----"
"But suppose we don't?"
"Oh, well, we aren't there yet--and--er--let's talk of fish."