"My golly, Joe! this big current," said Yellow Billy, who, with Jimmy, was at the oars. "Must be goin' twenty mile."
"Twenty mile! you goose. We're goin' six or seven and that's mighty fast."
"I say, Joe," called Jimmy a second later, the boys having ceased rowing, for there was no further need, "bes' run her ashore, or we'll be carried out. By gosh, she's tearing away!"
"All right, mates, keep cool. There's the old mahogany ahead, we'll tie up there; we'll be there in a minute."
Yes, the boys would need all their coolness, for Joe was reckoning without up-to-date knowledge, and that made all the difference in the world. Rounding a clump of trees at this moment, or ever they were aware the boat fairly sucked into the channel of furiously rushing and tumultuously heaping waters that were finding their level by the newly made short-cut.
"Oh! oh! I—I say!" shouted Tom. "We're being swept into the river! Back water!"
Joe, quicker than the others, had hit the situation, and turned the boat's nose to a clump of bushes, but before the rowers could pick up their oars to help him the boat had swept past. Tom, it is true, made a frantic grasp at the bough, but the way on the boat was so strong that the branch, when the full force of the current bore on her at her momentary check, snapped like a pipe-stem, and the little craft was fair in the turgid stream, which had now the velocity of a water-race. The incident of the half-arrest, however, had turned her head up-stream, which was a providential thing. The river break-away was at most three hundred yards away. To turn the boat into the perpendicular sides of the channel was to court destruction; for, be it said, the maddened waters had excavated the banks until they rose sheer from the water's edge.
The necessities of the case came like an inspiration to Joe. The boat was drifting, as we have said, stern first, the advantage of which will be seen. Save Joe, whom the sense of responsibility braced to immediate action, the boys were speechless with consternation. One look at their blanched faces was sufficient. They were certainly alive to the dangers of the situation.
"Pull, boys! pull with all your might! We'll keep her head up. This'll check her speed a bit. It'll give her steerage way too, and save her gettin' broadside on."
The pullers put every ounce of strength into their strokes, and this was very helpful. The final rush into the cross-current was a most critical moment, and might easily have resulted in disaster. This was averted only by Joe's coolness and dexterity.