"But how am I to get aboard," asked the agent, perplexed.
"You might swim," suggested Bob, "or wade. The water is shallow—not higher than your neck, anywhere."
"That is nonsense. Steer your boat to shore, that I may board her."
"It can't be done, Mr. Wolverton. We can only drift down with the current."
"Then how am I to get aboard?"
"That is your lookout."
Just then Mr. Wolverton espied the flat-bottomed boat which Bob proposed to take with him. He had attached it by a line to the stern of the ferry-boat.
"Row over and take me across."
"I can't spare the time."
Wolverton was about to give vent to his wrath at this refusal, when he observed a boat approaching, rowed by a German boy named Otto Brandes.