"What's the matter?" Bivens yelled above the howl of the wind. "You're pushing against me, just spinning around. Why don't you keep her straight?"
Stuart saw they could never make headway by that method, turned and shot back into the marsh.
"Get out!" he shouted sternly. "You can walk along the edge—I can shove her alone."
Bivens grumbled, but did as he was ordered.
"Don't you leave the edge of that marsh ten feet!" Stuart shouted, cheerfully. "I think we'll make it now."
"All right," was the sullen answer.
It was a question whether one man had the strength to shove the little boat through the icy, roaring waters and keep her off the shore. He did it successfully for a hundred yards and the wind and sea became so fierce he was driven in and could make no headway. He called Bivens, gave him an oar and made him walk in the edge of the water and hold the boat off while he placed his oar on the mud bottom and pushed with might and main to drive her ahead.
Again and again he was on the point of giving up the struggle. It seemed utterly hopeless.
It took two hours of desperate battling to make half a mile through the white, blinding, freezing, roaring waters.
The yacht now lay but three hundred feet away from the edge of the marsh. Stuart could see her snow-white side glistening in the phosphorescent waves as they swept by her. The lights were gleaming from her windows and he could see Nan's figure pass in the cabin.