As Serge hurriedly tried to comply with this request, his pole, catching under the moving mass, was snapped short off. A strong wind was blowing off the land, and instantly both lads realized the danger of their situation.
“How could I have been so careless!” exclaimed poor Serge, his face pale with dismay. “It wasn’t your carelessness, old man; it was mine,” replied Phil. “If I hadn’t left that wretched pole on shore, we could have managed her easy enough. Now I am going to do my best to repair my fault.”
As he spoke, the impetuous lad began pulling off his boots.
“No, Phil, you mustn’t try that,” said Serge, at the same time laying a detaining hand on the other’s shoulder. “The water is too cold for you to swim to the shore and back again. Besides, I doubt if you could catch the raft, at the rate the wind is now moving her.”
“But I can wade more than half-way,” objected Phil.
“Not on this sticky mud bottom. I don’t believe you could wade ten steps.”
“What can we do, then? We can’t sit tamely here and drift out to sea. Oh, Serge, the horror of it! the terror! the awfulness! We can’t endure it again. Let us both take to the water, and make a try for the shore together. Yes, old man, that is what we must do! There is no other way.”
With this, Phil, who had already got rid of his boots, began to throw off his coat.
“Hold on, Phil! I see something that looks like a boat! Yes, it is a native boat coming from up the beach, and towards us.”
Serge was right. In a few minutes more a large bidarrah, filled with native employés of the trading-post, drew near, and its occupants stopped rowing a short distance from the raft, to see what the lads were doing.