It was about the middle of the afternoon when the head of the drive reached the rapids.
“Now for some fun and a fast ride,” Jack shouted, as the speed of the log he was riding increased.
“You be mighty careful,” yelled Bob, who was on a big log some forty feet to the right. “This is a nasty place for a spill.”
The boys were within a few logs of the head of the drive, Jack being near the center of the river and Bob well over toward the right bank. Four of the men, including Jean, were near the left bank where they were having all they could do in keeping the logs from jamming up on the shore.
“They’re running mighty close,” Jack declared to himself, as he saw the head of the drive start to take the curve.
The river at this point was not more than a hundred feet wide and the words had hardly left his lips when the thing which they had all dreaded happened. The logs were crowded too closely together and as they reached the sharp bend they suddenly jammed.
“Back for your life,” Bob shouted; and Jack, quick to see what had happened, turned and ran from log to log diagonally back toward the right bank.
He reached the shore in safety, and as he stopped beside Bob he gasped:
“Just look at them pile up.”
“Some mess, I’ll say,” Bob returned, as he watched the huge logs, urged on by the rapid current, pile one on top of the other, until many of them were several feet above the level of the river.