Jack himself had gone through a thrilling experience, which he would hardly care to have duplicated. He was trembling some too, now that the necessity for prompt action and quick thought was gone.
"But didn't she respond to the wheel fine though, Jimmie?" he asked: just as if the boat deserved all the credit. "If it had been the clumsy old Comfort now, nothing would have saved her, she's so slow to mind her helm."
Jimmie had ideas of his own about the matter. What they were he did not choose to put into words just then; but the way his kindling eyes surveyed his friend made it easy to guess.
"An' did ye notice how soon the pilot blowed his whistle?" he remarked, as they resumed their course. "Small use that same would have been to us afther a smash. Sure, I'd taken it for Gabriel's trump calling us to the resurrection, I would."
"Well, let's forget it if we can, and talk of something more pleasant," observed Jack, who was now urging the little boat nearer the shore than ever, since it appeared they had been in the path of up-river craft, hugging the Illinois bank.
Of course he had again reduced the engine to half speed; and his vigilance was not in the least relaxed.
"Give me warning if you ever even think you see anything ahead, Jimmie," he remarked a little later. "Then we can get ready to head in, while we're trying to make out what it is. But I'll be glad when this beastly day is over, that's what."
"Amen!" said Jimmie, with due reverence; for that expressed his own feeling to a dot.
The time crept on slowly. They had passed under the great railroad bridge at Rock Island, and even navigated the river at this dangerous point, where craft were moving in many directions. And as the afternoon wore away, with mile after mile left behind, Jack, who had taken occasional furtive looks at his maps, concluded from certain signs that they were within ten miles of Burlington.
"It's nearly four, Jimmie, and we'd better be hunting a place to put in for the night, I don't just fancy anchoring here on the open water in this fog. And as to going on, what's the use, when a big city looms up a few miles ahead? We couldn't get past it without cribbing on the time that doesn't count. So keep your eyes on the watch for anything that looks like a creek."