The various mishaps took time, however, and when night fell they were still some miles from their destination, with rain again beginning.
"I'm purely afeared to risk Troublesome in the dark," said Uncle Adam. "Hit is well named—hit is full of quicks. We'll take the night here with Benjy Logan's folks, and go on to the Forks in the morning."
Controlling her disappointment as best she might, Isabel made friends with Benjy Logan's folks, slept with them, eight in a room, that night, and was treated with such kindness that she was almost reconciled to the delay.
Next morning the sky was clear, and their journey went well for an hour, until they turned into Troublesome Creek. Then, very soon, the wagon began to settle and sink, and the mules to strain in vain to pull it out.
"We've struck one," said Uncle Adam, calmly. "A man can't manage no way to shun all the quicks there is in this creek." He stepped out on the tongue and began ungearing the mules.
"I'll ride back yander to the last house we passed and get another team, and some men to help. You set right there on your feet and don't take no fear,—hit ain't aiming to settle much furder."
He rode back down the stream, and Isabel "sat on her feet" and watched the yellow "tide" hurry past her, and rise higher in the wagon-bed. Very soon, however, it seemed to reach its limit, and then she relaxed and abandoned herself to the spell of rushing water, green wooded slopes, and deep loneliness.
Her revery was broken by the plunging of a horse's hoofs in water, and the appearance of a horseman a short distance ahead. He rode straight down toward her, inquiring,—
"Did you strike a quick?"
"Yes," she said.