He began to wonder what he would do with her if they ever got back to some kind of civilisation, and could only console himself with the poor consolation that they were never likely to do so. For to be on an unknown river, going into the unknown with no food and little chance of any, and a savage set of headhunters after them, seemed heavy odds against a lucky termination to their wanderings. He was glad to slave at the paddle to keep from speculating.
And as Smith worked, the whole adventure assumed the peculiar quality of a dream. It was just that kind of vision which sometimes comes to a man who has had adventures. Often in the old days, when in some kind of ease, he had dreamed such dreams, which began suddenly with his going somewhere in a strange impossible land, with some strange and yet more impossible perils in front of him. As he thought of the last week or two, it seemed to him that he had never left New Find at all. Was not the whole adventure of the nature of a nightmare. He had suffered dream thirst, and dream hunger, and had come into a mere vision of mixed origin, of knowledge and fantasy, and had handled fairy gold. And now he and his dream companions were stretched on the rack of imagination, toiling down a black river, margined by ghostly trees, clear-cut against a gibbous moon, with pre-historic devils behind them. For he conceived it as possible that no one would credit their story if they ever returned. But, then, the girl was with them. If they brought her back, and did obtain belief through her corroboration, it pleased him to think that he could make a rare stir in the world of travel. At the very notion, ambitions long dead within him began to lift their heads. But was not that the biggest dream of all?
By this time the moon, which had been almost in front of them for some time as their river turned nearly due west, came closer to the trees, and was soon hidden. It was now close on midnight, perhaps even later, and he was conscious of feeling fatigued.
"Spell, oh!" he said softly, and they floated idly for some minutes.
"I've been thinking, Baker," he said, "that the most dangerous time for us will be in the early morning. For if they go for the canoes and see we have them, as they must, and if they do determine to chase us, they will surely have the savvy to go as fast as they can down the river, and wait for us. At the utmost, we can't have done much more than thirty miles when it begins to get light. And if they aren't scared of going into an unknown country, they can do that too, if they hurry and trot a bit."
The Baker nodded.
"And what's your notion?"
"I think as soon as it begins to show the first sign of dawn we had better shove the canoes into the bank here, hide them, and lie up and see what happens. What's the girl think, I wonder."
"She's asleep," said the Baker. "Poor little devil."
She was lying in the bottom of the canoe, with her head on the Baker's knees.