Right that minute I heard another yell coming from the direction of the tents, and it was Dragonfly racing toward us in flapping pajamas wanting to know what on earth was going on and why.
I yelled back to him from the boat I was already in, and said, “Hey, you—Dragonfly! Beat it down to Santa’s cabin and tell Big Jim and Circus to step on the gas and get Santa’s motor boat and come out to help us! There’s somebody drowning out there in the moonlight!”
As quick as anything, Poetry and I were on our way. Our boat had three life-preserver cushions in it—enough for Poetry and me and whoever was out there, which of course had to be John Till, I thought, on account of the whiskey bottle in the bottom of the boat that had just roared its way up onto our shore.
If our own boat should upset or something, and we were tossed out into the water, we could swim to our cushions and by keeping our bodies down under the water and holding onto the cushions for dear life, we could manage to keep our faces above water, and the cushions would hold us up.
Poetry and I sat in the middle seat, side by side, with Poetry sitting nearer the center than I so our boat would be well balanced, on account of he was almost a whole lot heavier than I was. Each one of us used an oar and we rowed as fast as we could in the direction the call for HELP had come from.
Our oars made a squeaking noise in the locks and the blades made a little splashing sound in the water, and also the waves plopping against the prow of the boat, made it hard for us to hear the call for help, and also hard to tell just which direction to go, but we kept on rowing hard, and I could see the shore getting farther and farther away. For a jiffy I was glad that my parents had taught me how to work on the farm and that I had muscles that sometimes felt as strong as the muscles of the man in a poem Poetry is always quoting, the Village Blacksmith, which goes,
“Under the spreading chestnut tree
The village smithy stands,
The smith—a mighty man is he,
With large and sinewy hands,