I remember jumping—it must have been five feet—and I landed half in, half out of the water. I remember clinging a moment, then pulling myself aboard. I heard shouts from the others as the current swept them into the canyon. I remember looking round and cursing because both sweeps had been lost overboard, and lastly I remember bending over Berna and shouting in her ear:
"All right, I'm with you!"
If an angel had dropped from high heaven to her rescue I don't believe the girl could have been more impressed. For a moment she stared at me unbelievingly. I was kneeling by her and she put her hands on my shoulders as if to prove to herself that I was real. Then, with a half-sob, half-cry of joy, she clasped her arms tightly around me. Something in her look, something in the touch of her slender, clinging form made my heart exult. Once again I shouted in her ear.
"It's all right, don't be frightened. We'll pull through, all right."
Once more we had whirled off into the main current; once more we were in that roaring torrent, with its fearsome dips and rises, its columned walls corroded with age and filled with the gloom of eternal twilight. The water smashed and battered us, whirled us along relentlessly, lashed us in heavy sprays; yet with closed eyes and thudding hearts we waited. Then suddenly the light grew strong again. The primæval walls were gone. We were sweeping along smoothly, and on either side of us the valley sloped in green plateaus up to the smiling sky.
I unlocked my arms and peered down to where her face lay half hidden on my breast.
"Thank God, I was able to reach you!"
"Yes, thank God!" she answered faintly. "Oh, I thought it was all over. I nearly died with fear. It was terrible. Thank God for you!"
But she had scarce spoken when I realised, with a vast shock, that the danger was far from over. We were hurrying along helplessly in that fierce current, and already I heard the roar of the Squaw Rapids. Ahead, I could see them dancing, boiling, foaming, blood-red in the sunset glow.
"Be brave, Berna," I had to shout again; "we'll be all right. Trust me, dear!"