"No," said Keith; "I will take you, too: Hennson can take the boy. Can you walk at all?"
"I don't think so."
Keith made Hennson take the boy and hold on to him on one side, and slipping his arm around the injured man, he lifted him and they started back. He had put new courage into them, and the force of the current was in their favor. They passed the first high level, where he had found the others. When they reached a point where the water was too deep for the boy, Keith made the father take him on his shoulder, and they waded on through the blackness. The water was now almost up to his chin, and he grew so tired under his burden that he began to think they should never get out; but he fought against it and kept on, steadying himself against the timbers. He knew that if he went down it was the end. Many thoughts came to him of the past. He banished them and tried to speak words of encouragement, though he could scarcely hear himself.
"Shout," he said hoarsely; and the boy shouted, though it was somewhat feeble.
A moment later, he gave a shout of an entirely different kind.
"There is a light!" he cried.
The sound revived Keith's fainting energies, and he tried to muster his flagging strength. The boy shouted again, and in response there came back, strangely flattened, the shrill cry of a woman. Keith staggered forward with Bluffy, at times holding himself up by the side-timbers. He was conscious of a light and of voices, but was too exhausted to know more. If he could only keep the man and the boy above water until assistance came! He summoned his last atom of strength.
"Hold tight to the timbers, Hennson," he cried; "I am going."
The rest was a confused dream. He was conscious for a moment of the weight being lifted from him, and he was sinking into the water as if into a soft couch. He thought some one clutched him, but he knew nothing more.