He had again seated himself, even while he was speaking, and Mort Hopkins hardly knew why he didn't resist the sudden seizure of those oars.
Then there came a surprise to both of them, for the stranger made the Ark spin around, and get her head up stream, and glide away over the water, after a fashion to which she was entirely unaccustomed.
"Quill," said Mort, "he can row."
"Mister," said Quill, "did you bring any lunch with you?"
"I did, my young friend. I am provisioned for the voyage. Is it a long one?"
"All the way up Taponican Creek, and it just meandrews."
"You don't say! Have to tack around the short corners, and all that sort of thing. Are the natives at all dangerous?"
"Never been there," said Mort, "'cept once, when father and Uncle Hiram and the Dutch house-painter went to Pawg a-fishin', and took me along."
"Did they catch anything?"
"Guess they did; but they had things to catch 'em with. Something better than that there whip-stalk and a spool o' thread."