For a moment the girl sat paralysed with terror as her brain grasped the full gravity of her position. The wind had risen, and blowing up river, kicked up waves that struck the boat with sledgehammer force and broke over the gunwales. Overhead the thunder roared incessantly, while about her the thick, black dark burst momentarily into vivid blazes of light that revealed the long slash of the driving rain, and the heaving bosom of the river, with its tossing burden of uprooted trees—revealed, also her trembling horse, and the form of the unconscious Texan lying with face awash in the bottom of the boat. His hat, floating from side to side as the craft rocked in the waves, brushed the horse's heels, and he lashed out viciously, his iron-shod hoofs striking the side of the boat with a force that threatened to tear the planking loose. The incident galvanized her into action. If those hoofs had struck the Texan? And if he were not already dead, suppose he should drown in the filthy water in the bottom of the boat? Carefully, she worked the frightened animal to the Added to the physical discomfort came torturing thoughts of their plight. Each moment carried her farther and farther from Timber City—from Win. When the lightning flashed she caught glimpses of the shore, but always it appeared the same distance away. The boat was holding to the Inaction became unbearable, and shifting the body of the Texan so that his head would remain clear of the ever deepening wash in the bottom of the boat, she seized the pole and worked frantically. But after a few moments she realized the futility of her puny efforts to deviate the heavy craft a hair's breadth from its course. The tree-root that had knocked the Texan unconscious had descended upon the boat, and remained locked over the gunwale, holding the trunk with its high-flung tangle of roots and branches close alongside, the whole structure moving as one mass. She discarded the pole and tried to arouse the unconscious man, shaking and pounding him vigorously. After a time his head moved slightly and redoubling her efforts, she soon had the satisfaction of seeing his eyes open slowly. His hand raised to his bandaged head, and dropped listlessly to his side. Placing her lips close to his ear to make herself heard above the roar of the storm, she begged and implored him to rouse himself. He evidently understood, for he moved his arms and legs and shifted his body into a more comfortable position. "I—don't—remember—" the "When you cut the cable that root hit you on the head," she explained, pointing to the root-stub that held the boat firmly against the trunk of the tree. He nodded his understanding, and in the illumination of the almost continuous flashes of lightning stared at the root, as if trying to collect his scattered wits. The boat jerked unsteadily, hesitated, jerked again and the branches and uplifted roots of the tree swayed and thrashed wildly. He struggled to his knees, and holding to the girl's arm raised himself unsteadily to his feet where he stood swaying uncertainly, his eyes fixed on the thrashing branches. His vitality returned with a rush. His eyes narrowed as he pointed out the danger, and his voice rang strong above the storm: "Where's the ax?" Stooping, the girl recovered it from the water at her feet. Instantly, it was seized from her hand, and staggering to the root, the Texan chopped at it with blows that increased in vigour with each successive swing. A few moments sufficed to sever it, and springing to one side, the man drew the girl to the bottom of the boat, while above them the branches thrashed and tore at the gunwales. A moment later the craft floated free, and placing his lips to her ear, the Texan explained: "They stick down as far as they do up, an' when we pass over a shallow place they drag along the Alice shuddered. "An' now," continued the cowboy, "we've got to bail out this old tub. What with the water that rolled in over the edge, and what's rained in, we'll have a boatful before long." "Why, there's barrels of it!" cried the girl. "And we haven't anything to bail with!" The Texan nodded: "There's barrels of it all right. I saw a fellow empty a barrel with a thimble, once—on a bet. It took him a considerable spell, but he did it. My boots hold considerable more'n a thimble, an' we can each take one an' go to it." "But, wouldn't it be better to try and reach shore?" "Reach shore?" With a sweep of his arm the man indicated the surface of the turgid flood. Following the gesture, Alice realized the utter futility of any attempt to influence the course of the clumsy craft. The wind had risen to a gale, but the full fury of the electrical storm had passed. Still continuous, the roar of the thunder had diminished to a low rumbling roll, and the lightning flashed pale, like ghost lightning, its wan luminescence foreshortening the range of vision to include only the nearer reaches of wild lashing water upon whose surface heaved and tossed the "Down river, somewhere," answered the Texan, with an attempt at cheerfulness. The man was industriously bailing with a boot. He tossed its mate to the girl. "Bail," he urged, "it gives you somethin' to think about, an' it's good exercise. I was about froze till I got to heavin' out this water. We ain't so bad, now. We're bound to get shoved ashore at some bend, or the wind'll blow us ashore. Looks to me as if she was widenin' out. Must of overflowed some flat." Mechanically she took the boot and, following the example of the Texan, began to bail out. "Rain's quit, an' this wind'll dry us out when we get the boat emptied so we don't have to sit in the water. My shirt's most dry already." "The wind has changed!" cried the girl. "It's blowing crosswise of the river, now." "More likely we've rounded a bend," opined the Texan. "I don't know the river below Claggett." "If we're blown ashore, now, it will be the wrong shore." "Most any old shore'd look good to me. I ain't what you might call aquatic by nature—I ain't "Oh, nothing. Only one would hardly expect a cowboy, adrift in the middle of a swollen river to be drawing distinctions between words." "Bailin' water out of a boat with a boot don't overtax the mental capacity of even a cowboy to absolute paralysis." "You're certainly the most astonishing cowboy I've ever known." "You ain't known many——" "If I'd known a thousand—" The sentence was never finished. The boat came to a sudden stop. Both occupants were thrown violently to the bottom where they floundered helplessly in their efforts to regain their feet. "What happened?" asked the girl, as she struggled to her knees, holding fast to the gunwale. "Oh, maybe we're ashore!" Both glanced about them as a distant flash of lightning threw its pale radiance over the surface of the flood. On every side was water—water, and the tossing branches of floating trees. The Texan was quieting the terrified horse that crouched at the farther end of the boat, threatening momentarily to become a very real "Struck a rock, I reckon," said the cowboy. "This cayuse'll be all right in a minute, an' I'll try to shove her off. Must be we've headed along some new channel. There hadn't ought to be rocks in the main river." The clumsy craft shifted position with an ugly grating sound as the current sucked and gurgled about it, and the whitecapped waves pounded its sides and broke in white foam over the gunwales. The Texan took soundings with the pole. "Deep water on three sides," he announced, "an' about a foot down to solid rock on the other. Maybe I can climb out an' shove her off." "No! No!" cried the girl, in a sudden panic of fear. "You can't swim, and suppose something should happen and the boat moved off before you could climb into it? You'd be washed off the rock in a minute, and I—I couldn't stand it alone!" "The way she's millin' around on the rock, I'm afraid she'll rip her bottom out. She's leakin' already. There's more water in here now, than when we started to bail." "Most of it splashed in over the side—see, when the waves break." "Maybe," assented the Texan, carelessly, but in the darkness he stooped and with his fingers located a crack where the planking had been forced apart, through which the river water gushed copiously. Without a word he stepped to the The man's first effort resulted only in breaking a couple of feet from the end of his lever, but finally, by waiting to heave on his bar at the moment a wave pounded the side, he had the satisfaction of seeing the craft move slowly, inch by inch toward the deeper water. A moment later the man thanked his stars that he had thought of the rope, for without warning the boat lifted on a huge wave and slipped from the rock where it was instantly seized by the current and whirled down stream with a force that jerked him from his feet. Taking a deep breath, he clutched the line, and easily pulled himself to the boat, where the girl assisted him over the side. They were entirely at the mercy of the river, now, for in the suddenness of their escape from the rock, the Texan had been unable to save the pole. Groping in the water for his boot he began to bail earnestly, and as Alice attempted to locate the other boot her hand came in contact with the "Yes, I found the leak back there on the rock. If we both bail for all we're worth maybe we can keep her afloat." Alice found the other boot and for what seemed interminable hours the two bailed in silence. But despite their efforts, the water gained. Nearly half full, the boat floated lower and more sluggishly. Waves broke over the side with greater frequency, adding their bit to the stream that flowed in through the bottom. At length, the girl dropped her boot with a sigh that was half a sob: "I can't lift another bootful," she murmured; "my shoulders and arms ache so—and I feel—faint." "Just you prop yourself up in the corner an' rest a while," advised the Texan, with forced cheerfulness, "I can handle it all right, now." Wearily, the girl obeyed. At the bow and stern of the square-ended boat, the bottom curved upward so that the water was not more than six or eight inches deep where she sank heavily against the rough planking, with an arm thrown over the gunwale. Her eyes closed, and despite the extreme discomfort of her position, utter weariness claimed her, and she sank into that borderland of oblivion that is neither restful sleep, nor impressionable wakefulness. It may have been minutes later, or hours, that the voice of the Texan brought her jerkily erect. The Texan was on his feet, eagerly scanning his surroundings that grew momentarily more distinct in the rapidly increasing light. The farther shore showed dimly and the man emitted a low whistle of surprise. "Must be a good four or five miles wide," he muttered, as his eyes took in the broad expanse of water that rolled between. He saw at a glance that he was well out of the main channel, for all about him were tiny islands formed by the summits of low buttes and ridges while here and there the green tops of willows protruded above the surface of the water swaying crazily in the current. "Some flood!" he muttered, and turned his attention to the nearer bank. The boat floated sluggishly not more than fifty or sixty feet from the steep slope that rose to a considerable height. "Driftin' plumb along the edge of the bench," he A buckskin horse, with two water-soaked boots lashing his flanks and trailing a lariat rope from the horn of his saddle, dashed madly up a coulee. The pack string broke and the terrifying thing that lashed him on, fell to the ground with a thud. The run became a trot, and the trot a walk. When the coulee widened into a grassy plain, he warily circled the rope that dragged from the saddle, and deciding it was harmless, fell eagerly to eating the soggy buffalo grass that carpeted the ground. While back at the mouth of the coulee lay two unconscious forms, their bodies partly awash in the lapping waves of the rising river. |