About three o'clock the boys broke camp. They were now thoroughly rested, and eager to be on the water again. Moreover the cleft among the rocks—though admirably adapted for a hiding place—had none of the qualifications which a good camping site should possess.

A paddle of two miles brought the party to Tanner's Dam, and when they had carried the canoes around and embarked on the lower side they passed the mouth of the real Otter Run. This enabled Ned to fix their bearings definitely on the map, and he resolved to keep close track of the topography of the creek in the future.

About six o'clock a beautiful place to camp was found on the left shore of the creek; shade was abundant, and the soil was level and grassy. A few yards up the beach a spring bubbled and spurted from a nest of rocks.

As the boys landed a flock of wild ducks flew up with a great splashing, and winged their way down the creek. Along the opposite shore, which was flat and marshy, yellow-legged snipe were running to and fro, a couple of gray herons standing contentedly on one leg, were gobbling minnows from the shallow pools.

This was now Thursday evening. It would be a week on the morrow since the Jolly Rovers had started on their cruise. They were so pleased with the location of the camp, and the opportunities it seemed to offer that they concluded to remain for a while, and here they spent Friday, Saturday, Sunday and Monday.

The keen and peaceful enjoyments of those four days were in vivid contrast to the turbulent, adventurous life the boys had led during the past week. They looked back upon it afterward as the brightest period of their cruise.

Sunday was spent quietly in camp, but the remainder of the time was filled up with all sorts of occupations. Randy shot numerous snipe and woodcock. Clay and Nugget gave their attention to fishing, and caught altogether some thirty or forty large bass—not counting the trout which they snared in a neighboring brook.

Ned found his keenest enjoyment in wandering over the country from farmhouse to farmhouse and bringing back tempting supplies. He was a born forager, and well understood the art of making bargains with the farmers.

The boys lived on the fat of the land, and at very slight cost. The diet of fish and game was constantly varied by green corn, new potatoes, sometimes peaches or melons, and occasionally a plump duck or chicken. Only on one day did it rain, and this merely served to make the fish bite better.

But each and every one of the Jolly Rovers had the true instinct of the canoeist, and when Monday's sun dropped redly behind the hills they were eager to start afresh on their wanderings. Their arms tingled to grasp the paddle and drive the graceful canoe over the blue water; they longed to explore the great unknown territory that lay in front of them, to seek new camping grounds and new adventures.

At eight o'clock on Tuesday morning the crimson and gold pennant stood stiffly against the breeze as it led the little fleet from the spot where so many happy hours had been spent.

It was a glorious day—a day when all living things should have been happy. So it seemed to the boys as they paddled lazily down mid-channel with the slanting sunbeams on their bronzed and radiant faces.

But the business of life went on just the same around them. The hungry bass with his piratical black fin just cutting the surface, scattered the shoals of minnows, and sadly lessened their numbers. The kingfisher scooped occasionally from his perch to return with a shining morsel, and the gray heron stalked among the pools like a duck on stilts, searching the muddy bottom for tender young frogs.

Back in the forest the crows and the blue jays were waging a bitter squallish conflict, and here and there weary toilers among the yellow grain dropped their scythes to watch the canoes drifting by.

But the problem of life cast no shadow on the Jolly Rovers, and they paddled on contentedly, finding something new to admire every few minutes.

Nugget was more than usually happy that morning. The past few days had taught him the bright side of canoeing, and he fondly hoped to find the future just as smooth and free from snags.

He was dipping his paddle from side to side in a leisurely way when his eyes chanced to rest on the bottom of the cockpit. Right between his knees was a flat little head with two bead-like eyes and a red tongue that darted quickly in and out. Attached to the head was a long gracefully coiled body, mottled like the skin of a brook trout.

The yell that burst from Nugget's lips would have done credit to a Sioux warrior. It scared the snake half out of its wits, and the reptile wriggled under the bottom board.

"Help! Murder! Snakes!" roared Nugget, partly rising and clutching the combing with both hands. "Help me, help me! I'll be bitten. I'll die."

"Where is it?" cried Ned, paddling alongside.

"Stamp on it," shouted Randy. "Throw it out and I'll shoot it."

Nugget only yelled the more and shook the canoe so violently by his antics that it threatened to tip over.

"Be careful," Ned warned him. "You will upset. Paddle to shore and we'll take the snake out for you."

"I can't, I can't," shrieked Nugget. "My paddle fell overboard. There it goes."

Ned and Clay started simultaneously for the drifting paddle, but they had hardly taken a dozen strokes when the snake thrust his head out of a crevice in the bottom boards.

This proved too much for Nugget. Uttering yell after yell he sprang to his feet and tried to climb out on the foredeck of the canoe. The Imp refused to stand such treatment, and tipped over instantly, throwing Nugget head first into the water.

Fortunately the creek was shallow at this point, and after going under a couple of times, and swallowing a quantity of water—owing to his persistent yelling—Nugget gained a foothold without the aid of his friends, and waded shoulder deep for the nearest shore.

Amid all the confusion the snake escaped in some manner from the overturned canoe, and swam rapidly down stream. Ned and Clay went in pursuit, but the reptile was too swift for them, and safely gained a patch of reeds.

The Imp was quickly righted and towed to shore. The contents were little damaged, and Nugget made haste to change his clothes.

"I'd like to know how that snake got in my canoe," he said angrily. "It was a beastly mean trick."

"I don't believe it was a trick at all," exclaimed Ned laughingly. "The snake must have crawled in when the canoe was lying on shore, bottom up. It no doubt thought it had found a nice snug place to live."

"That's the way it happened, of course," said Randy. "No one would have been mean enough to put it in on purpose."

Clay said nothing, but turned abruptly aside and began to busy himself with his canoe.

The delay was of brief duration, and the Jolly Rovers were soon afloat again. Nugget had stretched his wet clothes across the fore and rear deck of his canoe, so that the sun would quickly dry them.

About noon, while the boys were paddling through a deep and narrow part of the creek, Ned called attention to a bunch of ducks that were feeding in the reeds some distance down the right shore. All eyes were turned in that direction, and consequently no one happened to glance toward the opposite bank.

Clay had fallen a little behind his companions, and was three or four yards to the left of them. He was drifting along with his gaze fixed on the ducks, when all at once his canoe began to twist and oscillate in a most alarming manner.

He turned quickly to see what was the matter, and the first glance sent a chill of fear to his heart. He was on the edge of a violently agitated patch of water that kept moving round and round in constantly narrowing circles until it ended in a funnel shaped aperture that went beneath the surface, and was itself whirling in dizzy revolutions.

Even as he looked his canoe drifted into the second circle, and mounted toward a great rock fifty or sixty feet high that rose straight from the water on the left shore.

Clay realized his situation instantly. He was caught in the whirlpool which some of the farmers had spoken about in a vague manner, as though they doubted its existence. There was no doubt about it now. The whirlpool was a stern reality, and he was fast in its embrace.

Without calling his companions, Clay tried to paddle away from the circling current. But to his horror and consternation the canoe was unmanageable. The violent paddle strokes simply made it swing around on its keel.

Then Clay became terribly frightened, and shouted for help. It was indeed high time. He had already drifted to the base of the rock where the whirlpool terminated, and was now swinging back toward the center of the creek.

The appeal for help—though its meaning was not comprehended at first—brought the other boys to Clay's assistance. That is to say they paddled toward the dangerous spot and were within an ace of getting in the same fix, when Clay frantically warned them back.

"Keep away! keep!" he shouted. "You must find some other way to help me."

Ned was the first to grasp the situation. During the last few days he had heard more than one tale about this dreaded whirlpool with its merciless undertow, and now it made him sick and faint to see Clay's peril, and yet be unable to devise a way of helping him.

For so it seemed then. It would be simple folly and madness for the others to trust themselves near the rapacious current; yet how else could help reach the imperiled lad?

The whirlpool was thirty feet in diameter, and while Randy and Nugget were looking on with white, scared faces, and Ned was vainly trying to plan a means of rescue, Clay was slowly drifting around the circle, coming nearer each time to the gurgling funnel in the center—and this in spite of the most strenuous paddling. Each stroke, in fact, only deflected the canoe sideways, as though it had no keel, and increased the risk of upsetting.

None realized the danger more than Clay himself and the horror of those few short minutes—they seemed more like hours—he never forgot.

It was not likely of course that the heavy canoe could be dragged clear under water; the whirlpool was no such gigantic thing as that. But it was absolutely certain that when the canoe reached the funnel shaped aperture in the center it would instantly be overturned, and just as surely Clay would be sucked into the black depths below, and whirled off by the fierce undercurrent with no possible chance of reaching the surface.

This was the awful fate that stared him in the face; and all that while he drifted nearer and nearer the end, crying vainly for help, and beating the frothy water with his paddle.