The Frontier Boys in the Grand Canyon Part 30

In an hour's time we had everything shipshape again. The bow was repaired, also the hole in the deck and in the cabin roof.

The scars remained upon the deck alongside, but these we were rather proud of and we felt we had a right, for our boat had proved herself stanch and strong enough to resist every danger and every attack.

The arrows we had extracted and kept for curiosities. They were of darker wood than those of the northern tribes we had skirmished with.

They were also tipped with a different variety of stone, with green streaks running through it.

While Jim and Tom were putting the finishing touches to the job I jumped ash.o.r.e and busied myself looking for specimens among the shingles and small stones on the sh.o.r.e.

I always took advantage of every opportunity to get ash.o.r.e, while Jim stuck to his boat like a barnacle and if he had been allowed his choice, he would never have set foot off from her.

"You can see where the boat's entire side has been sc.r.a.ped," I said, "she certainly looks like she has been through a battle."

"That's where the rock we b.u.mped into took the hide off," admitted Jim, "but she's none the worse for wear," he continued. "'The Captain' will take us through many a worse sc.r.a.pe than this."

I could not blame Jim for his confidence and he had a right to his pride in her, for it was his skill that had made her a serviceable boat instead of the clumsy raft Tom or I would have planned and constructed.

His success showed us the value of patient, hard work in preparing for an expedition that was hazardous at the best and would have been criminally reckless, if we had not had some one with a good head like Jim's to guide us through. It wasn't boy's work.

CHAPTER XXIII

A CLOSE CALL

I had a nice time of it, looking for specimens. There is a fascination about the search for some rare or precious stone.

You feel that the next step may bring it under your eye or that you may overturn some stones and find it hidden underneath.

I moved along carefully, keeping my eyes intent in their search among the small broken rocks and rounded pebbles. Suddenly my eye caught a clear glitter and I stooped and picked up a beautiful crystal, with its sharp cut sides and water clearness. A little later I picked up a green stone that looked like jade, through it was not so clear. My last specimen was a smoky topaz of mild, dark transparency.

I had been longer in my search than I realized, for I was so intent and interested that I did not note how time was pa.s.sing.

"All aboard, Jo," Jim yelled. "Hurry or you will be left."

Tom was already pulling up the bow anchor and Jim stood ready to hoist the one at the stern.

"All right," I called back.

Then I stooped to look at a peculiar stone. I heard a cry of alarm and glanced up.

"For heaven's sake, Jo!" was the startled cry that reached my ears.

It was all that Jim could say. I needed no warning. The boat was drifting away from the sh.o.r.e, carried by the current rapidly towards the outer river.

If I could not reach it, I was absolutely lost. The boat could not return and I was shut in by inaccessible cliffs. There was just one thing to do.

I took a short run forward and sprang out in the river as far as I could in the direction of the drifting boat. Jim and Tom were doing all they could, but it was impossible for one oar to effectively hold against the current.

Jim had his hands full with the steering sweep. As soon as I lit in the icy river,--my leap must have been eighteen feet,--I struck out desperately for the boat. The current helped me, but it seemed to be carrying the craft on faster than I did.

It was terrible, I had to catch it or my death was certain. Nothing could have saved me. "The Captain" seemed as remote and unreachable as though the length in feet that separated us had been miles.

If you have ever chased after a train that was gathering momentum every second as it pulls from the station, a train that you feel you must catch, you can have a faint inkling of how I felt. Still only a faint idea, for there was no later train for me.

I had to fight back a blinding fear and panic. If my heart had become cold like my body I should have not had the slightest chance. I was a strong swimmer and in my desperation I actually pulled up two strokes on her.

Then she reached a swifter current and pulled away from me rapidly. I struggled on blindly, though I knew I was lost. A mist was before my eyes and I was conscious of nothing but a straining, strangling, struggling sensation.

Then my hand instinctively grasped something, and I held on with the clutch of desperation. It was a rope. I felt myself being drawn toward the boat. I had sense enough left to help myself onto the craft, then I collapsed.

I came out of it, in a few minutes and found myself lying alongside the cabin. For a second I did not realize where I was. I heard the roar of the river all around and saw the great walls of red sandstone towering up and up, almost shutting out the sky.

Then I saw Jim at the steering oar and Tom laboring at the bow oar, and it all came over me. I grew suddenly weak as I realized the narrowness of my escape and I clutched the boards and tried to shut out the sound of the river that seemed like a hungry and devouring animal that for a moment had been balked of its prey.

"How are you now, Jo?" yelled Jim, anxiously. "We can't do anything for you for a bit; we are in the rapids."

"I'll be all right in a minute," I answered in a hollow voice that I scarcely recognized as my own.

I decided that the best thing that I could do was to get to work at the oars and warm up, for I was chilled through and through to the very bone.

I staggered to my place and after I had pulled for a few minutes my blood began to circulate and I felt better and in a short time I was pretty well recovered, but I dared not let my mind dwell on the escape that I had just had.

That evening we made a cheerless camp, not being able to run out of the canyon and had to tie up at a place that was nothing but a narrow shelf of rock with a few tough and stunted bushes growing on it.

A grey rain, began to come down steadily into the canyon, the first that we had experienced, and we decided to sleep on the boat.

"Why did you let that boat get away?" was the first question I asked.

"It wasn't our fault," explained Jim. "It happened this way. When Tom pulled up the bow anchor the strain was too much on the other rope. It had become worn, I guess, and it parted near the stone."

"That was the rope that was trailing behind, I happened to grasp it and that was all that saved me. It was that close," I shuddered.

"No more talk about it to-night," said Jim, "you need a good sleep."

Jim rolled up in his blankets on deck, with a tarpaulin over him. While Tom and I lay under the cabin, with our extremities sticking out, but covered with canvas. We managed to feel quite comfortable and cozy with the rain coming down gently on the roof over our heads.

We were shut in and felt protected from the storm; and the roar of the river that swept by in the darkness only lulled us to sleep for we had become as used to it as a sailor does to the sound of the sea. Jim seemed to be perfectly comfortable under his tarpaulin and being on the deck of his beloved yacht, as he called his creation, he was thoroughly contented.

The next morning was grey and the rain was still falling but it seemed warmer than ordinarily and we put our clothes in the cabin to keep them dry and it was fun too, as the rain came down in a regular shower bath.

We shoved out into the stream and were soon racing down between the narrow walls of Dark Canyon, as we called it. Guiding the boat, and dodging rocks was fast becoming second nature to us and our muscles, those that we had not used much before, were becoming hard and bunchy as rocks.

Jim's work at the steering oar was the best all-round exercises, as it took in every muscle in his body as he stood bringing the sweep back and then shoving it from him as the boat needed to be guided this way or that.

He had developed great power and control and the sweep had become a live part of the boat just as the tail of a fish guides it naturally through the water with an instinctive wave, this way or that.

Tom and I often took the sweep with several hours of exercise at a time, but when the rapids became very dangerous Jim was always at the helm. It was a pleasure to see his sinewy form as it bent to the guiding oar, with a wary glance ahead every now and then.