CHAPTER XVIII
Afloat Again
Back to camp tramped these two brothers, the one in a torn suit of underwear, the other fully dressed, but both wearing wide grins.
They were both happy—recklessly so. All things dwindled into insignificance except the fact that they were together again—together, after a night of terror. The cattle of Whirlpool River Ranch—The Pup—the reported landslide—all these were for the moment forgotten. They would return later, with their responsibilities. But now, for Teddy and Roy, there was happiness where they had feared to find sorrow.
Their tremendous relief was not the sort that is communicated by words. A firm handclasp, an arm thrown carelessly around the shoulders, speaks louder than any well-turned sentence. Thus it was that on that journey back to their camp there was little said besides Pop’s interminable: “Snakes!” and Roy’s: “I’ll tell a maverick!” whenever Teddy made a statement.
Roy’s story was soon told. Pop marveled much and examined the boy’s wounds with care, treating them with the antiseptic they had brought along. When Roy’s tale was finished, Teddy sprang his bit of news.
“We found the canoe!”
Roy’s eyes opened wide.
“You mean to say there is anything left of it?”
“Sure, there is!” Bug Eye exclaimed. “We can fix her up in no time! She’s got quite a hole in her, but Pop can mend that. Hey, Pop?”
“Betcher boots,” the veteran rancher replied, as he grinned. “I am one grand little fixer. Let’s take another look at it.”
Roy, clothed “in assembled finery,” as Bug Eye said, was delighted when he saw that the craft was not irreparably damaged. It had been washed ashore a short distance below the rock, and, aside from the hole in the stern, it was as good as ever.
“Guess dad’ll be at Jake Trummer’s by now,” Teddy declared. “But we’ll soon have the old boat on the way. Give your orders, Pop! You can be the boss carpenter. What do we do first?”
“Get out that strip of canvas,” Pop suggested. “Where’s yore knife, Roy? Snakes, you ain’t washed it yet!” He took it from the boy and looked at it silently. Darkening the blades was dried blood—the blood of the eagle. Sticking to the blade were a few tiny, grey feathers. Pop held it in the palm of his hand and nodded his head slowly.
“There’s not many knives that can say they killed an eagle,” he said musingly. “This’ll make a great token, Roy.” Then his voice took on a businesslike tone again. The incident was over. The chapter closed. Pop bent down, inserted the blade in the canvas, and drew it along with a ripping sound.
Soon all four were deep in their task. The hole had to be well mended, as the rapids were still ahead of them and the rocks would search hungrily for a weak spot on which to fasten their needle-like fingers. Pop went about the job slowly and deliberately, and it was afternoon before it was finished to his satisfaction.
“Might as well eat,” Bug Eye said as he straightened up and threw his shoulders back to get the kinks out. “Somehow I never did get over that there habit. So you had roast porcupine this morning, Roy? Well, we can’t promise you that, but we have got some pork an’ beans left unless Pop eat ’em all. You feel all right now, Roy?”
“Sure I do!” The boy flexed his muscles. “Those cuts have stiffened up a little, but they’ll soon work out. Yea, Bug Eye, I feel great! I’m mighty hungry, though.”
“You can do the paddlin’,” Teddy remarked with a grin. “And if you see a rock, duck!”
Unconsciously the boy’s healthy mind was bringing to the fore the events of that fear-ridden night just passed, and instead of hiding them deep in the recesses of the subconscious, later to emerge as tangled emotions, Teddy was baring them and destroying their power to haunt. Of course he did not realize all this. He knew only that an unpleasant experience cannot be forcibly forgotten—that it must be aired, shaken, and dry-cleaned.
But now, his eyes seemed still to hold some of the terror of last night when he had thought that his brother was killed. Roy had had other emotions to occupy his mind—pain, amazement, and self-preservation. Teddy had had nothing—nothing but an overpowering dread that increased hourly until, when dawn had come, it seemed to permeate his whole being, sickening him.
When he had seen Roy wading ashore, happiness caught him a sudden blow, and he had staggered for a moment. Then he had rushed forward, unable to do more than cry: “Roy—Roy!” in a voice that was a hoarse whisper. His brother had returned. The world had lurched, hesitated, and then had gone on spinning merrily. They were together again.
Now the repairs on the canoe were finished. Pop yawned, stretched, and pulled out his pipe. Then he followed Bug Eye to camp and spent the next fifteen minutes in disputing Teddy’s mastery over bean-eating. At length their appetites were satisfied. The pans were washed by the simple method of rubbing sand on them and rinsing them in the river. Blankets were folded. Then, having carried their possessions to the craft, they were ready to start once more.
“Remember those old books in our school library?” Teddy asked Roy, as he stood with his hand on the stern, ready to launch the canoe. “The Amazon Adventurers, or something like that. Where the heroes always come bobbing up from tornadoes, volcanoes, or what have you, with a smile on their faces ready to stop a revolution single handed. Remember the verse Spike Murphy wrote—you know, he played tackle our second year at Hopper. Like this, I think:
“‘The Amazon Adventurers are always to the mus-tard.
They cut an elephant in half as if he was a cus-tard!’
“And a lot more, but I forget the rest. Spike used to walk around the campus singing it. Well, the point of this is that that’s the way I feel now. It’s a good thing there aren’t any elephants around. But something tells me I’ll have my work-out yet. There is still much to be done, as the cook said, turning the whale steak he was roasting. I’ll bet—”
“You’ll bet nothing!” Roy interrupted, with a laugh. “What is this, a political speech? You’ve been talking an hour by the clock. Grab hold, and shove. Ready, Pop and Bug Eye? Then let’s go!”
All four bent down and seized the gunwales. There was a straining of backs, and the canoe slid noiselessly into the river with scarcely a splash.
“No leakee!” Teddy shouted, capering around the bank. “No leakee, no shirtee! Watch it, boys. I’ll bet two bits she don’t leak!”
“Doesn’t,” Bug Eye corrected, a certain page of his English book before his mind. “A plural predicate takes the nominative singular. Or something. Anyway, ‘don’t’ ain’t nowheres near right.”
“Did you say singular?” Teddy asked, grinning. “It is that, at least! But tell me, boys—I’m afraid to look. Does she leak?”
“Nary leak!” Pop exclaimed, leaning close. “Guess I qualify for an expert boat-maker, don’t I? All right, Teddy, stop yore solo an’ hop in.”
“Après vous, m’sieu,” Teddy smirked, and bowed low. “I assure you I crave to see you get wet first.”
“Don’t mind him, Pop,” Roy laughed. “That’s French, and not what you think it means. He just said: ‘after you!’ so don’t get sore. Come on, Teddy, you tomato! Get in there before I toss you in!”
“Now you said something!” the boy ejaculated. “I obey with pleasure—but I’ll be back—oh, I’ll be ba-a-a-a-ak!” and he waved a hand vigorously as he settled himself in the bottom of the canoe.
“You’ll be back before you’re gone,” Roy remarked. “You paddle, my young gentleman of leisure. Oh, yes, there’s more than one. Bug Eye found the one that wasn’t broken, and this stick will do for the bow paddle. Here. On your horse, cowboy!”
Teddy took the flat board Roy held out to him and looked at it wonderingly.
“I am to paddle with this?” he said in a shocked voice. “Roy, my social position! I could never forgive myself—paddling Whirlpool River with a flat board! Dear, dear, what will Mrs. Percy Van Pelt say when she hears about this? I shall never, never hear the last of it!”
“We’ll try to keep it out of the papers,” Roy replied, laughing loudly. “Pipe down now, and go to work. Just forget Mrs. Percy Van Pelt and remember me sitting back of you here with a strong paddle and a good reach.”
“I desire an objection noted,” Teddy murmured, as he took the stick and shifted to the bow seat. “I obey, but under protest. All right, cap’in, whenever you say! I’m all set.”
“Everything in?” Roy asked, looking about him. “Rifles in the bottom? Yep. We’re off, boys. The Amazon Adventurers!”
The canoe shot for the middle of the river, propelled by Teddy and Roy. The stream was again placid, as it had been before the storm. A gentle current bore them along.
As they left their camping site, Roy turned his head and looked back. Many things had happened in the space of twenty-four hours, since they had first lit their fire. They had heard thieves planning to rustle the cattle on the Whirlpool River range. Then the pursuit and the rock ahead. The crash, and the roaring flood. Then his life had hung in the balance. How close it had come to being taken, he probably would never know. How had he gotten ashore? Why hadn’t he been drowned? Why—
Roy shook his head slowly.
“Mother must have been on the job then,” he said to himself, and smiled. “She said she’d put in a good word, and I guess she did! Surely, something besides me kept my head above water!”
Then another thought came to him. They were approaching the rapids with a mended canoe. The cattle were beyond, and rustlers were bent on taking them, if they had not already done so. There was the possible landslide that the stranger had reported.
“There’s plenty to worry about yet, I reckon,” Roy thought grimly. “But what good is worry? Answer—none! We’ll get those cattle, and we won’t come back till we do! Hey, Teddy!” he exclaimed aloud. “Snap to it! All right, boy—ho, ho ho, ho! Stick in there!”