The fire was carefully extinguished before night-fall, so that no flash
or gleam might betray the adventurers' whereabouts to any prowling foe,
and watch was set in each boat after they had been moored about twenty
feet from the shore. Everything had been made snug, arms issued round
and loaded ready, and once more sleep came to all save Brace and his
American companion, who sat together for a good hour, gazing into the
forest gloom and listening to the many strange sounds which rose among
the dense growth.
Then sleep overtook them, just when they were vainly trying to puzzle
out the meaning of a strange booming roar, which sounded not unlike
thunder at a distance.
"I guess that's what it is," Briscoe had said. "That's the nearest I
can get to it. Maybe there's a clump of mountains not very far away,
and they've got a storm there."
"We shall know in the morning," said Brace. "If it's a storm the water
will have risen in the night."
"Let it," said Briscoe drowsily. "We're in shelter, and the boats will
rise, so it will not matter to us."
The next minute both were asleep, and the night passed tranquilly enough
till they were awakened by Lynton, who had the morning watch.
"What is it?" said Brace confusedly: "time to get up?"
"Yes, if you don't want to be scratched out of the boat. Look sharp,
please. We're going to get the awning down."
It was quite time, as Brace found on getting his eyes well opened, for
the boat was tugging at her moorings, the awning rigged up overnight for
shelter was close up among the leafage beneath a bough of the tree to
which the rope was made fast; and, instead of the water upon which they
floated being like that of a placid lake as it had seemed overnight, it
was now rushing rapidly by the boat's sides.
"What is the meaning of this?" asked Brace excitedly.
"Storm up in the hills somewhere," replied Lynton gruffly. "Water's
rising fast."
"Mind what you're about there, Dellow, or you'll be capsized," shouted
the captain to the first mate. "Make all snug, and keep the boat clear
of the trees."
"Ay, ay, sir," came from the other boat, and a few minutes later the
mooring-lines were cast off, while the men in each boat lay on their
oars, and then as they began to drift swiftly with the rushing waters, a
few strokes were given to get well clear of all overhanging branches
before the grapnels were let go, but refused for some minutes to get a
sufficiently good hold of the bottom.
Finally, however, they caught, plenty of line was let out, and they
swung head to stream, dividing the water that rushed by and sending it
off in elongated waves.
"That's better," said the captain; "but we must be ready, for I doubt
whether these little grapnels will hold long."
"Why not let the boats go?" said Brace. "It's all interesting to glide
along a fresh river."
"Because we may be swept no one knows where, my lad. Steering's hard
work in such a rapid as this. Besides, we may get into bad company--
uprooted trees, floating islands of weeds, and all sorts of things that
would make nothing of capsizing us. No; it will be best to wait here
till the flood begins to fall. I daresay you gentlemen can manage to
amuse yourselves somehow."
"I daresay we can," said Briscoe, lighting up one of his long cigars to
have as an early breakfast; "but isn't this all wrong?"
"What?" said the captain sharply, for he was fully upon his mettle in a
position which called for all his care. "What's all wrong?"
"Why, the way the water runs. It's just the opposite way to which it
was going yesterday."
"That's right," replied the captain; "but it's coming down one or other
of the rivers we came to last night with a rush and piling up faster
than the main stream will carry it off. It must go somewhere, and some
of it rushes along here. Strikes me that the whole country will be
under water soon. Look, it's rising fast up the tree-trunks. We shall
have to take great care, or we shall be drawn right in among the trees."
"Ah, that would be awkward," said Briscoe drily, "to find the water
suddenly go down and leave the boats up in the tree-tops like a couple
of big birds' nests."
"Ahoy! Look out, Dellow!" yelled the captain. "Stand by, my lads, to
shove her off, or she'll break us away. Hah! I thought so."
For the second boat had suddenly been swept from her anchorage and come
rapidly down upon the first. The men tried their hardest to ease her
off, but she came into collision with so sharp a shock that the bigger
boat was jerked free from her moorings and began to glide with the swift
current, dragging her grapnel after her, till the captain gave orders
for it to be hauled in.
"Row!" he shouted, and the men dipped their oars into the water with a
steady stroke, keeping the boat's prow head to stream as she dropped
down stern foremost between two mighty walls of verdure, while on either
side it was plain to see that the trunks of the huge forest monarchs
were being flooded many feet up.
"There's nothing else for it, sir," said the captain to Sir Humphrey.
"You'll be seeing what the country's like, and by-and-by as the water
drains off I daresay we can ride easily back with the current quite the
other way."
"And what about capsizing?" said Briscoe.
"That's my look-out, sir," said the captain gruffly. "Capsizing means
feeding the fish, and I've a great objection to being used for that
purpose, without taking into consideration my duty to my passengers and
men."
He met Brace's eyes as he spoke, his own twinkling with a drily humorous
look, and nothing more was said.
The adventure was exciting enough, for the boats rode on rapidly through
the forest, the river, which was comparatively narrow, winding and
doubling in the way peculiar to water making its way through a flat
country. For now all appeared to be one dead level, with the trees on
either side much of a height. Every now and then it was as if they had
been swept by the heavy stream into a lake whose end was right in front,
but invariably as they were gliding straight for a huge bank of trees
the river curved round to right or left, opening out into some fresh
bend of its serpentine course, but there was no alteration in their rate
of speed.
"It can't last very much longer, though," said Briscoe. "Why, we're
going along just like two corks in a gully."
"Yes," said Brace, who had been watching the movements of a troop of
monkeys passing along through the trees on their left. "It's all very
well now, but if this is to go on after dark we are bound to come to
grief."
"No," said Briscoe drily. "The skipper won't risk it. He'll pick his
place and run us in among the tree-trunks before sunset. He's a dry old
chap, but the longer I'm with him the safer I feel."
The American was quite right, for just when the sun was disappearing
behind the trees their leader took advantage of a whirling eddy at a
bend of the stream, called upon the men to pull with all their might,
and, steering himself; he deftly ran the boat right into the gloom
amongst the enormous tree-trunks, where the water was running fast, but
it was comparative stillness after the torrent-like rush in the open
river.
Here they moored the boats for the night, and, after partaking of a
much-needed meal, sleep once more came with the intense darkness, all
but the watch resting as calmly as if the sound of many waters lulled
them through the night.