IN THE RIVER’S CLUTCH
The raft leaped forward like a thing alive. Kikuyus sweating at the
steering oar were unable to point the unwieldly craft inshore any
longer. Frightened cries broke from the blacks as they saw the
spouters ahead, saw too the black teeth of the basaltic rocks
waiting to tear them.
“Back, back,” shouted Jack, stationed on the shoreward side of the
raft. He waved his arms frantically in warning to the blacks. “Don’t
let them jump in, Matse,” he screamed. “They’d drown.”
But the thoroughly frightened blacks had lost all awe of their
superiors. They continued to crowd forward as if planning to leap
overboard.
“Look out, Jack,” cried Frank, standing in the bow, his attention
diverted from the river ahead by Jack’s predicament. “You can’t stop
them. They’ll brush you into the river if you get in their way.”
But big Bob saw the danger to his comrade, too.
He gained Jack’s side and, legs braced, facing the hysterically
frightened blacks, he waved his automatic in their faces.
“Any man deserting will be shot,” he cried. “Matse, tell these
fellows we want to save their lives. We’ll swing the raft against
the island below us. If everybody works on the steering oar it can
be done. And we’ll all be saved.”
Matse also had succumbed to the fright of the moment, along with his
companions. But not to the same extent. One look ahead showed him
the possibilities and, flinging himself in front of his wavering
assistants, he shouted at them in their own tongue. The boys could
not understand his words, but there was no misreading his tone. He
was lashing them with whips of scorn. And that it was proving
effective was plain to be seen.
“Fella-boys help, baas,” cried Matse, in the end, turning to Bob.
“You tell um what can do.”
It was an anxious moment for the three boys. Fate had thrust them
without any preliminary warning into a mighty tight place, indeed.
Ahead lay possible, even probable, disaster. To escape to the shore
by swimming was out of the question. The current was running like a
mill race, and even the strongest of swimmers could not have stemmed
it, but must of necessity have been swept along helpless in its
clutch. And upon the young shoulders of the trio rested the
responsibility for extricating not themselves alone from this
threatening monster of a river, but also the half dozen blacks.
Moreover, if it were humanly possible, they desired also to save the
raft and its contents.
But was it possible? Was it possible to save the lives of all
concerned? Could they hope to save the raft? Was not their only
chance to be flung upon some of the rocks which, bare, jagged, wet
from the constant spray spouting over them, offering only insecure
hold at best, seemed to leap toward them, so swiftly were they borne
along? And then the raft would go whirling and bumping into the
further rapids around the bend which as yet they could not see and
be swept to destruction over the falls they suspected lay not far
away by reason of the growing volume of sound which came to them,
the dull booming roar of water tumbling, cascading, over a
precipice.
At such moments, one’s eyes seem to drink in all the surroundings as
if in one vast comprehensive glance, and one’s thoughts stimulated
by the unwonted danger race madly. It was so with the boys. They saw
the high wooded bluffs, rank jungle growth descending to the water’s
edge. They saw the broad river, fully half a mile wide, sweeping on
like a great sheet of glass to crash and splinter upon the rocks at
the bend and upon the wooded island in the middle. What lay beyond
that mighty curve, where the river turning sharply bore away to the
right whence came the roar of the waterfall which they suspected to
be there, they could not see. All this they saw, all this their
vision grasped, in that one sweeping glance when a moment seemed an
eternity. And their thoughts moved as swiftly as sight. In fact,
only one possible salvation for all lay ahead. And all three grasped
it simultaneously.
“The island,” cried Jack. “We must try to reach the island.”
This island was in shape long and narrow and as they drew nearer,
they could discern the contour of that portion at the upstream end
quite clearly. At the tip were rocks in a jumbled mass which would
spell destruction to the raft, perhaps to themselves, if they were
swept upon them. But, caught in a current setting into the channel
between the island and the left bank of the river, they could see as
they drew closer to the island that just below the rocks lay a cove
with a shelving sandy shore.
They were still some distance above this point, and Bob believed
they could maneuver the raft into the cove before being swept beyond
it and into the rocks which began not far away. He said as much to
the others, who nodded agreement, then he leaped to position at the
steering oar. Three of the blacks helped him swing the clumsy but
effective sweep and hold it in position. Steadily but surely, the
raft swung in toward the cove.
Frank and Jack in the meantime took command at the bow of the raft,
if the square end downstream can so be dignified. And Matse passed
the word to the two remaining blacks of what was intended. All five
were to stand ready to leap into the water as they approached the
cove and help to direct the raft into it.
On swept the raft. And now it could be seen that, even though the
direction given it by the steering oar was carrying it steadily
toward the island, yet so strong was the drag of the current upon
its unwieldly bulk that the raft would arrive only by the narrowest
of margins, if at all. And, if they missed the cove, almost certain
destruction awaited beyond.
“If I think we’re going to miss it, Bob,” shouted Jack from the bow,
“I’ll warn you in time so that you and the blacks can run forward
and swim for the cove.”
Bob shouted an “All right,” to show he had heard. But he did not
look up. The improvised steering oar was bending under the strain
placed upon it, and he was fearful it would snap at any moment.
Still it held, however. And Bob was grimly determined that as long
as there remained a chance to bring their rude craft to shore, he’d
stick to it.
A sensible diminution in the tug of the water a moment later
apprised Bob that they had managed to swing the raft out of the
center of the current. They were close to the island now. But they
were close to the cove, too. In fact, they were almost abreast of
it. And that meant that unless they could swing the raft in at once,
it would be carried beyond the only possible landing place.
Bob decided to change his tactics. Instead of using his improvised
paddle as steering oar, he would use it as a sweep. The raft had
been spun around so that the forward end faced the shore. Bob
couldn’t speak to the Kikuyus in their own tongue, but he could
signal his intentions. And this he did by thrusting them away and
himself straining to work the oar back and forth. Then he beckoned
them to assist him, and they understood and leaped to obey.
Over his shoulder he glanced anxiously toward the forward end, and
with a leap of the heart he saw that they were making progress. The
threshing of the sweep, acting as a paddle wheel, was sending them
toward the shore. But still their progress was not sufficient to put
them into the cove for, although the pull of the current had
diminished, it still was sweeping them along at a rate which
threatened to carry them beyond the safety zone.
But Frank and Jack also were alive to the danger. And they had
changed their original plan of all leaping into the water and
attempting to pull the raft ashore by swimming. For as they drew
closer to the cove, Jack had gotten the idea that, perhaps, the
river grew shallower here and had thrust one of the long poles into
the water. It had been almost torn from his hand. Nevertheless, he
had touched bottom.
So now the two boys and the three blacks not engaged on the sweep
with Bob lined the downstream side of the raft, two to a pole. And
at every thrust they touched bottom.
For a long minute it was touch and go, and whether the combined
efforts of the men at the poles with those at the sweep would
succeed in bringing the raft into the backwater of the cove, hung in
the balance. But human determination defeated the river, robbed it
of its victims. After proceeding only by inches, the raft suddenly
shot ahead, as if the river deciding it was defeated spurned this
stubborn craft at the last. And the next moment, the raft was
bobbing in the backwater of the cove, where the current was not
perceptible, while just beyond the rocks guarding the two
extremities of its half-moon shore the river rolled on so swiftly as
to make a sharp line of cleavage between the main stream and the
cove.
After their strenuous exertions, all were a trifle bewildered to
find themselves thus suddenly shot into safety with no call to
extend themselves further. The Kikuyus began chattering like magpies
and, leaping into the shallow water, dragged the raft up until the
forward end rested on the sand above the water line. As for the
boys, they could only look at each other, each reading in the eyes
of his friends unutterable relief at escape from that threat of a
watery death.
Quite simply big Bob bent his head and closed his eyes. And the
others did likewise. And from three profoundly grateful hearts there
went up to the Divine Providence which guards poor mortals a prayer
of gratitude no less sincere because unspoken.