CHAPTER IX

SHIPWRECK

"Hold her, boys!" called out Uncle d.i.c.k. "Overboard! Hold her up!"

Even as he spoke he had plunged overboard on the upstream side, throwing his weight on the rail. The water caught him nearly waist deep, for the treacherous bar shelved rapidly.

It was not so deep where Rob went in, but Jesse and John, thoughtlessly plunging in on the lower side, were swept under the boat, which all the strength of the other two could not hold back against the combined power of the current and the wind.

Without warning they were cast into an accident which in nine cases out of ten would have meant death to some or all of them.

The boat was filling fast, and the great weight of the outboard motors buried her stern, so she was about to swamp in midstream. Uncle d.i.c.k in horror saw the set faces of two of his young friends at the rail beyond him, their legs under the boat, which was swinging on them, their terror showing in their eyes. He made one grasp across the boat, and luckily caught Jesse's hand. Their combined weight held the boat down by the bow, and she swung downstream, half full but not sinking.

"Swim for it, John, as soon as we reach the island!"

The voice of Uncle d.i.c.k rose high and clear. A willow-clad island lay below, toward which the boat now was setting. He knew the boys all could swim, and they were all lightly dressed, with canvas sneakers and no coat.

"All right!" replied John, confidently, now getting his legs free. "I can make it." Indeed, it did not seem the boat could carry another pound. Rob was swimming on the upstream side, one hand on the stern.

Keeping low in the water, they floated on down in the black squall of wind and rain which now came on them. Their course downstream was very rapid.

"Now, John!" Uncle d.i.c.k gave the word, and John, without one instant's hesitation, struck out for the island, now not over forty yards away over the choppy, rain-whipped water. His head was seen bobbing over the waves, but gaining distance. Uncle d.i.c.k hardly breathed as he watched.

The boat was lightened a little. Rob took a chance, climbed in over the stern, and, catching up a setting pole, began to reach for bottom on the upstream side. He caught it and, putting in all his strength, swung the bow across stream, repeating again and again, until the boat was not far back of John's bobbing head. Then all at once Uncle d.i.c.k gave a shout.

His feet had struck bottom on the shelving sand once more. Between them they now could guide and drag the boat till they made a landing, with Jesse on top the cargo, only about fifty yards below where John was headed. They saw him scramble up the bank, lie for an instant half exhausted, and then come running down the sh.o.r.e to them. They all dragged at the water-logged boat until they had her ash.o.r.e so she would hold.

"And that's that!" panted John, coolly and slangily enough.

Till then no one had spoken. Uncle d.i.c.k couldn't speak at first. He only drew Jesse and John to him, one to each arm, wet as they all were, and in the rain now pouring down. "Fine, boys!" said he.

"The closest squeak we've ever had," said Rob, at last. "Right here in the settlements! There's the city of Leavenworth just around the bend."

"Close enough!" said Uncle d.i.c.k. "And my compliments to you all, every one. If it had been a lot of chaps less cool and ready, we'd none of us have been saved. Rob, who taught you to paddle on the up side when crossing a current?"

"I learned it of Moise Richard, on the Peace River, sir," replied Rob.

"Right! Most people try to hold her nose against the current by working on the lower side. Upstream is right--and I must say the setting pole saved the day. But, John, you'll never know how I dreaded to tell you to cast free and swim for it. I thought it was safest for you."

"Oh, that's nothing," said John. But at the same time he was very proud of his feat.

They were wet to the skin and the rain was cold, their boat was full of water and their stores wet. At last, surely, they had an adventure on their hands. But they were not downhearted over it at all.

"All hands lay to for camp!" called Uncle d.i.c.k.

[Ill.u.s.tration: THEY SAW HIM SCRAMBLE UP THE BANK, LIE FOR AN INSTANT HALF EXHAUSTED, AND THEN COME RUNNING DOWN THE Sh.o.r.e TO THEM]

They began to unload the heavier stuff, so they could cant the boat and spill the bilge water out of her. The tarpaulin was thrown over some willow bushes for a shelter, and under this they piled their grub boxes and dunnage rolls. The beds were all in watertight canvas bags, and so were their spare clothes, so matters might have been worse. The guns could be dried, and the tarpaulin had kept the lighter articles from washing away. In a little while they got the tent up, and then they folded the wet tarpaulin for a floor and hurried their outfit inside, damp but yet not ruined.

"Get some boughs to put inside," suggested their leader. "Get out that little forced-draught oil stove and let's see if we can dry out. It's going to be hard to get a fire on this island in this rain, for there's nothing but willows. They're wet. Get the little stove going and pull shut the flaps. When it gets a little warmer we'll open the bags and change our clothes. And as John would say, that'll be that! But it's only by mercy that we're here. You are right, Rob, this is the most serious accident we have ever had together."

"Let's open a can of soup, and issue an extra gill of tea," said Rob.

They broke into a roar of laughter. Inside of half an hour the little hut was steaming and they all were sitting on boxes eating their evening meal. The storm, which had culminated in a fierce thunder gust, now was muttering itself away.

Jesse went out and brought in the Flag from its staff on the boat.

"We'll have to dry her," he said. "She's silk, and fast colors."

"And I think my expeditionary force is all true blue!" added Uncle d.i.c.k, quietly.

In the night Jesse waked them all by suddenly crying out in a nightmare.

Rob shook him awake.

"What's wrong, old top?" he asked.

"I guess I was scared," admitted Jesse, frankly, and pulled the covers over his head.

CHAPTER X

AT THE PLATTE

On the morning following the storm the sun broke through the clouds with promise of a clear, warm day. Our _voyageurs_ were astir early.

"Take it easy, fellows," counseled the leader. "We've got to 'sun our powder,' as our _Journal_ would say. John, when you set down the day's doings in your own journal, make it simple as William Clark would. It's more manly. Well, here we are."

Rob looked ruefully at the wet willow thicket in which their camp was pitched. "We can get a few dead limbs," he said, "but, wet as things are now, we'd only smoke the stuff and not dry it much."

"Wait for the sun," advised John. And this they found it wise to do, not leaving the island until nearly noon.

"Morale pretty good!" said Uncle d.i.c.k. "John, set down, 'Men in verry high sperrits.' And off we go!"

They chugged up directly to the point, as nearly as they could determine, where they had met the disaster of the previous day. "Keep leading a horse up to a newspaper and he'll quit shying at it," said Uncle d.i.c.k. "Find the very spot where we struck."

"There she is!" exclaimed Rob, presently. The boat stuck again and began to swing. But this time the setting pole held her bow firm, and, since there was no wind, a strong shove pushed her free without anyone getting overboard. They went on after that with greater confidence than ever, and Jesse began to sing the old canoe song of the voyagers, "_En roulant ma boule, roulant!_"

They paused at none of the cities and towns now, and only set down the rivers and main features, as they continued their steady journey day after day for all of a week. At the end of that time the increasing shallowness of the river, the many sand bars and the nature of the discolored, rolling waters, made them sure they were approaching the mouth of the great Platte River, which, as they knew, rose far to the west in the Rocky Mountains.

Here they went into a camp and rested for almost a day, bringing up their field notes and maps and getting a good idea of the country by comparing their records with the old journals of the great expedition.

"Bear in mind that, after all, they were not the first," said Uncle d.i.c.k. "They had picked up old Dorion, their interpreter, from a canoe away down in Missouri, and brought him back up to help them with the Sioux, where he had lived. Their bowman Cruzatte and several other Frenchmen had spent two years up in here, at the mouth of the Loup.

There were a lot of cabins, Indian trading camps, one of them fifty years old, along this part of the river.

"But when they got up this far, they were coming into the Plains. New animals now, before so very long. They really were explorers, for there were no records to help them."

"You say they found new animals now," Rob began. "You mean elk, buffalo?"