Chapter XXXVI

_In Which Ha-Ha Shallow is Foiled, Archie Armstrong Displays Swift
Cunning, of Which He is Well Aware, and Billy Topsail, Much to His
Surprise, and not Greatly to His Distaste, is Kissed by a Lady of
Poor Luck Barrens_

Another advance of the right foot; an increased depth of two inches; a sudden, upward thrust of the water; a rolling stone: Billy Topsail tottered--struggled for balance, like a man on a tight-rope, and caught and held it; but in the wrenching effort his pack had shifted and disturbed his natural poise. He faced up-stream, feet spread, body bent, arms extended; and in this awkward posture, at a disadvantage, he swayed dangerously, incommoded by the pack, his legs quivering in the current.

Deliberately, then, Billy contorted himself until the pack slipped from his shoulder to its place on his back; and upright again, established once more, he dragged his left foot by inches against the current, set it above the right, forced it into place, and turned to face the opposite shore. He was fairly mid-stream, now. Another confident, successful step--a moment more of cool behaviour and intelligent procedure--and the grip of the current would begin to fail.

All this while the tumbling water had worked its inevitable effect. It was noisy; it ran swift; it troubled Billy Topsail--the speed and clatter of it. And he was now confused and dizzy. Now, too, he was conscious of the roar of the stream below. More clamorously, more vividly, it asserted itself--reiterated and magnified its suggestion of disaster. It could not be ignored. Billy Topsail abstracted his attention. It returned to the menace.

There it was--the roar of the stream below: the deep, narrow rush of it, swelling over the boulders, curling around them, plunging irresistibly towards the Black Pool ice, and vanishing into the stifling gloom beneath, in a swift, black, silent stream, flecked with creamy puffs of foam. A misstep, a false stone, a lost balance--a man would then drift fast and helpless, bruised by the bottom, flung against the boulders and stunned, smothered by the water, cast into Black Pool and left to sink in still water. It was the logical incident of failure.

Aware of the cumulative effect of fear, conscious of the first creeping paralysis of it, Billy Topsail instantly determined upon the next step. It must be taken--it must be taken at once. Already the weakness and confusion of terror was a crippling factor to be dealt with. He must act--venture. He moved in haste; there was a misstep, an incautious faith in the foothold, a blind chance taken--and the current caught him, lifted him, tugged at him, and he lost his feet, flung his arms in the air, toppled over, drifted off with the current, submerged, and was swept like driftwood into the deep rush below.

He rose, gasped, sank--came breathless to the surface; and self-possessed again, and fighting for life against hope, instinctively, but yet with determined intelligence, grasping breath when he could and desperately seeking handhold, foothold--fighting thus he was dragged a bruising course through the narrowing channel towards Black Pool and at last momentarily arrested his drift with a failing grip of a boulder.

Archie Armstrong ran down-stream. No expedient was in his horrified mind. The impulse was to plunge in and rescue Billy if he could. That was all. But the current was swifter than he; he was outstripped--stumbling along the rocky, icy shore. When he came abreast of Billy, who was still clinging to the rock in mid-stream, he did plunge in; but he came at once to a full stop, not gone a fathom into the current, and stood staring.

Billy Topsail could not catch the bottom in the lee of the rock. Even there the current was too strong, the depth of water too great, the lee too narrow, the rock too small for a wide, sufficient backwater. Black Pool was within twenty fathoms. Billy's clutch was breaking. In a moment he would be torn away. Yet there was a moment--a minute or more of opportunity. And having assured himself of this grace, Archie Armstrong splashed ashore, without a word or a sign, scaled the bank and ran down-stream to the bridge of Black Pool ice.

The bridge was rotten. It was rotten from bank to bank. It would not bear the weight of a man. Archie Armstrong knew it. Its fall was imminent. It awaited the last straw--a dash of rain, a squall of wind. The ice was thick; there was a foot of it. And the bridge was heavy; its attachment to the low cliffs was slight; in a day--next day, perhaps--it would fall of its own weight, lie inert in the pool, drift slowly away to the open reaches of Skeleton Arm and drive to sea.

Archie Armstrong, hanging by his hands from the edge of the low cliff, broke a great fragment from the rock and thus reduced the stability of the whole; and hanging from the edge of the same low cliff, a few fathoms below, grasping the roots of the spruce, he broke a second fragment loose with his weight--a third and a fourth. And the structure collapsed. It fell in thick, spacious fragments on the quiet water of the pool, buoyant and dry, and covered the face of the water, held imprisoned by the rocks of the narrow exit.

When Billy Topsail came drifting down, Archie Armstrong, waiting on the ice, helped him out and ashore.

"Better build a fire, Archie," said Billy, presently.

"I'm doing that very thing, Billy."

"Thanks, Archie."

"Cold, b'y?"

"I'll take no harm from the wettin'."

"Harm! A hardy kid like you! I laugh!"

Billy grinned.

"When I'm rested," said he, "I'll wring out my clothes. By the time we've had a snack o' soggy grub I'll be dry. An' then we'll go on."

"On it is!"

Billy looked up.

"Archie," said he, "that was marvellous--clever!"

"Clever?" inquired Archie. "What was clever?"

And Archie Armstrong grinned. He knew well enough what was clever.

* * * * *

Nobody was mad at Poor Luck Barrens. But somebody was in a raving delirium of fever. And that was big George Tulk--Trapper George of Bread-and-Butter Tickle. It was a tight little tilt on the edge of the timber--winter quarters: a log shanty, with a turf roof, deep in a drift of snow, to which a rising cloud of smoke attracted the attention of Archie and Billy Topsail. No; what was alarming at Poor Luck Barrens was not a frenzy of insanity--it was the delirium of pneumonia.

Jinny Tulk was glad enough to receive the help of Billy Topsail and Archie Armstrong.

By and by Billy asked:

"Was it you put the letter in the cleft stick?"

Jinny smiled.

"Ay," said she.

"I found it," said Billy.

With that Jinny Tulk kissed Billy Topsail before he could stop her. She was old enough for that; and she was so wholesome and pretty that when Billy had reflected upon the incident he determined that he would not try to stop her should she attempt it again.

"How'd you like it?" Archie teased him, privately, when Doctor Luke had arrived and Trapper George was resting.

Billy blushed.

"'Twasn't so awful," was his stout reply.

Archie burst out laughing. Billy blushed again. Then he, too, laughed.

"I 'low I got my reward," said he.

By that time Trapper George was doing well. Doctor Luke was watchfully at work. And Doctor Luke and Jinny Tulk, with the help of a spell of frosty weather and an abundance of healing fresh air, and assisted by the determined constitution of Trapper George Tulk himself, who had formed the fixed habit of surviving adverse conditions--Doctor Luke and Jinny Tulk worked an improvement, which passed presently into a state of convalescence and ultimately became a cure. It was no easy matter. Trapper George Tulk put one foot over the border--took a long look into the final shadows. But Doctor Luke was a good fighter. And he happened to win.