k it.

They sat down, and the boy took wonderful things out of his wonderful
pockets--sandwiches of egg and sandwiches of jam; and Margaret fell to.

"I live in New York," said the boy, "but I'm staying with my cousins
up the river. They told me there were partridges on this island, and I
rowed down to try and get some, but I missed two." The boy blushed most
becomingly whenever he spoke, and his voice, and the way he said words,
were different from anything Margaret had ever heard. And she admired
him tremendously. And the boy, because she had spent a night on a desert
island, which he never had, admired her in turn.

"Maybe we'll find 'Laddin on the way," said Margaret, cheerfully, and
she looked up with great eyes at her godlike young friend.

V

Meanwhile to Aladdin and his log divers things had occurred, but the
wonderful lamp, burning low or high at the will of the river, had
not gone out. Sliding through the smoking fog at three miles an hour,
kicking and paddling, all had gone well for a while. Then, for he was
more keen than Margaret to note the fog's promise to lift, at the very
moment when the shores began to appear and mark his course as favorable,
at the very moment when the sun struck one end of the log, an eddy of
the current struck the other, and sent the stanch little craft Good Luck
and her captain by a wide curve back up the river. The backward journey
was slow and tortuous, and twice when the Good Luck turned turtle,
submerging Aladdin, he gave himself up for lost; but amidships of the
island, fairly opposite to the spot where he had left Margaret, the log
was again seized by the right current, and the voyage recommenced.
But the same eddy seized them, and back they came, with only an arm
stiffened by cold between Aladdin and death. The third descent of the
river, however, was more propitious. The eddy, it is true, made a final
snatch, but its fingers were weakened and its murderous intentions
thwarted. They passed by the knob of trees at the narrowing of the
river, and swept grandly toward the town. Past the first shipyard they
tore unnoticed, but at the second a shouting arose, and a boat was
slipped overboard and put after them. Strong hands dragged Aladdin from
the water, and, gulp after gulp, water gushed from his mouth. Then they
rowed him quickly to land, and the Good Luck, having done her duty, went
down the river alone. Years after, could Aladdin have met with that log,
he would