ut it's so wide there we couldn't
make nobody hear. So pap said somebody got to get ashore and get help
somehow. I was the only one that could swim, so I made a dash for it,
and Miss Hooker she said if I didn't strike help sooner, come here and
hunt up her uncle, and he'd fix the thing. I made the land about a
mile below, and been fooling along ever since, trying to get people to
do something, but they said, 'What, in such a night and such a
current? There ain't no sense in it; go for the steam-ferry.' Now if
you'll go and--"

"By Jackson, I'd _like_ to, and, blame it, I don't know but I will;
but who in the dingnation's a-going to _pay_ for it? Do you reckon
your pap--"

"Why _that's_ all right. Miss Hooker she tole me, _particular_, that
her uncle Hornback--"

"Great guns! is _he_ her uncle? Looky here, you break for that light
over yonder-way, and turn out west when you git there, and about a
quarter of a mile out you'll come to the tavern; tell 'em to dart you
out to Jim Hornback's, and he'll foot the bill. And don't you fool
around any, because he'll want to know the news. Tell him I'll have
his niece all safe before he can get to town. Hump yourself, now; I'm
a-going up around the corner here to roust out my engineer."

I struck for the light, but as soon as he turned the corner I went
back and got into my skiff and bailed her out, and then pulled up
shore in the easy water about six hundred yards, and tucked myself in
among some wood-boats; for I couldn't rest easy till I could see the
ferryboat start. But take it all around, I was feeling ruther
comfortable on accounts of taking all this trouble for that gang, for
not many would 'a' done it. I wished the widow knowed about it. I
judged she would be proud of me for helping these rapscallions,
because rapscallions and dead-beats is the kind the widow and good
people takes the most interest in.

Well, before long here comes the wreck, dim and dusky, sliding along
down! A kind of cold shiver went through me, and then I struck out for
her. She was very deep, and I see in a minute there warn't much chance
for anybody being alive in her. I pulled all around her and hollered a
little, but there wasn't any answer; all dead still. I felt a little
bit heavy-hearted about the gang, but not much, for I reckoned if they
could stand it I could.

Then here comes the ferryboat; so I shoved for the middle of the river
on a long down-stream slant; and when I judged I was o