a friend who
would put them wise to actual conditions around town.

They took catnaps, having had too little sleep, and yet they could not
sleep deeply. They watched the shanty-boats which dropped down the river
at intervals, most of them in the main current close to the far bank,
and often hardly visible against the mottled background of caving earth,
fallen trees, and flickering mirage. Their restlessness was silent,
morose, and one of them was always on the lookout.

Despard himself was on watch in the afternoon. He sat just inside the
kitchen door, out of the sunshine, in a comfortable rocking chair. Two
windows and the stern door gave him a wide view of the river, sandbars
and eddy. It seemed but a minute, but he had fallen into a doze, when
the splash of a shanty-boat sweeps awakened all the crew with a sudden,
frightened start. Whispers, hardly audible, hailed in alarm. The three,
crouching in involuntary doubt and dismay, glared at the newcomer.

It was a woman drifting in. Apparently she intended to land there, and
the three men stared at her.

"His wife!" Despard said with soundless lips. The others nodded their
recognition.

Mrs. Carline had run into the great dead eddy at the foot of Yankee
Lower Bar, turned up in the slow reverse eddy of the chute, and was
coming by their boat at the slowest possible speed.

Despard pulled his soft shirt collar, straightened his tie, hitched his
suspenders, put on his coat, walked out on the stern deck, and, after a
glance around, seemed suddenly to discover the stranger.

"Howdy!" he nodded, touching his cap respectfully, and gazing with
flickering eyes at the woman whose marksmanship entitled her to the
greatest respect.

"Howdy!" she nodded, scrutinizing him with level eyes. "Where am I?"

"Yankee Bar. Them's Chickasaw Bluffs No. 1."

"Do you know Jest Prebol?"

"Yessum." Despard's head bobbed in alarmed, unwilling assent.

"I thought perhaps you'd like to know that he's getting along all
right."

"I bet he learnt his lesson," Despard grimaced.

"What? I don't just understand."

"About bein' impudent to a lady that can shoot--straight!"

A flicker moved the woman's countenance, and she smiled, oddly.

"Oh, any one is likely to make mistakes!"

"Darn fools is, Miss Crele. And you Old Crele's girl! He might of
knowed!"

The other two stepped out to help enjoy the conversation and the
scenery.

"You know me?" she demanded.

"Yessum, we shore do.