“Good-by, Diana!  Good-by, Curly and Mack!” Enoch waved his hand and took his place, and the racing water seized the boats.  Hardly had Enoch turned to look once more at the four watching on the beach, when the boats shot round the curving western wall.  For the first half hour, the water was smooth and swift, sweeping between walls that were abrupt and verdureless and offered not so much as a finger hold for a landing place.

Enoch, following instruction did not try to row at first.  He sat quietly watching the swift changing scenery, feeling awkward and a little helpless in his life preserver.

“We’re due, sometime this morning, to strike some pretty stiff cataracts,” said Milton, “but the records show that we can shoot most of them.  Keep in to the left wall, Forr, I want to squint at that bend in the strata.”

They swung across the stream, and as they did so they caught a glimpse of Jonas.  He was crouched in the bottom of the boat, his eyes rolling above his life preserver.

“Didn’t Na-che give you that Navaho charm, Jonas?” called Forrester.

“It’ll take more than a charm to help poor old Jonas,” said Enoch.  “I really think he’ll like it in a day or so.  He’s got good pluck.”

“He’s only showing what all of us felt on our maiden trip,” chuckled Milton.  Then he added, quickly, “Listen, Forr!”

Above the splash of the oars and the swift rush of the river rose a sound like the far roar of street traffic.

“Our little vacation is over,” commented Forrester.

“Easy now, Forr!  We’ll land for observation before we tackle a racket like that.  Let the current carry us.  Be ready to back water when I shout.”  He raised his voice.  “Harden, don’t follow too closely!  You know your failing!”

They rounded a curving wall, the current carrying them, Milton said, at least ten miles an hour.  A short distance now, and they saw spray breaking high in the middle of the stream.

“We’ll land here,” said Milton, steering to a great pile of bowlders against the right wall.

Enoch watched with keen interest the preparation for the descent.  First sticks were thrown into the water, to catch the trend of the main current.  Milton pointed out to Enoch that if the stick were deflected against one wall or another, great care had to be exercised to prevent the boats being dashed against the walls in like manner.  But, he said, if the current seemed to run a fairly unobstructed course, it was hopeful that the boats would go through.  There were a number of rocks protruding from the water, but the current appeared to round these cleanly and Milton gave the order to proceed.  They worked back upstream a short distance so as to catch the current straight prow on, and in a moment they were dashing through a sea of roaring waves that drenched them to the skin.

Forrester and Milton steered a zigzag course about the menacing rocks, grazing and bumping them now and again, but emerging finally, without accident, in quieter waters.  Here they hugged the shore and waited for Harden’s boat, the Mary, to come down.  And come it did, balancing uncannily on the top of the waves, with Jonas’ yells sounding even above the uproar of the waters.