“Biccause—­I’m pilot myse’f.”

“Oh, I see!  You’re one of the good ones.”  Danny’s air was surly, his tone forbidding.

“Yes.”

“Hate yourself, don’t you?  I s’pose you want his job.  Is that it?  No wonder—­five hundred seeds for fifteen minutes’ work.  Soft graft, I call it.”  The speaker laughed unpleasantly.  “Well, what does a good pilot charge?”

“Me?” The Canadian shrugged indifferently.  “I charge you one t’ousan’ dollar.”

Royal’s jaw dropped.  “The devil you say!” he exclaimed.

“I don’t want de job—­your scow’s no good—­but I toss a coin wit’ you.  One t’ousan’ dollar or—­free trip.”

“Nothing doing,” snapped the ex-horseman.

“Bien!  Now I give you li’l ad-vice.  Hol’ hard to de right in lower end dis canon.  Dere’s beeg rock dere.  Don’t touch ‘im or you goin’ spin lak’ top an’ mebbe you go over W’ite ’Orse sideways.  Dat’s goin’ smash you, sure.”

Royal broke out, peevishly:  “Another hot tip, eh?  Everybody’s got some feed-box information—­especially the ones you don’t hire.  Well, I ain’t scared—­”

“Oh yes, you are!” said the other man.  “Everybody is scare’ of dis place.”

“Anyhow, I ain’t scared a thousand dollars’ worth.  Takes a lot to scare me that much.  I bet this place is as safe as a chapel and I bet our scow goes through with her tail up.  Let her bump; she’ll finish with me on her back and all her weights.  I built her and I named her.”

Danny watched the pilot as he swung down to the stony shore and rejoined Pierce Phillips; then he looked on in fascination while they removed their outer garments, stepped into a boat with Kid Bridges, and rowed away into the gorge.

“It’s—­got my goat!” muttered the little jockey.

CHAPTER XI

Although scows larger than the Rouletta had run Miles Canon and the rapids below in safety, perhaps none more unwieldy had ever done so.  Royal had built his barge stoutly, to be sure, but of other virtues the craft had none.  When loaded she was so clumsy, so obstinate, so headstrong that it required unceasing effort to hold her on a course; as for rowing her, it was almost impossible.  She took the first swooping rush into the canon, strange to say, in very good form, and thereafter, by dint of herculean efforts, Royal and his three men managed to hold her head down-stream.  Sweeping between the palisades, she galloped clumsily onward, wallowing like a hippopotamus.  Her long pine sweeps, balanced and bored to receive thick thole-pins, rose and fell like the stiff legs of some fat, square-bodied spider; she reared her bluff bow; then she dove, shrouding herself in spray.

It was a journey to terrify experienced rivermen; doubly terrifying was it to Royal and Kirby, who knew nothing whatever of swift water and to whom its perils were magnified a thousandfold.