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Mrs. Carruth sat stifling the sobs that rose in her throat.

      "My poor boy!" she whispered. "My brave son!"

      The river had carried away her son!

      "Oh, he’ll be sure to get out all right!" Mr. Carruth assured her. "All he’ll have to do is take the sweeps and row ashore somewhere. He’ll land in down below."

      "If he isn’t caught in a squeeze," she suggested, "and the boat all smashed!"

      "In a squeeze there are always lots of logs and things to ride on; in the morning, or perhaps to-night he may be taken off by a skiffman, or a drifter, or some one else. Perhaps he has been already."

      So Mrs. Carruth worried and Mr. Carruth consoled her all that long dark night as they waited in the tavern at the edge of the flood’s waters, listening to the low thunder of the crashing of timber against timber out in midstream, or straining their ears to catch any unusual sound that rose above the murmurings of the restless current. Sometimes they slept a little, but before daylight they were awake and downstairs.

      Just at dawn they sat down at the breakfast-table, where men who had been up all night, watching buildings and boats jeopardized by the rising tide, joined them. A minute later, others came in who had been down below Cape Girardeau in a gasolene-launch, to rescue a family reported to be lodged in the woods above La Croix Creek. They told how they had found a man and a woman in the trees, their house-boat having broken up against the woods in the bend, through the send of a floating island of drift.

      "Didn’t see anything of my boat?" Carruth asked.

      "You lost your boat, eh?"

      "It drifted out. Boy’s on it, too!"

      "That so? But he’ll be all right—right’s a muskrat’d be! I saw him and some other little chaps once riding logs in the back-water. Why, that boy’d walk across the drift!"

      "You think so!" Mrs. Carruth exclaimed. "You really think he could?"

      "Why, of course! You couldn’t get that boy under, light’s he is on his feet! Why, he spun the log right around, one of those white-pine poles, same as a log-driver would!"

      The Carruths smiled. It was comforting to know that their son could do things with a skill he might need when the river caught him. He could swim, row a boat, make a landing, and read the river signs; and he knew a thousand things no Up-the-Banker need know, but which are vitally useful to one who goes shanty-boating.

      Word that Sibley Carruth had been carried away in his father’s shanty-boat had been gossiped around town. Messages had been sent down the railway line, to be forwarded into the overflow, as opportunity offered, so that people would know about the matter.

      "No word from down below," Mr. Carruth was told by the telegraph operator. "Our wires over Thebes bridge are open of course. He’ll be passing Cairo sometime this morning. It’s fifty-five miles down. They’ll see the boat from the levee, if it has’nt landed above there. Everything is under below Commerce and they think it’s caving fast at Saladin towhead; drift is piling in there, some—"

      "Oh!" Mrs. Carruth caught her breath. "Suppose, Perry—"

      "Don’t worry!" Mr. Carruth replied. "There’s a chance of the boat’s being carried into the trees by the drift, but you remember that time we tripped down tied to a big snag, for two days, right out in the drift? We didn’t think a thing—"

      "Of course not!" she laughed, a little hysterically. "We didn’t know any better."

      "It’s all right!" he declared. "You mustn’t worry. Every one knows Sib can take care of himself if any one is able to!"

      "And he’s been wanting to go alone, too!" she recalled, with just a touch of asperity. "I hope he’s satisfied."

      "Lots to eat, a good little boat that rows like a skiff, a brave heart—And he knows—Why, that boy has read River Commission reports clear through, and he’s always talking to shanty-boaters, asking them about the river and how to do things. I wish he had a skiff, though—in case—in case—"

      "The drift should break the hull in, and sink it!" she cried. "If we could only do something! What can we do?"

      "Just wait." He shook his head.

      "Well, I won’t wait!" She announced. "I’m going over to see what I can do for the refugees!"

      People who lived out on the near-by bottoms, driven from their homes, had flocked into the village. Some had remained too long at home, and had escaped only when their houses were rocked on the foundations. Some had even been taken from roofs, or off improvised rafts. Some women and children needed a great deal of help from others better situated. The Carruths did not feel quite so badly lost as some others. They had lived as shanty-boaters for several years, but they had the calm and poise of well-educated and intelligent persons. Mr. Carruth’s work of finding choice logs for extra fine lumber paid him well. Living in a house-boat on the rivers, he had been able to save money through the wise investment of which he received a considerable income in dividends and rents. He knew most of the ten thousand miles of navigable streams in the Mississippi basin, and had seen them in all their phases, from extreme low water, with the baffling changes of channels in quicksands, to great and overwhelming floods which devastated the bottoms from river ridge to river ridge.

      During their years afloat Sibley had been growing up with his bright eyes filled with the wonders seen from the river, from miles-wide prairie to bad-land washes; from arid sage brush land to miles-square wheat-fields; from cattle herded by cow-boys to wild deer in the timber brakes along the river. The Carruths had entered the lower river, with its willow towheads, caving banks, dark swamp brakes, and settled territory interspersed with virgin wilderness.

      Having learned to read, the boy had looked upon one of the old Missouri River Commission reports as a treasure of literature. The report told of the failure of men to cope successfully with the Big Muddy. The river maps, on a scale of an inch-to-the-mile, showed the twists and bends of the river, the islands and reaches.

      Besides river reports, Sibley had read histories and stories, trappers’ magazines, biographies, grammars, and what not, when he must sit in the little cabin of the shanty-boat floating in a still sheltered eddy, with the rain pattering on the canvas-covering of the thin board roof.

      So while, in this great emergency, Mrs. Carruth could not help worrying about Sibley, she knew that he had knowledge and training, experience and courage. Not only did he know books but he was river-wise. He pulled a sturdy stroke on the long, light shanty-boat sweeps as they swung on their iron pins in the tops of oak posts on each side of the bow deck. He could swim far in river currents. He had fished from skiffs in running water, and spent many a day earning money at busy river ferries, where he handled motor-launches carrying passengers across, while the ferrymen handled the slower, more difficult flat-boats with loads of cattle, horses, wagons, automobiles, and other vehicles.

      "At least, he was prepared to take care of himself. He knows what to do!" Mr. Carruth assured her. "What boy has had better training?"

      CHAPTER III

      CAUGHT IN THE RIVER DRIFT

       Table of Contents

      ALL thought of escaping to the edge of the mighty current and the safety of the long shore eddies suddenly left Sib Carruth’s mind as he started to the rescue of the person who had shouted for help, from the common peril of the river drift. He had a good, strong-hulled shanty-boat. It would row as easily as any twenty-four-foot skiff, for there was a three-to-one rake at bow and stern, and the boat slid over the water like a skimming dish yacht.

      Rowing with the sweeps—oars fifteen feet long—he found that the light on the cabin roof blinded him, so he ran up on top and carried the lantern forward, where it could be seen by any one on the river, while he, standing in the shadow of the cabin, could not see even the reflected glow except where some drop of water out

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