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down the tow-head. That was all right as far as it went, but the tow-head

warn't sixty yards long, and the minute I flew by the foot of it I shot out

into the solid white fog, and hadn't no more idea which way I was going

than a dead man. ssssssssss

Thinks I, it won't do to paddle; first I know I'll run into the bank or a

tow-head or something; I got to set still and float, and yet it's mighty fidgety

business to have to hold your hands still at such a time. I whooped and

listened. Away down there, somewheres, I hears a small whoop, and up

comes my spirits. I went tearing after it, listening sharp to hear it again.

The next time it come, I see I warn't heading for it but heading away to the right

of it. And the next time, I was heading away to the left of it -- and not gaining

on it much, either, for I was flying around, this way and that and 'tother, but it

was going straight ahead all the time. ssssssssss

I did wish the fool would think to beat a tin pan, and beat it all the time,

but he never did, and it was the still places between the whoops that was making

the trouble for me. Well, I fought along, and directly I hears the whoop

behind me. I was tangled good, now. That was somebody else's whoop, or

else I was turned around. ssssssssss

I throwed the paddle down. I heard the whoop again; it was behind me

yet, but in a different place; it kept coming, and kept changing its place, and I

kept answering, till by-and-by it was in front of me again and I knowed the cur-

rent had swung the canoe's head down stream and I was all right, if that was Jim

and not some other raftsman hollering. I couldn't tell nothing about voices in a

fog, for nothing don't look natural nor sound natural in a fog.

The whooping went on, and in about a minute I come a booming down on a

cut bank with smoky ghosts of big trees on it, and the current throwed me off

to the left and shot by, amongst a lot of snags that fairly roared, the current was

tearing by them so swift. ssssssssss

In another second or two it was solid white and still again. I set perfectly

still, then, listening to my heart thump, and I reckon I didn't draw a breath

while it thumped a hundred. ssssssssss

I just give up, then. I knowed what the matter was. That cut bank was

an island, and Jim had gone down 'tother side of it. It warn't no tow-head, that

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