Apparently, there was no immediate danger; the yacht was heading fairly straight up the middle of the river, and although now and then the stern slid this way or that, she was behaving well. But the imperative thing was to stop. Dick tried to undo a rope that looked promising, but his fingers were numb and stiff, despite the woolen gloves that covered them, and refused to act. He peered ahead into the descending darkness. The shore to the left was getting rather too near for comfort, and he seized the tiller, and, half fearful of the result, swung it to the right, with the startling result that the yacht headed more directly toward the threatening shore. Desperately he moved the tiller to the left, and gave a sigh of relief as the boat’s nose swung toward midstream. Encouraged by his success he presently moved the helm back a little, and with the yacht’s head pointing a middle course, again tried to think of some means of bringing his unwelcome voyage to an end. He knew nothing, practically, of yachting on either water or ice, but he knew that if he could get the sail down the boat would eventually stop. Painfully he drew off a glove and sought his pocket-knife. It was not there. He tried all his pockets with the same disappointing result. Then he drew his glove back over his deadened hand, and thought desperately of jumping off and letting The Sleet look after herself. But the prospect of being dashed across the ice at the risk of a broken limb didn’t appeal to him; and besides, he felt in a measure responsible for the safe return of the confounded boat. “Stand by the ship!” he muttered with an attempt at a grin. [Illustration: “Stand by the ship!” he muttered.] The wind seemed now to be decreasing in force, but The Sleet still charged away into the gathering blackness with breathless speed. At a loss for any better solution, Dick struggled again at the rope, and it seemed that success was about to reward his efforts when there was a sudden jar, followed a second later by a strange sinking sensation, the sound of breaking ice, and then Dick felt the cockpit being lifted up and up, and ere he could grasp anything he was rolled over the edge and plunged downward into icy water. CHAPTER XIV DICK TELLS HIS STORY When Carl and Trevor, bruised and breathless, found their feet and stared about them, The Sleet was already a whisking gray blot in the twilight. Trevor obeyed his first impulse and limping up the ice in the direction of the disappearing boat, called frantically: “Dick! Dick!” Then, realizing the absurdity of his chase after a thing that was probably reeling off half a mile every minute or so, he stopped and came dejectedly back to where Carl was silently rubbing a bruised thigh. “Dick will be killed!” he cried hoarsely. “What shall we do?” “Get back to the academy,” said Carl. “What good will that do?” “They can telegraph up the river and get some one to look for him. I wonder how far from Hillton we are?”