To Bart’s surprise, not a gun was to be seen in the boat. In the bottom, at one end, however, lay a pile of rushes, such as are sometimes bound on the front end of a boat when it creeps upon water birds, for the occupants of the boat to obtain a shot. Of a sudden, Frank leaned over and gave those reeds a yank. Two shotguns were exposed to view! Hodge gave a cry of triumph and anger, and Frank, with another sudden twist of his paddle, tried to back the canoe away from the boat. The man uttered a cry of anger, and Welch leaped to his feet, catching up an oar. “Oh, I’ll fix you!” he shouted, swinging the oar over his head and striking straight at Frank’s head. Merry saw he could not get out of reach, and so, in a moment, he swung his paddle out of water and used it to divert the oar. Crack!—the oar struck the paddle and was turned aside. Frank had saved his skull from being cracked by his swift move. With a great splash, the oar struck in the water, and Welch was given a yank that set him toppling, in a frantic effort not to plunge headlong out of the boat. He let go of the oar and flung up his hands, waving them wildly, and then, finding he must go over, he dropped and caught at the side of the boat, overturning that in a twinkling. It happened in a moment. Both Welch and his companion were precipitated into the water. The man disappeared a few seconds, and then came up and grasped the end of the boat. Welch went down, came to the surface, thrust his hands up into the air, cried out gurglingly, splashed a moment, and went down again. The commotion in the water caused the canoe to rock, but Bart Hodge laughed shortly. His face showed triumph and satisfaction at the misfortune that had befallen the man and boy. With his paddle, he moved the canoe yet farther away. Merriwell looked somewhat anxious and waited for Welch to come to the surface again. The man, clinging to the overturned boat, poured forth a torrent of angry abuse at the boys in the canoe, neither of whom paid any attention to him. Had they done so, they would have observed that he felt of his beard and hair in a singular manner, as if doubtful about something. Welch came up again, splashed about, strangled, coughed, cried out and sank. Immediately Frank began to take off some of his clothing. He flung his cap into the bottom of the canoe, his coat followed it, and then he pulled off his shoes, keeping low down, so that he would not overturn the birch-bark craft. “What are you going to do, Frank?” asked Bart, surprised. “Save that fellow from drowning, if I can. He can’t swim.” “But what is the use to jump into the water and get wet? We can get near him as he comes up, and one of us can catch hold of him.” “It won’t do.” “Why?” “Don’t you see, he is drowning! He would clutch the canoe—try to drag himself out of the water—overturn it instantly! We’d both get a wetting, when one can——There he is!”