Then they made motions to us, to know if we could swim, to which we both replied by shaking our heads and pretending to be frightened. So again we began our march by a road that led along the stream. I pretended to be very tired, and occasionally jostled against the guard that was marching near me. He cried out angrily and pushed me with his rifle. When I jostled against him again, he threatened me with the butt of it. I was getting on bad terms with him; for he did not have the sweetest of tempers. I am afraid my face showed him that it would be more than agreeable to me if I could kick him; for he grew more and more disagreeable. It was nearly dark and clouds darkened the sky, when we came to a pontoon boat bridge. “I am awfully afraid of water,” I said to Gordon with a wink. “It would be just my confounded luck to fall overboard here and drown. It don’t look safe.” As our group reached the bridge, I pretended to grow very timid about trusting myself on it. The guard near me was tired and ugly. I started and jostled against him, and he struck me with the butt of his rifle, which I returned with an angry look and gesture; for that is a language that any one can understand. The bridge was made up of about twenty boats, which showed me that the stream was about two hundred and seventy feet in width, or more. The water looked dark, but I was not sure that it was deep. About the middle of the bridge I lurched against the same guard heavily, as though by accident, and he struck me a heavy blow with his rifle. With a yell I went overboard, threw up my hands, and sank. I had taken a deep breath for a long swim under water, for I had fallen on the down tide side and would have to swim against the current to come up under the bridge, as I intended to do. I was almost exhausted when, looking upward, I saw I was under one of the boats. I took another long stroke and, fortunately, came up between two boats, but to my alarm saw that I was not under the covered portion that formed the roadway. I quickly submerged, and without being seen reached a safe place and clutched the gunwale of a covered boat. I heard a tumult of trampling feet on the planks above me, with calls and outcries. Then it occurred to me that some one might look under the planking; so I dove under the boat, swam to one that was nearer the shore from which we had come, and waited again until their footsteps receded to the other end of the bridge, and I was satisfied that they had abandoned further search for me. But what had become of my chum? He was to have followed me. I stayed under the bridge, keeping myself above water by holding on to a boat, until it was very dark, then swimming quietly down stream, landed on the shore, thinking it safer to keep away from the roadway for a time.