‘It won’t do to run no risk er losin’ this, after all the trouble we’ve been at ter git it,’ he said. ‘Whar d’ye reckon I’d better put it?’ ‘Stow it in your cartridge pouch,’ suggested Lucius. ‘That will be as safe a place as any other.’ ‘Right!’ said Ephraim, folding the letter up small and placing it in his pouch. ‘Haul her in, Luce.’ ‘What are you going to do?’ asked Lucius, bringing the boat’s nose again to the bank. ‘If we pull out into the river, we shall be seen.’ ‘Likely, ain’t it?’ inquired Ephraim cheerfully, as he gathered up the rifles. ‘No; we’ll head her up stream and glide along the bank till we git below their outposts. Ketch hold er the guns.’ ‘But they may search along the bank,’ demurred Lucius, laying the rifles in the bottom of the boat. ‘Nary a doubt er that,’ replied Ephraim, stooping to unloose the knot of the painter from the sapling round which it was tied. ‘But et first they’ll be in sech a confusion thet I ’low they won’t be able ter think er everything et once. And the fust idee’ll nat’ally be thet we hev gone down stream and then headed fer the opposite side.’ He untied the rope, and jumping down the bank, slung it aboard and scrambled in after it. Instantly the boat swung round, obedient to the current, and with her nose to the north, drifted rapidly down stream. ‘Out oars, Luce!’ cried Ephraim, fumbling in the bottom of the boat. ‘Head her round. By time!’ He stopped suddenly and straightened up. At the same instant Lucius grasped the facts, and they stared at each other with white, scared faces. There were no oars in the boat! [Illustration] CHAPTER XI. LUCIUS BRINGS THE BOAT ASHORE. For a moment Ephraim was, as he would himself have expressed it, ‘sot back,’ but he was not one to remain so long, and seizing his rifle, he grasped it by the barrel, and using the butt as a paddle, endeavoured to guide the course of the boat. ‘Quick, Luce!’ he exclaimed. ‘Take yourn, and we’ll see what kin be done. The pesky Yank! Of co’se he’d hid the oars somewhar in the bresh, so as nobody could steal his boat. By time! What an or’nery fool I war not ter hev thort er thet before.’ ‘No; it was I who was the fool,’ corrected Lucius, labouring away with his makeshift oar. ‘You had quite enough to do with the letter and the rifles. I should have looked to see if everything was right.’ ‘Waal, thar’s a pair of us, then, ef ye will hev it so,’ returned Ephraim gloomily. ‘Ennyway, it don’t matter a corn cob now whose fault it war. The mischief’s done. I wouldn’t so much keer,’ he added, beating the water furiously with his rifle-butt, ‘on’y when that clever captain comes back and finds the oars whar he left ’em, he’ll nat’ally know we must be down stream, and they won’t be long gittin’ on our trail.’