ou didn't, you couldn't
hit it off so cheerfully. I know a thing or two, and what I don't know
I am learning. You are a perfectly normal woman, Lucetta, and normality
doesn't mean continuous travel."

"You have changed your mind again. Last week you were calling me
abnormal, and saying that you had never met a woman like me before."

"I hadn't; but that was my misfortune. I hope there are a good many like
you; I've got to hope it for the sake of humanity and the good of the
race. But this talk isn't getting us anywhere. We had better turn in;
there is a hard day ahead of us tomorrow."

In the morning the prophecy seemed destined to fulfil itself in heaping
measure. While Lucetta was getting breakfast Prime took to the woods and
made a careful survey of some portion of the hazards ahead. He was gone
for the better part of an hour, and when he came back his report was not
encouraging.

"Worse and more of it," was the way he described the difficulties. "It
is just one rapid after another, as far as I went; and that must have
been a mile and a half or more. Coming back, I kept to the river bank,
and tried to imagine us picking the way between the rocks in the
channel. I believe we can do it if you have the nerve to try."

"If _I_ have the nerve?" she flung back. "Is that a revival of the sex
idea?"

"I beg your pardon," he hastened to say. "It was simply a manner of
speaking. Your nerve is like the rest of you--superb. We'll shoot the
rapids if it takes a leg. It would ask for more than a leg to make the
carry."

A little later they loaded the canoe carefully for the greater hazard,
packing the dunnage securely and protecting the meal and the flour as
well as they could by wrapping them tightly in the canvas roll. Past
this, they cut strips from the remaining scraps of deerskin and tied
everything, even to the utensils, the guns, and the axe, to the braces,
taking time to make their preparations thorough.

It was well that they took the time while they had it. After the
birch-bark had been headed into the first of the rapids there was no
time for anything but the strenuous fight for life. Faster and still
faster the frail craft leaped on its way, down one rapid and into
another before they could congratulate themselves upon the latest
hairbreadth dodging of the thickly strewn boulders.

From time to time in the brief respites Prime shouted encouragement to
his canoe-mate. "Keep it up--it can't last forever! We're