enter and arose as vertical as a plumb
line, swayed in short, quick circles and then dove from sight. A moment
later it leaped from the water well away from the pool and fell back
with a smack which the noise of the wind did not drown. To starboard was
a rhythmic splashing of bare limbs, where a great cottonwood, partly
submerged, bared its fangs. To the right of that was a towhead, a newly
formed island of mud and sand partly awash.

The pilot cursed softly and jerked on the bell handle, the boat
instantly falling into half speed. He did not dare to cut across the
whirlpool, the snag barred him dead ahead, and it was doubtful if there
was room to pass between it and the towhead; but he had no choice in the
matter and he rang again, the boat falling into bare steerageway. If he
ran aground he would do so gently and no harm would be done. So swift
was the current that the moment he put the wheel over a few spokes and
shifted the angle between the keel-line and the current direction, the
river sent the craft sideways so quickly that before he had stopped
turning the wheel in the first direction he had to spin it part way back
again. The snag now lay to port, the towhead to starboard, and holding a
straight course the _Missouri Belle_ crept slowly between them. There
came a slight tremor, a gentle lifting to port, and he met it by a quick
turn of the wheel. For a moment the boat hung pivoted, its bow caught by
a thrusting side current and slowly swinging to port and the snag. A
hard yank on the bell handle was followed by a sudden forward surge, a
perceptible side-slip, a gentle rocking, and the bow swung back as the
boat, entirely free again, surged past both dangers.

The pilot heaved a sigh of relief. "Peterson didn't say nothin' about
th' snag or th' towhead," he growled. Then he grinned. "I bet he rounded
inter th' edge o' th' whirler afore he knowed it was thar! Now that I
recollect it he did seem a mite excited."

"Somethin' like a boy explorin' a cave, an' comin' face to face with a
b'ar," laughed Tom. "I recken you fellers don't find pilotin'
monotonous."

"Thar ain't no two trips alike; might say no two miles, up or down, trip
after trip. Here comes th' rain, an' by buckets; an' thar's th' place I
been a-lookin' fer. Th' bank's so high th' wind won't hardly tech us."

He signaled for half speed and then for quarter and the boat no sooner
had fallen into the latter than her bow lifted and she came to a grating