Page:Chetyates00yateiala.pdf/131

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I feel like Rip Van Winkle. I never slept so hard in my life. Are we nearly there?"

"Just going into the river," I said, "and it's so crooked that the boat has to tie knots in herself to get through."

Bess jumped up. "Oh," she cried, "there's the life-saving station! See the look-out man on top!"

"That job looks good to me," I said. "Nothing to do but walk up and down there and watch for wrecks; and then, when you see one—Whee-ee-ee!"—and I went through all the motions of running out boats and managing oars and throwing life-preservers. I wanted to be right in the middle of a big storm and see what I'd do, and whether I'd keep my nerve. Just then we bumped into the piling; for that little river is so crooked that the boat had to run her nose right up onto the bank and then throw out a rope to hold her there, and swing around and go up to the dock backward. Gee, you ought to have seen her strain on that rope! They say that a lot of money has been spent on that harbor; but it's the most skewgee one that I ever saw.

Bess and I hurried back to where the others were gathering up wraps and lunch-boxes. "Twin-