Being compelled to fight against the steady current, the boat could not make such very rapid progress, especially when backing up. Still it seemed as though Buster might be swimming toward them. He was using only one hand, and churning the water like the paddle-wheel of a Mississippi steamboat.
"Whew!" they heard him say, after ejecting a stream of water from his mouth, which he persisted in keeping open; "a sockdolager, I tell you!
Going to beat all the records this time. It must be a river horse, or a boss sturgeon, boys. I want to save him, you bet!"
Evidently, like a true fisherman, Buster"s first, last and only thought concerned the successful landing of the game he had struck. And presently the boat had come so close to the submerged boy that Jack stopped the engine lest the propeller do Buster some material damage.
Two of them leaned over the stern and with great difficulty managed to drag the water-soaked chum aboard.
"Sit there in the stern until you drain, Buster," ordered Jack. "If we took all that water aboard we"d be in danger of foundering."
"What ails your left hand?" demanded Josh.
"Why, don"t you see," explained George, "the silly went and wound the line about his wrist. Then when the fish took hold it was a case of Buster going overboard or having his left arm pulled out of its socket.
No wonder he lets it hang down like that now. I bet you it hurts like fun."
"But say, the bally old fish has quit pulling like mad!" exclaimed Buster, as though that circ.u.mstance troubled him much more than any bodily pain he might be enduring.
Josh leaned forward and took hold of the line. He even started to pull it in after the manner of a skillful fisherman, while Buster eyed him eagerly.
"Tell me you feel him pulling yet, Josh, can"t you?" he pleaded. "Don"t break my heart by saying he"s gone! After all my fight I deserve to land that monster."
Josh chuckled.
"I do feel something now, all right, Buster," he remarked. "Watch me yank him alongside in a hurry. You never could handle such a monster with one of your arms next to useless."
So Josh worked away, possibly putting on more or less, as though he were having the time of his life in trying to drag the captive alongside.
Every little while he pretended to lose a foot or so of line, whereupon Buster would call out anxiously and beg him to keep a tight hold on the glorious prize.
"Talk to me about having fish for supper," the dripping sportsman cried as he watched for the first glimpse of his catch; "why, we could feed a whole village on such a dandy as this. And caught on a bare hook, too!
Ain"t I the lucky one for keeps? What d"ye know about that?"
"There he comes, Buster!" cried Josh, pantingly; "get ready now to help me pull him up over the stern, all of you. My stars! but how he does fight."
In another moment Josh drew alongside a small but broad-nosed _log_, which in floating with the current of the river had suddenly been snagged by the bare hook. The impact, with the boat running as it was, had been severe enough to drag the fisherman into the water, for the stout line held, and he had foolishly wrapped one end of the same around his left wrist.
Jack and George shouted with mirth, and Josh excelled them both. Buster looked down at the now tamed "fish," felt ruefully of his lame arm, and then grinned.
"You bit, all right, fellows!" he blandly told them; nor would he offer any further explanation, so that to the end of the chapter none of them really knew whether Buster had been playing a trick on them or not by pretending to fight the object at the end of his line and showing such tremendous solicitude while Josh was pulling in the same.
"What am I going to do about drying off?" asked Buster a little later, after he had succeeded in reeling in all his line without getting it very much tangled--the log he allowed to float off on the current, having no use for it, though Josh did ask him if he had never heard of "planked fish."
"You"re draining right along," George told him; "and as the weather is so nice and warm there"s no danger of your taking cold, I guess."
"When we get ash.o.r.e," Jack explained, "we can start a fire, and that will give you a chance to get dry. But I"m sorry about that arm, Buster.
It may give you some trouble, because the jerk must have been fierce."
"Well, I should say it was," admitted the other, with a sigh. "I thought my arm would come off sure. But then the excitement kept me up, you see.
And I knew right well you"d stop the boat and come back after me. But Jack, later on I want you to rub my arm with that liniment you carry with you. Chances are it"ll be black and blue along the muscles. It hurts like fun even now."
Jack considered that the sooner this was done the better, so he turned the wheel over to George, and bidding Buster bare his arm, proceeded to give it a good rubbing with the liniment he knew to be fine for this purpose.
Buster was glad to find that as yet there were no signs of discoloration, as he had feared.
"It may last a few days," he cheerfully declared, "but that"s the extent of the damage. I consider that I came off better than I deserved. But then, who"d think a bare hook would catch anything?"
"Well, Buster," warned George, "be sure you don"t fasten your fishline to your leg, or around your neck. You never can tell what"s going to happen; and after you"re drowned it"s no time to be sorry."
"I think we"d better go ash.o.r.e below, where the trees come down to the edge of the bank," suggested Jack just then, showing that all this while he had been keeping a sharp lookout ahead.
"It makes me think of places where we"ve pulled up over along the old Mississippi," said Josh; "I wonder now do they have tramps over here, who prowl around looking for a chance to steal what they can lay hands on."
"I don"t believe they do," George told him; "for they regulate such things a lot better than we do over the big water. Tramps are a luxury here, while with us they flourish like the green bay tree; the woods are full of them."
Jack took the boat in closer to the sh.o.r.e. On seeing the proposed landing place at closer quarters all of them seemed to be of the same opinion. It looked like just the camping ground they were looking for. A fire might be built for cooking purposes, and the district seemed lonely enough to make it appear that they might not be disturbed during their short stay of a single night.
On the following morning they expected to be once more on the move down the long and sinuous stream that covered hundreds of miles before emptying its clear water into the Black Sea.
As soon as the landing was effected Buster waddled clumsily ash.o.r.e.
"I hope somebody will have the kindness now to get that blaze started right away," he was saying; "I"d do it myself, but I"m afraid all the matches I had in my pocket must have been soaked, and they wouldn"t light easy."
"I"ll take care of the fire, and do the cooking tonight in the bargain if you want me to, Buster," Josh told him.
"That"s kind of you, Josh, and I won"t forget it in a hurry, either.
Fact is this arm of mine pains a little too much for me to sling the pots and skillets around in my customary way. But fry me two eggs, remember, Josh; I"d say three if n.o.body kicked up any sort of a row."
"You shall have them, Buster," Josh told him; "because the chances are we can pick up as many as we want as we go along."
"But no fish for supper tonight, how"s that?" George demanded, trying to frown at Buster.
"Oh, well, n.o.body really promised you any," the latter explained. "But if there are any fat grubs in some of those rotten stumps around here I"m meaning to have a line out with three hooks to-night, and mebbe, George, you can indulge in fresh fish for breakfast. Will that do?"
"Guess I"ll have to make it; besides, ham and eggs suits my taste well enough this time. I"ll forgive you, Buster, only be careful not to get our mouths watering for fish again when it"s only a floating log you"ve caught."
Josh was already busy with the fire. He had long since graduated in this department of woodcraft, and knew about all there was going in connection with fires of every description.
Then, too, he could cook in a way to make the mouths of his chums fairly water. Josh had a way of browning things so cleverly that they were unusually attractive, where so many boys more careless would frequently burn whatever they had on the fire, and in a happy-go-lucky fashion dub it "pot-luck."
"One thing sure," said Jack, as they sat around waiting for the call to supper, "we"re a lucky set to have two such willing workers with the pots and pans as Buster and Josh here."
"That"s right," declared George, agreeable for once; "it would be hard to find their match, search where you will. What one lacks the other makes up for, and the opposite way around too. And we want them to know we appreciate their services, don"t we, Jack?"
"Come, now, no taffy, George," said Josh, though his eyes sparkled under praise from such a source; "as they used to say in olden days, beware the Greeks who come bearing gifts. And when _you_ get to praising anything there must be a deep motive back of it."
"There is," a.s.sented George frankly, "a very deep motive, for I"m hollow all the way down to my heels, seems like. Sure the grub must be done by now, Josh. That"s a good fellow, ring the bell for us to gather round."
Whenever these lads were sitting about the camp fire they always had plenty of fun on tap. If "jabs" were given at times it was done with such good-natured chaff that no one could get provoked.