There was a sudden splash as his body struck the water.
Phil shot right down beneath it and the waters of the Mississippi closed over him.
He understood then what had happened, but not for an instant did he lose his presence of mind. Phil had caught his breath as his feet touched the water, and now that he had sunk beneath the surface he began to kick vigorously and work his hands to check his downward course.
A moment of this and he felt himself rising toward the surface.
Phil was as good a swimmer as he was a performer in the circus ring, and he felt no nervousness, even though his position at that moment was a perilous one.
Almost at once he felt his head above the surface of the river, but his eyes were so full of muddy water that he could see nothing at all. Instead of trying to swim, Phil lay over on his back, floated and began blinking industriously to get the water out of his eyes. He soon found that he could see once more, though at that moment there was nothing to be seen in the blackness of the night.
"There"s the "Marie,"" he cried. Phil raised his voice in a good l.u.s.ty howl for help, but none heard him. He could see the lights of the steamboat and they appeared to be far away.
"There is only one thing left for me to do, and that is to strike out for the sh.o.r.e. I wonder which way the sh.o.r.e is?"
Once more he raised himself in the water, for an instant, and gazed toward the rapidly disappearing lights of the "Marie."
"She is going downstream, so if I swim to the left I should reach sh.o.r.e after a while," decided the lad.
He did not know that the boat had in the meantime made a sharp turn to her right and that in turning to the left he would be swimming downstream, making his attempt to reach sh.o.r.e a difficult one indeed.
The lad struck out manfully, swimming with long, easy strokes, aided considerably by the current which was sweeping him downstream much faster than he thought.
"I"m glad I have only my pajamas on," decided the lad. "If I had all my clothes on I fear I should have a pretty tough fight.
It"s bad enough as it is."
Talking to himself, in order to keep up his courage, he swam steadily on, now and then pausing to swim on his back to rest himself. He had gone on for nearly an hour when the lad began to wonder why he had not reached sh.o.r.e.
"Surely the river cannot be so wide at this point. I must have drifted downstream considerably. Perhaps I haven"t been going in the right direction at all."
He tried to find out which way the drift was, in order to make up his mind as to the direction in which the sh.o.r.e lay. In the darkness, however, he was unable to determine this, so he began swimming again, trusting to luck to land him on something solid, sooner or later. He knew that this must occur, but whether his strength would hold out that long he could not say.
All at once he caught a peculiar drumming sound. It reminded him of a partridge that he had once heard in the woods, but it seemed a long way off and he could not identify it.
"I guess it must be my heart, up somewhere near my mouth, that I hear," said the boy with a short mindless laugh. "Maybe I am going to pieces. If I am I deserve to drown."
About that time Phil decided to turn over on his back and rest for a moment.
The instant he did so he uttered a sharp exclamation. His eyes caught sight of something that he had not seen before. It looked to him like some giant shadow, from which twinkled hundreds of lights.
"It is the "Marie"!" cried the boy. "They are coming back for me. No, no, it cannot be the "Marie," for this boat is coming from the opposite direction. Yes, it surely is a steamboat!"
Though Phil did not know it, this was one of the big river packets bound down the river from St. Louis.
"I must get out of the way, or they will run me down, but I want to keep close enough so I can hail them. I hope this is where I get on something solid again."
A few minutes of steady swimming appeared to have taken him out of the path of the river boat. Then Phil rested, lying on his back, watching the boat narrowly.
"In almost any other position or place, I might think that was a pretty sight. As matters stand, now, it looks dangerous to me."
His position was more perilous at that moment than he even dreamed.
"H-e-l-p! H-e-l-p!" called Phil, in what he thought was a loud tone.
There were no indications that his cry had been heard by those on board the steamboat. He tried it again, but with no better success than before.
"I have simply got to keep on yelling my lungs out until I attract their attention. I am afraid I shall never reach sh.o.r.e unless I am picked up. I might be able to keep afloat until daylight, but I doubt it. I shall get so chilled, before then, that I shall have to give up. I"ve got some fight left in me yet, just the same."
"A-h-o-y, boat! _Help!_"
On came the steamer, steadily.
Suddenly Phil discovered something else. She had changed her course. The boat seemed to be drawing away from him!
His heart sank, but almost at once, the boat turned again, following the tortuous channel of the stream.
She now was sweeping almost directly down upon him. He heard some call on the upper deck.
"They are going to run me down!" he gasped.
Phil threw all his strength into an effort to swim out of the path of the swiftly moving boat, but he feared he would not be able to clear her.
The lad uttered a loud shout, then dived deep, coming up at once only to find himself almost against the side of the moving craft.
He grabbed frantically, hoping that his hands might come in contact with some projection to which he could cling, but the slippery sides of the hull slid past him at what seemed almost express train speed.
He was almost on the point of diving again to get away from the dangerous spot, when suddenly, his fingers closed over something.
It was a rope, one of the hawsers that had not been fully hauled in when the boat left the last landing place some miles up the river.
With a glad cry, both the lad"s hands closed over the precious rope. His joy was short lived. He found himself dropping back, the river craft still gliding past him.
The rope was paying out over the boat"s side in his hands.
Phil Forrest was never more cool in his life, but he now began to realize the well-nigh hopeless position in which be found himself placed.
Suddenly the rope ceased paying out with an abruptness that jerked him clear out of the water. He fell back with a splash, all but losing hold of the rope as he did so.
"I"ve got it! I"ve got it!" exulted the lad. A rush of water filled his mouth, almost suffocating him.
"I guess I had better keep my mouth closed," thought the boy.
He was directly astern of the steamboat by this time, and this placed him in a much more favorable position than he had been while dragging along at the side.
Phil began resolutely to work himself along the rope hand over hand. It was a desperate undertaking, one calling for strength and courage of an unusual kind, but he never hesitated.
His breath came in long, steady, sighs, for he was going though the water at such a rate of speed that breathing was made doubly difficult.
"It is a good thing I am a circus performer. I should probably have been at the bottom of the river long ago, had I not been a ring man."
At last, after what seemed hours of struggling, he had succeeded in working his way past the stern paddle wheel, and up under the stern of the ship. He twisted the rope about one arm, and with his head well out of water lay half exhausted while he was shot through the water at high speed.
A few minutes of this, and Phil, considerably rested, began to pull himself up.