Page:Castlemon--Joe Wayring at Home.djvu/366

 that if the scow struck her at all, it would be a glancing blow. But they had miscalculated the speed of Matt's clumsy looking craft. She seemed to glide over the top of the water instead of passing through it, as other boats do. On she came with terrific force, and although Joe and Roy worked hard to slip out of her way, she struck the skiff fairly in the side, ripping off two of her planks, smashing in as many more, and making a hole that Mars could have crawled through with all ease. At the same instant darkness settled down over the scene as if by magic. Arthur Hastings had been knocked off his perch on the stern locker, and he and the jack-lamp went into the pond together.

"Whoop-ee!" yelled Matt, triumphantly. "Will you git outen our road the next time you see us comin'? Take that fur your imperdence in gittin' before your betters," he added, making a vicious blow with his paddle at the place where he had last seen Joe Wayring's head.

Joe's head was not there now, however, for he had been sharp enough to put it somewhere else; but Matt was speedily made aware that