Page:November Joe.pdf/97

 Finally four of us boarded the big canoe and set off. They were Thompson, Wedding Charlie, November, and myself. It was a memorable voyage. November stood in the stern, Wedding Charlie in the bows, while Thompson and I sat between with nothing to do. Our craft rushed down through the creaming rapids, the banks flashed by, and in an astonishingly short space of time we had left the canoe and were walking through the woods.

I lost all sense of direction in the darkness until we came out on the banks of the brook near Tideson's Bridge. We crossed, and all four of us crouched in the shadow of a big rock not twenty yards from the hut. We had been forewarned by November to keep very quiet and to watch the hut.

It seemed to me that hours went by while I stared at the shifting moonlight and the creeping shadows. Dimly I foresaw what was about to happen. The pale forelights of dawn were already in the air when I felt November move slightly, and a moment later I heard a stick break, then footfalls on the bridge. A bluish shadow came cautiously down the bank, hesi-