A frightened exclamation came from the interior of the boat, and then the
small door on that side was flung open. At the same instant a woolly
head was thrust out of the galley window, and a trembling voice cried,
"Golly, Marse Cap'n! Wha' dat ar? Yo' heah um?"
"Yes, Solon, I heard it, and you want to come here as quick as you can.
Some one is in trouble," answered the old man, who was standing with the
girl in the open doorway. He held a lamp above his head, and was peering
anxiously in the direction of the splashings and flounderings that Winn,
sitting in the shallow water, but tightly wedged between the log and the
boat, was making in his efforts to extricate himself.
"Who's there?" cried the old man, who could not yet make out what was
taking place; "and what are you doing?"
[Illustration: "'Who's there?' cried the old man"]
"It's me!" returned Winn, regardless of his grammar; "and I am sinking in
this awful mud. Hurry up and push your boat away from the log, or I
shall be drowned!"
While the old man and the negro exerted all their strength at the pole,
with which they finally succeeded in pushing the boat a foot or so out
into the stream, Sabella was also busy. Though greatly excited, and
somewhat alarmed by the unexpected appearance of a human being in that
place, and his perilous situation, she still had presence of mind enough
to run for a rope, one end of which she fastened to the table.
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