"When will you know?" asked Clip, eagerly.
"When I find out whether I can use this boat. I had thought of building a raft, but that wouldn't do. No raft that I could build would carry our crop to St. Louis. This boat will be just the thing. I think it must have been used for that purpose before. See those large bins on each side. Each would contain from fifty to a hundred bushels of wheat. I only wish I knew the owner. Even if I couldn't buy the boat, I might make a bargain to hire it."
Bob had hardly finished his sentence when he heard a voice hailing him from the bank.
Going to the end of the boat, he looked towards the shore, and saw a tall angular figure, who seemed from his dress and appearance to be a Western Yankee. His figure was tall and angular, his face of the kind usually described as hatchet face, with a long thin nose, and his head was surmounted by a flapping sombrero, soft, broad-brimmed, and shapeless.
"Did you wish to speak to us?" asked Bob, politely.
"I reckon I do," answered the stranger. "I want you to take me aboard that boat."
"It doesn't belong to anybody else," was the reply.
"Untie the boat, Clip. We'll go back!" ordered Bob.
The two boys dropped into the rowboat, and soon touched the bank.
"If you will get in we'll row you over," said Bob. "When did you lose the boat?"
"It drifted down last night," answered the new acquaintance. "I've been usin' it as a ferry-boat about twenty miles up the creek. Last night I thought it was tied securely, but this morning it was gone."
"I don't see how it could have broken away."
"Like as not some mischievous boy cut the cable," was the answer. "Any way, here it is, and here am I, Ichabod Slocum, the owner."
"Then the boat and its owner are once more united."
"Yes, but that don't take the boat back to where it belongs. It's drifted down here, easy enough; mebbe one of you boys will tell me how it's goin' to drift back."
"There may be some difficulty about that," answered Bob with a smile. "How long have you owned the boat?"
"About two years. I've been usin' her as a ferry-boat between Transfer City and Romeo, and I've made a pretty fair livin' at it."
Bob was familiar with the names of these towns, though he had never been so far up the creek.