“I think we’ll make it,” he said to himself, measuring the distance with cool eye. But he refrained from telling Reube what he saw. A moment later, however, as he marked the terrible speed of the approaching peril, he could not help saying, in a voice which he kept quite steady and casual:
“You’re doing finely, Reube. Don’t hurry your stroke, but put a little more power in it for a spurt and we’re safe.”
Reube wasted no breath for a reply. He knew this adjuration of Will’s meant that the danger was drawing very near; but his companion’s anxiety as to his nerves was quite unneeded. He struck out as steadily as ever, but with all the force which his muscle and his will power together could create, and went ahead so fast that Will had to really swim to keep up with him. In half a minute more—to them it seemed a long time—Reube struck bottom in shallow water and dragged himself to land. The sharks were now so near that for an instant Will hesitated. Would he have time to get out, or must he turn and defend his legs? But his decision was instantaneous. With a mighty thrust of his legs and one free arm he flung himself forward, felt the mud beneath his hands, jerked his feet under him, and stood up just in time to turn and deal the nearest shark a desperate blow with the pointed stake as it half turned over to seize him. Astonished and daunted, the great fish recoiled, and before its fellow could join in the attack Will had sprung out of reach.
“It’s a blessed thing,” said Will, “to get ashore with a whole leg, isn’t it?”
His light manner was but the froth on the surface of his deeper emotions. He was trembling from the long strain and stern self-repression.
“Verily,” said he, with a grave face, “that was pretty nearly as bad as the cave while it lasted!”
“O, surely not,” objected Will. “We had the free air and sun, and a chance to fight for our lives. But it makes me mad to think what fools we were in the first place.”
“Why,” answered Will, “if we’d come, this way on the first arrival of those beastly leviathans we would not have had half so far to swim, and our pursuers would have had nearly twice as far to go. It would have all been as simple and easy as falling off a log, and our hearts wouldn’t be going like trip hammers now, the way they are.”