"Well, well, you always done what you wanted; but we got to git him up
the hills, till it's sure they're out o' the mountains and gone back.
It'll be days, mebbe."

"Uncle Tom, you've took too much to drink," she answered. "You don't
remember he's got to be at Bindon by to-morrow noon. He's got to save
his friend by then."

"Pshaw! Who's going to take him down the river to-night? You're goin'
to be married to-morrow. If you like, you can give him the canoe. It'll
never come back, nor him neither!"

"You've been down with me," she responded suggestively. "And you went
down once by yourself."

He shook his head. "I ain't been so well this summer. My sight ain't
what it was. I can't stand the racket as I once could. 'Pears to me I'm
gettin' old. No, I couldn't take them rapids, Jinny, not for one frozen
minute."

She looked at him with trouble in her eyes, and her face lost some of its
colour. She was fighting back the inevitable, even as its shadow fell
upon her. "You wouldn't want a man to die, if you could save him, Uncle
Tom--blown up, sent to Kingdom Come without any warning at all; and
perhaps he's got them that love him--and the world so beautiful."

"Well, it ain't nice dyin' in the summer, when it's all sun, and there's
plenty everywhere; but there's no one to go down the river with him.
What's his name?"