We lay all sprawled in a heap while the others hugged the
banks, afraid to add their weight to the creaking ice, and Ongyatasse
was beating about in the rotten sludge, trying to find a place firm
enough to climb out on.
"We had seen both boys disappear for an instant as the ice gave under
them, but even when we saw them come to the surface, with Ongyatasse
holding Tiakens by the hair, we hardly grasped what had happened. The
edge of the ice-cake had taken Tiakens under the chin and he was
unconscious. If Ongyatasse had let go of him he would have been carried
under the ice by the current, and that would have been the last any one
would have seen of him until the spring thaw. But as fast as Ongyatasse
tried to drag their double weight onto the ice, it broke, and before the
rest of us had thought of anything to do the cold would have cramped
him. I saw Ongyatasse stuffing Tiakens's hair into his mouth so as to
leave both his hands free, and then there was a running gasp of
astonishment from the rest of the band, as a slim figure shot out of
Dark Woods, skimming and circling like a swallow. We had heard of the
snowshoes of the Lenni-Lenape, but this was the first time we had seen
them.
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