water.
But the Winkles were old hands at outdoor feats of skill, and they were cunning with equipment. They threw a line across the rapids; it was called a survival rope, they told Homer. The rope attached to a rakelike cluster of spikes, which Grant Winkle neatly lodged among the rocks on the far shore of the roaring river; he then strung a second rope to this one, and then a third. These additional ropes were complicated, with metal eyelets and hooks and adjustable safety straps that went around the Winkles themselves and held them tightly at their waists. With the assistance of this truly adventuresome gear, the Winkles were able to bounce, semisuspended, into the thick of the rapids—where they were tossed about like bathtub toys while remaining safely in the same place, attached to each other and to the socalled survival rope. It was fun for Homer to watch them. The water seemed to swallow them completely at times—streaming sheets of it would engulf them and suck them down. Yet they would emerge in seconds, bouncing, appearing to walk across the churning, rolling foam. They played in midstream like giant, blond otters. Homer was very nearly convinced of their mastery of the elements—at least of water—and felt himself to be on the verge of asking them to let him try the game of showering in the rapids when it occurred to him that they couldn't hear him. If he'd called out to them—even if he'd screamed—the whoosh of the turbid water all around the Winkles would have drowned out any noise he could muster.
He had resolved, therefore, to remain sitting on the shore and watch his would-be adoptive parents play, when the ground began to shake under him. He knew this more from certain badly told stories, in badly written {52} children's books, than from the felt recognition of the moving ground itself; in those children's books, when something terrible is about to happen, the ground always shakes. He almost chose not to believe it, but the ground was unmistakably trembling; a dull hammering reached his ears.
Homer watched the Winkles more closely, believing them to be in control of everything. The Winkles continued to play in the rapids; they heard nothing, they didn't feel the ground shake because they weren't on the ground.
Oh my God, a moose is coming! thought Homer Wells. He stood up. He watched his feet hop—all by themselves —on the jumping ground. It is a herd of moose! he thought. To add to the hammering sound, Homer now heard sharper noises: cracks, some as startling as pistol shots. He looked at the Winkles and could tell that they'd heard these harsh slaps, too. Whatever it was that was coming, the Winkles were familiar with it; their entire attitude changed—they were no longer playful. They seemed to be struggling, and on their faces (now disappearing in the rushing white froth) their expressions were both knowledgeable and frightened. When they got a second to look (between plunges into the rapids), they looked upstream.
So did Homer—in time to see the log drive when it was about twenty-five yards away. The trees along the shoreline were occasionally snapped off as cleanly as kindling snapped over a knee—by a random log as big as a telephone pole but stouter, hurtling out of the water, striking a boulder and spinning for twenty feet through the air, leveling a patch of forest wherever it crashed and rolled on. The mass of logs, each as big as telephone poles, moved swiftly downstream with a wall of water in front of it. This water was not like the clear water of the river, but muddy with turmoil, clogged with slabs of bark, messy with whole chunks of ground that had been gouged out of the shore. The Ramses Paper Company {53} called it a modest log drive; they said there'd been no more than four hundred, maybe seven hundred logs in that particular drive downriver.
Homer Wells was still running when he reached the road, where he was safe. He turned in time to see; the logs surge by. A line
But the Winkles were old hands at outdoor feats of skill, and they were cunning with equipment. They threw a line across the rapids; it was called a survival rope, they told Homer. The rope attached to a rakelike cluster of spikes, which Grant Winkle neatly lodged among the rocks on the far shore of the roaring river; he then strung a second rope to this one, and then a third. These additional ropes were complicated, with metal eyelets and hooks and adjustable safety straps that went around the Winkles themselves and held them tightly at their waists. With the assistance of this truly adventuresome gear, the Winkles were able to bounce, semisuspended, into the thick of the rapids—where they were tossed about like bathtub toys while remaining safely in the same place, attached to each other and to the socalled survival rope. It was fun for Homer to watch them. The water seemed to swallow them completely at times—streaming sheets of it would engulf them and suck them down. Yet they would emerge in seconds, bouncing, appearing to walk across the churning, rolling foam. They played in midstream like giant, blond otters. Homer was very nearly convinced of their mastery of the elements—at least of water—and felt himself to be on the verge of asking them to let him try the game of showering in the rapids when it occurred to him that they couldn't hear him. If he'd called out to them—even if he'd screamed—the whoosh of the turbid water all around the Winkles would have drowned out any noise he could muster.
He had resolved, therefore, to remain sitting on the shore and watch his would-be adoptive parents play, when the ground began to shake under him. He knew this more from certain badly told stories, in badly written {52} children's books, than from the felt recognition of the moving ground itself; in those children's books, when something terrible is about to happen, the ground always shakes. He almost chose not to believe it, but the ground was unmistakably trembling; a dull hammering reached his ears.
Homer watched the Winkles more closely, believing them to be in control of everything. The Winkles continued to play in the rapids; they heard nothing, they didn't feel the ground shake because they weren't on the ground.
Oh my God, a moose is coming! thought Homer Wells. He stood up. He watched his feet hop—all by themselves —on the jumping ground. It is a herd of moose! he thought. To add to the hammering sound, Homer now heard sharper noises: cracks, some as startling as pistol shots. He looked at the Winkles and could tell that they'd heard these harsh slaps, too. Whatever it was that was coming, the Winkles were familiar with it; their entire attitude changed—they were no longer playful. They seemed to be struggling, and on their faces (now disappearing in the rushing white froth) their expressions were both knowledgeable and frightened. When they got a second to look (between plunges into the rapids), they looked upstream.
So did Homer—in time to see the log drive when it was about twenty-five yards away. The trees along the shoreline were occasionally snapped off as cleanly as kindling snapped over a knee—by a random log as big as a telephone pole but stouter, hurtling out of the water, striking a boulder and spinning for twenty feet through the air, leveling a patch of forest wherever it crashed and rolled on. The mass of logs, each as big as telephone poles, moved swiftly downstream with a wall of water in front of it. This water was not like the clear water of the river, but muddy with turmoil, clogged with slabs of bark, messy with whole chunks of ground that had been gouged out of the shore. The Ramses Paper Company {53} called it a modest log drive; they said there'd been no more than four hundred, maybe seven hundred logs in that particular drive downriver.
Homer Wells was still running when he reached the road, where he was safe. He turned in time to see; the logs surge by. A line
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