Through the murk and rain I saw what it — was- a moment before the boat struck — a low brush island with debris of all kinds heaping up against it. The boat was still running and yawing like a hunted animal and there was no time to make even a gesture with the engine to avoid it. We tripped over a seething white reef fronting the island and bumped across it with a sickening crash-grind, crash-grind.
I was caught on the open deck with only the pole in my hands and nothing to hang on to. The jar on the keel shot me headlong into the water and I was carried away downstream on the current and into the night.
CHAPTER FIFTEEN
The water was very cold and I thought I would never come up. My boots and the tarpaulin poncho were a deadweight pulling down as the flood turned my body over and over. When I did surface I grabbed a lungful of air and tried to see the island where the boat had grounded but didn't know which way to look. It was dark and the waves splashed into my eyes and the swirling water completely disorientated me. The weight of my clothes and boots took me down again and I knew that I would drown if I didn't get rid of them or find something to hang on to. I was being whirled about, fairly deep under the water again, in a kind of blind-man's buff; then rose to the surface a second time, almost bumping into a piece of floating timber spinning about as I had just been doing underwater. I was too keen and snatched at it too quickly; it span and slipped away out of my grip. I tried to follow it but my boots and clothing stopped me. I attempted to thrash with arms and feet but the waves kept slapping me down and filling my eyes and mouth with ice-cold water, full of sand and grit.
I tried not to panic and told myself that the river was full of things to hang on to and that I had seen big trees about just before the boat struck. I'm only a fair swimmer and couldn't float because of my boots. Then I saw a trunk near by and it swung round as if it were meant for me. I held on to it and seemed to be moving very fast but there was nothing static against which I could judge my speed. Now that I could move my head freely, I looked for the island and the boat, and thought I saw them sliding away out of sight behind me. I couldn't be sure, however, what with the dirty water slapping into my face, but I hoped to guide the log towards where I thought the boat might be by thrashing with my feet and paddling with my free arm. But I couldn't work against the current and after a few minutes my throat tasted sour from the effort and my stomach muscles were strained; I wanted to retch but couldn't.
The rain on my face had a different quality about it from the water blown into it off the river. The latter was thick and muddy, and a silly phrase kept, beating about in my brain about its being 'too thin to plough and too thick to drink'. I steadied the log and tried to face the wind, which I knew would be north-east, but every time I achieved this by paddling, a new eddy would swing us round and I would lose direction again.
It wasn't until I knew I wouldn't drown that I started to panic about Nadine. Until then I had taken it for granted she would be safe below in the cabin because the boat had grounded on an outlying spur of the island. But now the thought tore at me that she might have struck an isolated rock and not an island at all tearing the bottom out of the boat, with Nadine trapped in the cabin before she could escape. I lifted myself on the trunk as high as I could to see if I could spot the boat but it was dark and streaming and even the coffee-coloured wave-tops were invisible beyond a few yards.
It was colder out of the water than in and the wind seemed to cut into my chest through my soaking clothes. I fell back to my previous position, numbed by an inner chill and sick with despair.
I do not know how long I was in the river. There was nothing by which to judge distances or speed and my watch had been smashed. I was held in a tiny world of darkness, slapping water and cavorting tree trunk. I wondered if I would fall off if I got cramps or if I could do anything about a crocodile if it came my way. It was so dark, I told myself, that I wouldn't see it coming anyhow and the end would be quick. I also wondered whether any of the dead things in the river were hyenas and I cursed Dika and everything to do with von Praeger. I tried not to think of Nadine and clung to the hope that the boat had stuck fast on the reef, with the comparative safety of the island only a few steps away. After a time it seemed that the wind was beginning to ease: it felt less cold about my head; and from the way it played in turn on my cheeks, ears and then the back of my neck I judged that I was travelling in a long swinging curve. The white caps appeared easier, too, though the current was stronger. I hoped the moon would give some light later on when the storm had slacked off, so that I could see if I was moving in towards a bank. I could, have been near one a dozen times in the darkness without knowing it. At first I was hopeful but afterwards began to lose heart when the rain continued to sluice down. Now the wind was definitely less. I consoled myself that I mightn't be travelling miles away from Nadine but was perhaps circling about quite near her; and the thought brought me comfort for a while. I wished I had Koen's brandy. My toes felt dead when I wriggled them inside my boots. I wondered if the cramps would start there first or in my arms and whether I could do anything about lashing myself to the log when they did come.
We began to swing round more slowly and the white caps were missing. My trunk thumped into another log and then into a second one. I thought I could see other timber swirling about and reckoned we must have struck an eddy and consequently could be close to the bank. I didn't do anything to guide the log but let it pick up its own momentum again. I considered that the direction from which came the least thrust of current would be the shore. When I thought I had established this I paddled and thrashed but it was a poor effort as I was so cold and stiff. I knew that should I be swept out again into mid-stream I wouldn't be able to hang on much longer. I fought the water and pushed at the log and then felt thorns across my face. I ducked to keep my eyes clear and at the same time reached up and found a firm branch. It was rough and solid and I realized I was ashore. But I was too weak to pull myself out of the water and hung at full stretch with a sensation of nausea in my stomach and pains in my chest. I rested, then began to vomit sour water. My feet were still hanging into the water; but when I felt strong enough I pulled myself hand over hand along the branch and at last my feet touched ground. I could no longer feel my toes and lower legs and my hands were being torn on the thorny branch. But I went on until I banged into the trunk of the tree itself, standing firm and upright in the water. I pushed on until I was quite clear of the river and fell down among some wet grass and bushes.
I lay there until the ache in my chest and arms subsided then sat up to take off my boots and get the blood flowing again in my feet. This wasn't easy: the leather seemed to have shrunk and the laces were impossible. As I sat fumbling with them the rain became colder and changed to a flurry of graupel or soft hail pellets. I crammed a handful of it into my mouth and the sweet taste washed away the sourness which had stuck like a wad at the back of my throat. I managed to get the boots off at last, emptying them of water; but as my exposed feet now felt even colder I put them on again. The sound of water was everywhere. I tried to make out where it wasn't coming from, arguing that in that direction would would be solid land; but I couldn't manage to pinpoint it. I explored, and found water near by, on every side: my island was about the size of two tennis courts. I found my way back to my original starting point, which I recognized from a scatter of the same tussocky grass I had encountered when first I'd cut the fence surrounding The Hill. When I lay down in the grass my imagination began to play tricks, and I fancied it was Nadine's drowned hair that I held between my fingers. The cold and fatigue made me lose control and I buried my face in the wet grass and wept, finally passing into a nightmare between waking and sleeping.