Oh, I shall be glad, Tom! Work hard." Tom looked in his companion's face, and uttered a low laugh, as he toiled away at the poling, and that laugh seemed to say more than a dozen long speeches.

Then there was nothing heard for some time but the regular plash and ripple of the water, as it was disturbed by pole and punt, while the darkness seemed to increase.

At the same time, though, the hopes of the two lads rose high, for, standing as it were alone in the midst of the black darkness, there was a soft yellow light.

At first it was so dull and lambent that it suggested thoughts of the will-o'-the-wisp.

But this was no dancing flame, being a steady glow in one fixed spot, and Tom expressed his companion's thoughts exactly as he exclaimed: "There's Hicky's old horn lanthorn!" A few minutes more and the big bluff voice of the wheelwright was heard in a loud hail.
This was answered, and the sounds roused the wounded man.
"Nearly there ?" he said hoarsely.
"Very close now," replied Dick; and snatching the pole from Tom he drove it down vigorously, making a tremendous spurt to reach the patch of old pollard willows by the landing-place, on one of whose old posts the lanthorn had been hung, and beyond which could now be seen the light in the Hickathrifts' cot.
"Why, I was a-coming swimming after you, lads," shouted Hickathrift.
"You scarred me.