Boatman dance, boatman sing,Boatman do most anything,Dance, boatman, dance.
Dance all night till the broad daylight,Go home with the girls in the morning.
Hey, ho, boatman row,Sailing down the river on the Ohio.
American Folk SongOn almost any other river, Blackberry's plan would not have worked. The puntwould not have left the bank or, if it had, would have run aground or been fouledby weeds or some other obstruction. But here, on the Test, there were nosubmerged branches and no gravel spits or beds of weed above the surface at all.
From bank to bank the current, regular and unvaried, flowed as fast as a manstrolling. The punt slipped downstream smoothly, without any alteration of thespeed which it had gained within a few yards of leaving the bank.
Most of the rabbits had very little idea of what was happening. The Efrafandoes had never seen a river and it would certainly have been beyond Pipkin orHawkbit to explain to them that they were on a boat. They -- and nearly all theothers -- had simply trusted Hazel and done as they were told. But all -- bucksand does alike -- realized that Woundwort and his followers had vanished.
Wearied by all they had gone through, the sodden rabbits crouched withouttalking, incapable of any feeling but a dull relief and without even the energy towonder what was going to happen next.
That they should feel any relief -- dull or otherwise -- was remarkable in thecircumstances and showed both how little they understood their situation andhow much fear Woundwort could inspire, for their escape from him seemed to betheir only good fortune. The rain was still falling. Already so wet that they nolonger felt it, they were nevertheless shivering with cold and weighted with theirdrenched fur. The punt was holding over half an inch of rainwater. There was onesmall, slatted floorboard and this was floating. Some of the rabbits, in the firstconfusion of boarding the punt, had found themselves in this water, but now allhad got clear of it -- most either to bows or stern, though Thethuthinnang andSpeedwell were hunched on the narrow thwart, amidships. In addition to theirdiscomfort, they were exposed and helpless. Finally, there was no way ofcontrolling the punt and they did not know where they were going. But these lastwere troubles beyond the understanding of everyone but Hazel, Fiver andBlackberry.
Bigwig had collapsed beside Hazel and lay on his side, exhausted. The feverishcourage which had brought him from Efrafa to the river had gone and hiswounded shoulder had begun to hurt badly. In spite of the rain and the throbbingpulse down his foreleg, he felt ready to sleep where he was, stretched upon theplanking. He opened his eyes and looked up at Hazel.
"I couldn't do it again, Hazel-rah," he said.
"You haven't got to," replied Hazel.
"It was touch and go, you know," said Bigwig. "A chance in a thousand.""Our children's children will hear a good story," answered Hazel, quoting arabbit proverb. "How did you get that wound? It's a nasty one.""I fought a member of the Council police," said Bigwig.
"A what?" The term "Owslafa" was unknown to Hazel.
"A dirty little beast like Hufsa," said Bigwig.
"Did you beat him?""Oh, yes -- or I shouldn't be here. I should think he'll stop running. I say,Hazel-rah, we've got the does. What's going to happen now?""I don't know," said Hazel. "We need one of these clever rabbits to tell us. AndKehaar -- where's he gone? He's supposed to know about this thing we're sittingon."Dandelion, crouching beside Hazel, got up at the mention of "clever rabbits,"made his way across the puddled floor and returned with Blackberry and Fiver.
"We're all wondering what to do next," said Hazel.
"Well," said Blackberry, "I suppose we shall drift into the bank before long andthen we can get out and find cover. There's no harm, though, in going a good longway from those friends of Bigwig's.""There is," said Hazel. "We're stuck here in full view and we can't run. If a mansees us we're in trouble.""Men don't like rain," said Blackberry. "Neither do I, if it comes to that, but itmakes us safer just now."At this moment Hyzenthlay, sitting just behind him, started and looked up.
"Excuse me, sir, for interrupting you," she said, as though speaking to anofficer in Efrafa, "but the bird -- the white bird -- it's coming toward us."Kehaar came flying up the river through the rain and alighted on the narrowside of the punt. The does nearest to him backed away nervously.
"Meester 'Azel," he said, "pridge come. You see 'im pridge?"It had not occurred to any of the rabbits that they were floating beside the pathup which they had come earlier that evening before the storm broke. They wereon the opposite side of the hedge of plants along the bank and the whole riverlooked different. But now they saw, not far ahead, the bridge which they hadcrossed when they first came to the Test four nights before. This they recognizedat once, for it looked the same as it had from the bank.
"Maybe you go under 'im, maybe not," said Kehaar. "But you sit dere, eestrouble."The bridge stretched from bank to bank between two low abutments. It wasnot arched. Its underside, made of iron girders, was perfectly straight -- parallelwith the surface and about eight inches above it. Just in time Hazel saw whatKehaar meant. If the punt did pass under the bridge without sticking, it would doso by no more than a claw's breadth. Any creature above the level of the sideswould be struck and perhaps knocked into the river. He scuttered through thewarm bilgewater to the other end and pushed his way up among the wet, crowdedrabbits.
"Get down in the bottom! Get down in the bottom!" he said. "Silver, Hawkbit --all of you. Never mind the water. You, and you -- what's your name? Oh,Blackavar, is it? -- get everyone into the bottom. Be quick."Like Bigwig, he found that the Efrafan rabbits obeyed him at once. He sawKehaar fly up from his perch and disappear over the wooden rails. The concreteabutments projected from each bank, so that the narrowed river ran slightlyfaster under the bridge. The punt had been drifting broadside on, but now oneend swung forward, so that Hazel lost his bearings and found that he was nolonger looking at the bridge but at the bank. As he hesitated, the bridge seemed tocome at him in a dark mass, like snow sliding from a bough. He pressed himselfinto the bilge. There was a squeal and a rabbit tumbled on top of him. Then aheavy blow vibrated along the length of the punt and its smooth movement waschecked. This was followed by a hollow sound of scraping. It grew dark and a roofappeared, very low above him. For a moment Hazel had the vague idea that hewas underground. Then the roof vanished, the punt was gliding on and he heardKehaar calling. They were below the bridge and still drifting downstream.
The rabbit who had fallen on him was Acorn. He had been struck by the bridgeand the blow had sent him flying. However, though dazed and bruised, he seemedto have escaped injury.
"I wasn't quick enough, Hazel-rah," he said. "I'd better go to Efrafa for a bit.""You'd be wasted," said Hazel. "But I'm afraid there's someone at the other endwho hasn't been so lucky."One of the does had held back from the bilgewater, and the upstream girderunder the bridge had caught her across the back. It was plain that she wasinjured, but how badly Hazel could not tell. He saw Hyzenthlay beside her and itseemed to him that since there was nothing he could do to help, it would probablybe best to let them alone. He looked round at his bedraggled, shivering comradesand then at Kehaar, spruce and brisk on the stem.
"We ought to get back on the bank, Kehaar," he said. "How can we do it?
Rabbits weren't meant for this, you know.""You not stop poat. But again is nudder pridge more. 'E stop 'im."There was nothing to be done but wait. They drifted on and came to a secondbend, where the river curved westward. The current did not slacken and the puntcame round the bend almost in the middle of the stream, revolving as it did so.
The rabbits had been frightened by what had happened to Acorn and to the doe,and remained squatting miserably, half in and half out of the bilge. Hazel creptback to the raised bow and looked ahead.
The river broadened and the current slackened. He realized that they hadbegun to drift more slowly. The nearer bank was high and the trees stood closeand thick, but on the further bank the ground was low and open. Grassy, itstretched away, smooth as the mown gallops on Watership Down. Hazel hopedthat they might somehow drop out of the current and reach that side, but thepunt moved quietly on, down the very center of the broad pool. The open bankslipped by and now the trees towered on both sides. Downstream, the pool wasclosed by the second bridge, of which Kehaar had spoken.
It was old, built of darkened bricks. Ivy trailed over it and the valerian andcreeping mauve toadflax. Well out from either bank stood four low arches --scarcely more than culverts, each filled by the stream to within a foot of the apex.
Through them, thin segments of daylight showed from the downstream side. Thepiers did not project, but against each lay a little accumulation of flotsam, fromwhich driftweed and sticks continually broke away to be carried through thebridge.
It was plain that the punt would drift against the bridge and be held there. As itapproached, Hazel dropped back into the bilgewater. But this time there was noneed. Broadside on, the punt struck gently against two of the piers and stopped,pinned squarely across the mouth of one of the central culverts. It could go nofurther.
They had floated not quite half a mile in just over fifteen minutes.
Hazel put his forepaws on the low side and looked gingerly over upstream.
Immediately below, a shallow ripple spread all along the waterline, where thecurrent met the woodwork. It was too far to jump to the shore and both bankswere steep. He turned and looked upward. The brickwork was sheer, with aprojecting course half way between him and the parapet. There was noscrambling up that.
"What's to be done, Blackberry?" he asked, making his way to the bolt fixed onthe bow, with its ragged remnant of painter. "You got us on this thing. How do weget off?""I don't know, Hazel-rah," replied Blackberry. "Of all the ways we could finishup, I never thought of this. It looks as though we'll have to swim.""Swim?" said Silver. "I don't fancy it, Hazel-rah. I know it's no distance, butlook at those banks. The current would take us down before we could get out: andthat means into one of these holes under the bridge."Hazel tried to look through the arch. There was very little to be seen. The darktunnel was not long -- perhaps not much longer than the punt itself. The waterlooked smooth. There seemed to be no obstructions and there was room for thehead of a swimming animal between the surface of the water and the apex of thearch. But the segment was so narrow that it was impossible to see exactly what layon the other side of the bridge. The light was failing. Water, green leaves, movingreflections of leaves, the splashing of the raindrops and some curious thing thatappeared to be standing in the water and to be made of vertical gray lines -- thesewere all that could be made out. The rain echoed dismally up the culvert. Thehard, ringing noise from under the soffit, so much unlike any sound to be heardin an earth tunnel, was disturbing. Hazel returned to Blackberry and Silver.
"This is as bad a fix as we've been in," he said. "We can't stay here, but I can'tsee any way out."Kehaar appeared on the parapet above them, flapped the rain out of his wingsand dropped down to the punt.
"Ees finish poat," he said. "Not vait more.""But how can we get to the bank, Kehaar?" said Hazel.
The gull was surprised. "Dog sveem, rat sveem. You no sveem?""Yes, we can swim as long as it's not very far. But the banks are too steep forus, Kehaar. We wouldn't be able to stop the current taking............