“They say the Frenchman, Montlivet, can do that.”  Then he looked at me and light dawned.

“You are Montlivet!”

I wasted no time.  I do not know how I did it, but I sprang the length of the canoe and was on him before he could reach his knife.  The canoe rocked, but righted itself.  I knotted my fingers in the Indian’s throat, and my body pinioned his arms.

The surprise of my attack gave me a second’s vantage, and in it I snatched at the vial in my shirt, and drew the stopper with my teeth.  It was difficult, for the great, naked frame was writhing under me, and the canoe pitched like a cork in an eddy.  I felt the Indian’s hot breath, and his teeth snapping to reach me.  His arm was working free and his knife unsheathed.  I threw my whole weight on his chest, released my clutch on his neck, and taking both hands, forced his mouth open and dashed the contents of my laudanum vial down his throat.  Then I sprang into the water, dragging Indian and canoe after me.

I felt the slash of a knife in my right shoulder as I touched the water, and the Indian’s wiry grasp on my coat.  I rolled and grappled with him, and the canoe floated away.  Hugging each other like twining water snakes, we sank down through the reeds to the slimy ooze of the bottom.

Down there we wrestled for a second, blinded and choking.  Then self-love conquered hate, and we kicked ourselves free and spluttered to the surface.  My shoulder was stinging, and I could not tell how long I could depend on it.  I made a desperate stroke or two, dived, and put myself in the cover of the reeds.

The Indian splashed after me, but the water flowed through the reeds in a dozen channels, and he took the wrong one.  He would find his mistake in a moment.  I swam a few paces under water, then lay quiet, holding myself up by the reeds, and keeping my mouth to the air.  Piece by piece I freed myself of my clothing and let it drop.  The cut in my shoulder was raw and made me faint.  It was not dangerous, but deep enough to give me trouble, and would make my swimming slow, if, indeed, I could swim at all.  I felt the water swash against me and knew the Indian was swimming back.  There was only a thin wall of reeds between us, and in a moment he would come to where the channels joined and see my floating garments.  I could not stop to secure them, though I had hoped to tie them in a bundle on my back.  I dropped under the water and swam away.

I have often marveled how I distanced that Indian so easily.  It may have been his discomfort from the opiate, though I have never known how much of what I splashed over him went into his mouth, nor what effect it had.  But after a little I heard no sound of pursuit.  I thought that perhaps the Indian had gone back to spread the alarm, and I took no risks.  I swam as fast as I had strength, resting occasionally by holding on to the reeds, and trying to keep my course due northwest.