get back again."

"Yes--hic--that--is the question--hic--afore the house."

"Afore the dock, I should say. Whew, I believe I'm up to my thighs in mud,
and if that isn't water I'm splashing in! The tide is coming in, certain.
Come, friend, we must get out of this!"

"Yes, we must all--hic."

"Must all hic? We must all get out, you mean."

"Yes, all get-hic."

"Let me think. There are stairs out of this old bog somewhere, and where
are they? I declare! down at the other end, and the water is three or four
feet deep there when it is dry up here. Then put on top of it or under it
two or three feet of mud and you have five to six feet in all, and that is
an interesting state of things to wade through. We must stay at this end
of the dock; and back of Aunt Stanshy's barn, I believe, are steps. I must
work him up there, and do it myself somehow, for my shouting don't bring
any one."

Will had called several times for help, but there was no response. He now
addressed his boozy companion:

"I must get you up out of this somehow, and work you along where the steps
are. The wall is too high to boost you up here. If this isn't interesting,
nigh eleven o'clock, pitch dark, down in this old dock blundering with
you, drank as a fool! I feel like laughing."