another place farther off, great heavy banks were rising with strange suddenness. The air seemed to be knitting together overhead. Lightning flashed in various places, muffled thunder spoke far away.
Still the boat drifted. There was a smell of gasoline. The man pottered with the engine. The motor started again, only to stop again in a moment.
The man rolled up his trousers, and, to Kate’s amazement, stepped into the lake, though they were a mile from the shore. The water was not up to his knees. They were on a bank. He slowly pushed the boat before him, wading in the silence.
“How deep is the lake further in?” asked Kate.
“There, Señorita, where the birds with the white breasts are swimming, it is eight and a half metres,” he said, pointing as he waded.
“We must make haste,” said Cipriano.