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fingers brushed the yellow nylon and for
a split second, whilst in mid-air, I thought it wasn’t enough but I tightened
my fist and as I fell, a wave of relief washed over me as I felt the tension
snatch on my arm.
     
    “Heads up,” I shouted, hoping that Lindsey was clear of where me and
the canoe were going to fall. I hit the water and the canoe landed next to me,
fortunately missing my head by a hair’s breadth. It hadn’t nosedived
completely, it did more of a belly-flop, for which I was thankful as it left only
a couple of inches of water sloshing about in the bottom. It was the right way
up and floating, which were the important things, and the paddle had landed not
far away.
     
    Lindsey was already swimming toward the canoe, to grab on to it.
“Wait,” I shouted, wanting to check for stowaway spiders first, and swam to
catch hold of my discarded vest, which was floating flat on top of the water,
some distance downstream. I swam around the canoe, inspecting it both inside
and out and when I was as satisfied as I could be that it was spider-free, I
moved behind Lindsey and held her by the waist.
    “After three… Three.” We both kicked to lift her and with much
splashing and scrabbling, and me getting a kick to my chin, she clambered
aboard. Now it was my turn. Getting into a canoe from the water is not an
easy task. I’d read about how to do it and knew the theory, but it was
something I’d never done in practice. The trick is to not turn it upside
down. I reached across it to balance the opposite side to which I was trying
to climb in before kicking hard and pulling myself up. Several frustrating
attempts later and I was slumped in the bottom of the canoe, exhausted but
relieved.
     
    That evening was a glorious sunset of crimson skies, but as I looked at
it I couldn’t help feeling that it was setting on much more than just one day.
Wet through and kneeling in water, I started to paddle slowly down the river.
“Lift yourself out of the water,” I said to Lindsey. “Lie across the seat and
dangle your legs over the side. Go to sleep if you can?”
    She put her legs up, hugging them toward her chin as best she could in
the small space she had. She lay still for a while, curled up on the seat with
her back to me, and I thought she’d gone to sleep.
    At twilight it suddenly occurred to me how quiet it was. The silence
was complete; almost tangible. There were no crickets chirruping in the fields
nor owls screeching, there were none of the often heard but unidentified animal
cries, or rustling in the margins. It was altogether unsettling.
     
    As true dark closed in around us and the temperature began to drop, the
chattering of Lindsey’s teeth cut the silence like a chainsaw. “You still
awake?” I asked, unsure how I could help her.
    “Yes,” she shuddered.
    “Try and get some sleep,” is all I could think of to say. I was
shivering myself and trying to stop my own teeth from knocking together. I
don’t know whether she went to sleep or not, but she didn’t speak anymore apart
from letting out the occasional timid groan.
    I moved us slowly as I could down the river; too afraid to make land
and concentrating hard on keeping the canoe in a straight line to stop us
hitting the bank, trees or any other obstacle. I thought that if we did, the
spiders would be able to get us. Going was slow, as I couldn’t see to guide us
and only knew at the last second when we were approaching a bend, as the black
shapes of trees, only slightly darker than the night, loomed tall at the front
of the boat. Sometimes we ran into them and I needed to correct our course or
risk taking a twig to the eye.
     
    I could hear rushing water but didn’t see the gates of the next lock
until we crashed into them nose first, jolting us both forward, and even then I
needed to strain my eyes to figure out what we’d collided with. Lindsey was
propelled forward, off her seat and into the water lying in the bottom of the
canoe.