A Book of Ghosts

Excerpt: ...altogether. There we were, one on each side, clinging to the bulwarks and looking at one another. For a moment or two neither spoke. Donelly was the first to recover his presence of mind, and after wiping his mouth on the gunwale from the mud that had squirted over it, he said: "Can you get out?" "Hardly," said I. We tugged at the boat, it squelched about, splashing the slime over us, till it plastered our heads and faces and covered our hands. "This will never do," said he. "We must get in together, and by instalments. Look here! when I say 'three, ' throw in your left leg if you can get it out of the mud." "I will do my best." "And," he said further, "we must do so both at the same moment. Now, don't be a sneak and try to get in your body whilst I am putting in my leg, or you will upset the boat." "I never was a sneak," I retorted angrily, "and I certainly will not be one in what may be the throes of death." "All right," said the major. "One