About noon
Always in front wound the narrow , leaf-girt trail , and to the left the broad river gleamed at intervals through open spaces in the thickets . Flocks of birds rose in the line of march . They seemed tame , and uttered plaintive notes as if in sympathy . About noon the trail led to the river bank . One of the savages disappeared in a copse of willows , and presently reappeared carrying a birch-bark canoe . Case ordered Helen and Will into the boat , got in himself , and the savages , taking stations at bow and stern , paddled out into the stream . They shot over under the lee of an island , around a rocky point , and across a strait to another island .