Diana and Jane and Ruby only waited long enough to see it caught in the current and headed for the bridge before scampering up through the woods , across the road , and down to the lower headland where , as Lancelot and Guinevere and the King , they were to be in readiness to receive the lily maid . For a few minutes Anne , drifting slowly down , enjoyed the romance of her situation to the full . Then something happened not at all romantic . The flat began to leak . In a very few moments it was necessary for Elaine to scramble to her feet , pick up her cloth of gold coverlet and pall of blackest samite and gaze blankly at a big crack in the bottom of her barge through which the water was literally pouring . That sharp stake at the landing had torn off the strip of batting nailed on the flat . Anne did not know this , but it did not take her long to realize that she was in a dangerous plight . At this rate the flat would fill and sink long before it could drift to the lower headland . Where were the oars ? Left behind at the landing ! Anne gave one gasping little scream which nobody ever heard ; she was white to the lips , but she did not lose her self-possession . There was one chance -- just one . `` I was horribly frightened , '' she told Mrs. Allan the next day , `` and it seemed like years while the flat was drifting down to the bridge and the water rising in it every moment . I prayed , Mrs. Allan , most earnestly , but I did n't shut my eyes to pray , for I knew the only way God could save me was to let the flat float close enough to one of the bridge piles for me to climb up on it . You know the piles are just old tree trunks and there are lots of knots and old branch stubs on them . It was proper to pray , but I had to do my part by watching out and right well I knew it . I just said , ` Dear God , please take the flat close to a pile and I 'll do the rest , ' over and over again . Under such circumstances you do n't think much about making a flowery prayer . But mine was answered , for the flat bumped right into a pile for a minute and I flung the scarf and the shawl over my shoulder and scrambled up on a big providential stub . And there I was , Mrs. Allan , clinging to that slippery old pile with no way of getting up or down .
It was a very unromantic position , but I did n't think XXXXX that at the time .
For In about across as at off on over to