A CLOSE CALL
“Talk about your ice-water,” said Arnold to himself, as he paddled
slowly along on his back. “This has it beat a mile. I guess I stood
around on the launch too long and got chilled.”
He rolled over and threw an anxious look at the far-distant island, and
then, after a brief moment of indecision, turned back toward the launch.
“It’s too cold for _me_,” he murmured. “I’m going to beat it!”
For a few dozen strokes he managed to fight off the numbness that had
seized on his limbs. His teeth chattered unless he held them tightly
shut and a fear began to clutch at his rapidly beating heart. He had
never felt just like this in the water, never felt so numb and weak. He
recalled stories he had heard of folks who had been seized with cramp
and had drowned before help could reach them, and fear became panic. He
forgot all skill and science and thrashed arms and legs wildly in the
endeavor to reach the launch, a good hundred yards away. Of course he
got his head under water and swallowed more than was pleasant, and of
course he made little progress. A sudden swift, sharp pain in one thigh
brought a cry from him. It seemed to pull the muscles taut, and, in
obedience, his left leg doubled up helplessly.
Strangely enough, the sudden knowledge that what he had feared had
actually come to pass calmed him. Instead of the unreasoning panic,
a grim determination to fight took possession of him. The pain was
intolerable if he so much as moved that up-bent leg, but fortunately
one could swim without legs if one had to. “Keep your head! Swim slow!”
said Arnold to himself. “You’re all right if you don’t get rattled! I
guess it’s getting rattled that makes folks drown. Maybe if you turn
over on your back you can do better.” But the attempt to turn produced
such a horrible pain in thigh and leg that he gave it up and, faint
with agony, was content for the moment to keep himself barely afloat.
When the faintness had passed he remembered Toby and Frank and, calling
on his tired lungs for all the breath that was in them, sent that first
hail.
“_He-e-elp!_” he shouted.
If any one answered him he didn’t hear. Only the swish-swash of the
dancing waves and the slap of his wearied arms reached him. He sent
an agonized glance ahead. The launch was gone! No, there it was, but
he was swimming off his course. Carefully, trailing that useless,
pain-racked leg behind him, he changed his direction. His goal looked
leagues away and discouragement fell on him. He would never make it,
he groaned. Despair drove out determination. He wondered what it was
like to drown. Perhaps it wasn’t so dreadful. He prayed incoherently,
unconsciously slackening his efforts. The water closed over his head
and there was a queer rushing sound in his ears. The next moment, with
wide-open eyes looking into a yellow-green void, he was struggling
frantically, up and up――――
The sunlight burst on him again. Choking, gasping, he drew a long
breath of air into his bursting lungs and sent a second wild appeal to
the cloudless blue sky above. Fighting against fear, he swam doggedly,
urging his tired arms forward and back, using as best he could his
right leg, even though every movement of it brought a gasp of pain. He
had the horrid, haunting impression that clutching arms were dragging
at him from the green depths below him. He tried to tell himself that
it was only imagination, but he was beyond conviction. The pain grew.
It reached to his left foot now, to the uttermost tips of his toes,
dragging and pulling, pinching and twisting excruciatingly. He had lost
all sense of direction. His sole effort was to keep afloat, and that
was by now half unconscious. Time and again he found himself going
under and, opening closed eyes, fought in terror to the surface. At
such times he cried out, or thought he did, for the sounds he made were
scarcely to be heard above the lap of the waves. He no longer realized
either where he was or what he was doing. He struggled instinctively. A
dozen yards distant the launch swayed lazily and tugged at her anchor
rope, but he didn’t see it. Or, if he saw it, it meant nothing to him.
To keep his head above water was all.
And when his futile struggles were interrupted and fingers closed
tightly about his wrist he was too far gone to realize it. A few
minutes before Toby might have found him, in his fright, a difficult
bargain, but now, when the rescuer had drawn one arm over his shoulder,
Arnold dragged supinely behind, an easy burden. Allowing himself
the luxury of a dozen long-drawn breaths, Toby swam slowly toward
the launch, using right arm and legs, his left hand firmly grasping
Arnold’s wrist. He had so far outdistanced Frank that the latter
was still a good dozen yards away, and it wasn’t until Toby and his
unconscious burden were under the shadow of the _Urnove_ that Frank
reached them.
“Is he――all right?” he gasped.
“Guess so. About half drowned, though. Climb in and give me a hand with
him.”
A minute later Arnold was stretched, face downward, on the seat of
the launch and Toby was using all the knowledge he possessed of
resuscitation. Fortunately, Arnold’s trouble was exhaustion rather than
suffocation, and he was breathing naturally if painfully. Pressure
relieved him of a good deal of salt water, and after that his eyelids
flickered and he sighed heavily and groaned. And Toby, who, since he
had first sighted Arnold’s predicament, had been in a condition of
anxiety that was just short of panic, echoed the sigh. His troubled
frown cleared away and, hastily covering Arnold with all the clothing
he could lay hands on, much of it his own and Frank’s, he turned
quickly to the fly-wheel.
“Yank up that anchor, Frank,” he said. “We’ll beat it for the Head. I
guess he’s all right now, but he won’t feel much like running races
for awhile.” He turned the switch on, fixed his throttle and swung the
fly-wheel over, and the _Urnove_ responded with a gasp and a choke
and, finally, a nice, steady chug, chug-a-chug. With the dripping
anchor inboard, Toby swung the wheel and pointed the bow for the
Deerings’ landing; a good two miles away across the sparkling water.
That done, he requisitioned his clothing, piece by piece, from Arnold
and pulled it on his still damp body, and Frank, whose teeth were
chattering like castanets, followed his example. A square of sail-cloth
that Toby used to cover the engine at night took the place of their
garments. By the time they were presentable again Arnold’s cheeks held
a faint flush of color and he showed symptoms of reawakened interest in
existence. Finally he raised his head from the improvised pillow and
gazed across at Toby in faint surprise.
“Hello,” he said.
“How do you do?” responded the other.
Arnold considered that for a long moment. Then a perplexed frown
gathered on his forehead and he asked, weakly and irritated: “But――but
what am I doing here?”
“You’re lying on your back asking silly questions,” answered Toby a
trifle gruffly. “Shut up and go to sleep.”
“Don’t you remember what happened?” asked Frank.
Arnold scowled deeply and then an expression of mingled comprehension
and fear came over his face, and he started up from the seat. But Toby
reached across and thrust him back.
“Don’t do that!” he commanded. “Lie still. We’re taking you home.”
“How――how did I get here?” asked Arnold in a low voice.
“Frank and I pulled you in, of course. How do you feel?”
“All right――I guess.” He seemed to gain reassurance from the feel of
the gunwale on which one hand was clasped tightly, and the look of
alarm left his face. “I don’t remember much after I called to you
fellows,” he said with a shudder. “I thought I was a goner.”
“What was the trouble?” asked Toby. “Did you get tired?”
“Cramp.” Arnold stretched a leg experimentally and winced. “It’s pretty
nearly gone now. It was fierce, though. I couldn’t use my left leg at
all. And I guess I got frightened. I tried not to, but I couldn’t help
it. I was trying to get back to the launch.”
“You were headed out to sea when I――when we got to you,” said Toby
dryly. “Feel strong enough to get some clothes on if we help you?”
“Of course. I’m all right now.” To prove it he swung his legs from
the seat and sat up a trifle unsteadily――and was instantly very sick
at his stomach. But after the nausea had passed the color came back
to his cheeks and he managed to get into his clothes with very little
help from Frank. “I suppose I’d have drowned if you fellows hadn’t come
along when you did,” he said presently. “I guess I was just about all
in.”
“Yes, you were,” agreed Toby. “You had me scared good and plenty.”
“Me, too,” said Frank. “Toby beat me to you by a long ways. I swam as
hard as I knew how, too. He fairly flew through the water. He had you
alongside the launch here when I came up.”
“Thanks.” Arnold looked briefly at Toby and then gave all his attention
to a shoe lace. “I don’t know,” he grunted, pulling with unnecessary
violence at the lace, “how you thank a fellow for――saving your life,
but――I guess you fellows understand――――”
“Of course you’ll bust the lace if you pull at it like that,” said Toby
indignantly. “What do you think it is? An anchor cable?”
Arnold laughed, relieved. “Anyway, I hope I’ll be able to do something
for you some time――――”
“You can do it right now,” interrupted Toby gruffly. “You can shut up!”
“Who won the race?” inquired Arnold, glad to change the subject.
“It was a tie,” answered Toby promptly.
“Toby did,” said Frank with as little hesitation. “By about a yard.”
Toby glanced up in surprise and then turned his gaze toward the
landing, now but a short distance away. “The water was too cold for
Frank,” he said. “It must have been about forty-four, I guess. Too cold
for swimming, anyway.”
“It didn’t seem to trouble you much,” remarked Arnold.
“Oh, I’m used to it. Frank isn’t. Some one be ready with the boat-hook.
We’re almost in.”
Arnold patted his damp hair down and drew on his cap. “I say, you
fellows,” he began awkwardly, “there isn’t any reason for――for
mentioning this, I guess. It would only give my aunt hysterics, you
know. And dad might feel sort of――sort of uneasy, too. There’s no use
in troubling folks about things they can’t help, is there? See what I
mean?”
“We won’t say anything about it,” replied Toby, laughing. “It’s bully
of you, Arn, not to want to worry your folks.”
Arnold smiled sheepishly. “Well, you know how it is,” he muttered.
“Grown folks are awfully nervous about such things. Dad might forbid me
from sailing, you know. And that would be the very dickens.”
“If I were you,” said Frank, with a return to his pompous manner once
more, “I’d stay out of the water unless it was pretty warm. I guess if
a fellow has cramps once he might have them any time. I’d be afraid to
take chances if I were you.”
“I never had a cramp before in my life,” responded Arnold. “And I’ve
been in water colder than that, too. What I did, I guess, was get
cold watching you fellows race to the landing. Anyway, I’ll be mighty
careful the rest of the summer, you can bet! Pass me that boat-hook,
Frank.”
Toby watched Arnold and Frank disappear up the bluff and then chugged
his way thoughtfully back to the town landing. Now that it was over, he
found that the morning’s misadventure had left him feeling a little bit
like a rag. He had swum very nearly a half-mile at top speed, although,
to be sure, a brief rest had halved the performance, and that was no
slight task for a boy of his years. But the result of the exertion had
told on him less, perhaps, than those minutes of fear and anxiety
when, plunging from the lighthouse landing, he had raced to Arnold’s
rescue. He didn’t feel the least bit in the world like making that
eleven o’clock trip to Johnstown.
When he had tied up at the landing he had still more than fifteen
minutes to wait, and, after a reference to the contents of his pocket
and a minute of consideration, he climbed the lane and made his way
to a little lunch room nearby. There, seated on a high stool at the
counter, he consumed a large piece of apple pie and drank a cup of hot
coffee. Pie and coffee as a remedy for physical and nervous exhaustion
may sound queer, but they did the trick in Toby’s case, for he went
whistling back to the launch and a few minutes later ferried two
passengers across the bay in the best of spirits.
[Illustration: He consumed a large piece of apple pie.]
Two days later Arnold came over from the Head in the morning wearing an
expression that informed Toby that something of moment had occurred. He
looked at once subdued and important. When they were in the launch he
asked: “I suppose you didn’t say anything to any one, did you, Toby?”
“About what?” asked the other.
“About my trying to drown myself the other day.”
“No, I didn’t. Why?”
“Well, some one must have. Dad found out about it.”
“Gee! Did he? What did he say?”
“Not much. I mean――oh, he read me a lecture, of course. Said I was old
enough to know better than to do such things. I thought maybe you’d
told Phebe.”
“I didn’t. Even if I had, though, no one else would have heard. Phebe’s
a wonder at keeping a secret. She’s almost like a boy. If you tell her
not to tell you can’t drag it out of her!”
“Then it must have been Frank,” said Arnold, “but he swears he hasn’t
opened his mouth about it.”
“Maybe some one saw us from the Head. They might have, you know. With a
pair of glasses――――”
“There weren’t any boats around, were there?”
“Nowhere near. Did your father tell you not to sail the _Aydee_ any
more?”
“No, but I was scared he was going to. He said I must not go in the
water again this summer, though.”
“Well, you should worry,” laughed Toby. “Who wants to bathe much now,
anyway?”
“Aunt was the worst,” said Arnold. “She got all worked up about it and
I was afraid she’d make dad forbid my sailing any more. It’s funny
how he found out.”
“Frank might have told some one in confidence,” Toby suggested. “Still,
if he says he didn’t――――”
“I don’t believe he did.” Arnold stepped out and held the launch to the
float while Toby found the line. “He wants to see you, Toby.”
“Frank? What for?”
“No, dad. He said I was to ask you to come over this evening. I guess
he wants to thank you for pulling me out of the water. I’m sorry,” he
added apologetically.
“You can tell him you forgot to give me the message,” said Toby with a
laugh.
“What doing?”
“Oh, lots of things. I ought to study, I guess.”
Arnold grinned. “That’s sort of sudden, isn’t it? I haven’t heard you
mention studying all summer. You’d better come and have it over with.
He will just insist on doing it, Toby. Dad always does what he makes
up his mind to do. He’s like you that way. Besides, I wouldn’t want to
tell him I’d forgotten to tell you.”
“I don’t want any thanks,” grumbled Toby. “I didn’t do anything to make
a fuss over. Gee, I almost wish I’d left you there!”
“I’m sorry,” said Arnold again, “but you know the way fathers and
relatives are. They think they have to make a speech about such things.
It’s a beastly bore, I know, but I rather wish you’d come, Toby.”
“Oh, all right. I suppose I’ll have to. But the next time you try to
drown yourself you’ll have to find some one else to pull you out!”
The ordeal wasn’t very bad, however, after all. Mr. Deering was very
earnest, and shook hands with Toby twice and patted him once on the
back, but he evidently appreciated the fact that the boy was unhappily
embarrassed and so made his expression of gratitude mercifully brief.
But later, when Toby was toasting his shins in front of the library
fire, he traitorously returned to the subject in a roundabout way.
“Toby,” he said, “Arnold tells me you are going to Yardley Hall School
this fall.”
“Yes, sir.”
“That’s fine. It will be nice for Arnold, too. You boys will have
a very jolly time there, I’ll wager. Neither of you should forget,
though, that having a good time isn’t the sole reason for being there.
Last year Arnold rather――ah――rather neglected work, I fear. You must
set him a good example of diligence, Toby.”
“I studied a lot more than I needed to,” said Arnold defensively. “Gee,
you ought to see how some of the fellows loaf!”
“Well, perhaps you didn’t do so badly, son. I wouldn’t want you to
hurt yourself studying.” He winked gravely at Toby. “Any time you feel
brain-fever coming on you’d better let up awhile, eh? Now, Toby, what I
started out to say is this: Arnold says you haven’t really got enough
money to take you through the school year. How about that?”
“No, sir, not quite enough, but I guess I’ll make it somehow. I don’t
have to pay it all at once, sir.”
“Still, you’d feel easier in your mind, I suppose, if you had it all
in sight. It would give me a great deal of pleasure, my boy, if you
would let me help you just a little. I don’t want you to consider that
I am paying you for saving my son’s life. I couldn’t put a valuation
on that, anyway. What happened two days ago doesn’t enter into this
little affair, except that, naturally, it has made me feel a good deal
more――more kindly toward you, Toby. To be quite frank, it’s probable
that the idea of investing a small sum in your education wouldn’t have
occurred to me if you hadn’t made a draft on my gratitude. But I’d
rather you viewed my contribution as merely a token of admiration
and――ah――affection. Now how much money do you lack, Toby?”
“Why――why, I figure that I’ll be shy about forty-five dollars, sir,
but――――”
“Is that all? But surely, you’ll need more than that! Well, never mind.
I’m going to hand you a check for two hundred, Toby. That ought to
provide for everything, eh?”
“Yes, sir, it would,” answered Toby, shuffling his feet on the thick
rug and staring hard at the fire. “But――but I’d rather not, Mr.
Deering. I’m awfully much obliged to you, sir, but I guess I won’t.”
“What? But why not? Now don’t be proud, my boy. This isn’t charity I’m
offering. I――look here, then. We’ll make it a loan. How’s that?”
Toby shook his head, smiling a little. “It wouldn’t be a loan, sir,
because I wouldn’t ever be able to pay it back, I guess. Anyway, not
for years. I don’t want you to think I ain’t――am not――appreciating it,
sir, but I’ll come out all right. I’ve got almost enough now, and I can
make the rest before I need it. I’m awfully much obliged――――”
“Oh, go on, Toby!” begged Arnold. “Take it, won’t you? Dad’s got lots
of money. He won’t mind if you don’t pay him back for a long, long
time, will you, Dad? But I don’t see why he need ever pay it back, do
you?”
“But I don’t need it, you see,” protested Toby, embarrassed. “I――I’d so
much rather not take it, Arn! I would really!”
“Oh, shucks! There’s no sense in being so touchy!”
“I’m not touchy, Arn. I――I guess I can’t just explain how I feel about
it. If――if there was real need of the money――――”
“All right, Toby,” said Mr. Deering, coming to his rescue. “You know
best, perhaps. There’s no doubt that money you earn yourself goes a lot
farther than money that’s come by easily. But just remember that if you
ever need it it’s here waiting for you, and it’s yours as a loan or a
gift as you please. That will do, Arnold. Toby is quite right about it.
We won’t say any more.” Mr. Deering, who had arisen from his armchair
a minute before, stepped forward and shook Toby’s hand again. “I’ve
got some letters to write, and so I’ll say good-night to you. And good
luck, too, Toby.”
Later, on the landing, Toby asked: “Did you find out how your father
knew about it, Arn?”
“Yes, the lighthouse keeper saw it and he told the man who brings us
fish. And he told the cook and――――”
“Well, that lets Frank out, doesn’t it? I’m sort of glad. He――he was
pretty decent the other day, Frank was. About owning up that I beat
him, you know. And say, Arn, I guess he can swim as fast as he said. I
know I never had to work so hard before in my life!”