HARRIET HAS A NARROW ESCAPE
"Thave me! Oh, thave me!"
Tommy had turned over and righted herself before rising to the
surface. When she did appear she was within a foot or so of the pier.
Her little blonde head popped up from under the water all of a sudden,
and in that instant she opened her mouth in a wail for help. Tommy's
companions were fairly hysterical with merriment. Tommy yelled again,
begging them to "thave" her.
"I'll save ye, darlin'," cried Jane, throwing herself down and
fastening a hand lightly in Tommy's hair, whereat the little girl
screamed more lustily than before. "Lend a hand here, my hearties. The
darlin' wants to be saved. We'll save her, won't we?" Jane shouted in
great glee.
"Of course we will," answered Harriet. She leaned over the edge of the
pier, Jane raising the little girl until the latter's shoulders were
above water; Harriet got hold of her dress and worked her hand along
until she had grasped Tommy by the ankles.
"Let go!" yelled Tommy.
She meant for Harriet to release her feet, but instead Jane McCarthy
released her hold on Tommy's shoulders. The next second Tommy Thompson
was standing on her head in the pond with Harriet Burrell jouncing her
up and down, trying to get her out of the water, but taking more time
about it, so it seemed, than was really necessary. Every time Tommy's
head was drawn free of the water she uttered a choking yell. There was
no telling how long the nonsense might have continued, had not Miss
Elting thrust Harriet aside, resulting in Tommy's falling into the
water and having to be rescued again. Tommy was weeping when finally
they dragged her to the pier and wrung the water out of her clothing.
"Now, don't you wish you were _fat_?" jeered Margery. "If you had
been, they couldn't have lifted you and you wouldn't have fallen in
again."
"Fat like you? Never! I'd die firtht," replied Tommy. "But I may ath
it ith. I'm freething, Mith Elting."
"Get up and go ashore. Hazel, will you please see that Grace doesn't
sit down on the cold ground?"
Hazel Holland led the protesting Tommy along the pier to the shore,
where she walked the little girl up and down as fast as she could be
induced to move, which, after all, was not much faster than an
ordinarily slow walk. The others of the party remained out at the end,
walking back and forth and waiting until the coming of the dawn, so
that they might see to that for which they had planned by daylight.
At the first suggestion of dawn, Harriet plunged into the pond without
a word of warning to her companions and began gathering up and pushing
bundles of equipment toward the shore. Jane and Hazel were not far
behind her. Then Miss Elting, not to be outdone by her charges,
plunged in after them. Margery, shivering, turned her back on them and
walked shoreward.
"'Fraid cat! 'fraid cat!" taunted Tommy, when she saw Margery coming.
"I'm no more afraid than you are. You're afraid to go into the water.
The only way you can go in is to fall in or be pushed!"
"Am I? Ith that tho? Well, I'll thhow you whether I am afraid of the
water. I dare you to follow me." Tommy fairly flew down the pier;
then, leaping up into the air, jumped far out, taking a clean
feet-first dive into the pond, uttering a shrill little yell just
before disappearing under the surface. But all at once she stood up,
and, by raising her chin a little, was able to keep her head above
water.
"Hello there, Tommy, what are you standing on?" called Harriet,
puffing and blowing as she pushed a canvas-bound pack along ahead of
her.
"I don't know. I gueth it mutht be the automobile top. It ith nithe
and thpringy."
"Please stay there until I get back. I wish to look it over. If you
can, I wish you would find the rear end of the car, so I may locate it
exactly."
"What have you in mind, darlin'?" asked Jane, with a quick glance at
Harriet.
"I'm going to try to get our clothes. The trunk is strapped and
buckled to the rear end, is it not?"
"Yes."
"Tell me just how those buckles are placed; whether there is also a
loop through which the strap has been run, and all about it."
"How should I know?"
"You put the trunk on, didn't you?"
"Surely, but I can't remember all those things, even if I ever knew
them."
"Jane, you should learn to observe more closely. Most persons are
careless about that." Harriet began swimming toward the shore with
Jane.
"Thay! How long mutht I thtand here in the wet up to my prethiouth
neck?" demanded Grace Thompson. Her feet seemed to be very light. They
persisted in either rising or drifting away from the submerged
automobile top. Tommy kept her hands moving slowly to assist in
maintaining her equilibrium.
"Wait until I return, if you will, please," answered Harriet.
"Thave me! I can't wait. Here I go _now_!" She slipped off and went
under, but came up sputtering and protesting. Instead of remaining to
mark the sunken car, Tommy swam rapidly to shore. She found Harriet,
Hazel and Jane sitting with feet hanging over the pier talking to
Miss Elting. The four were dripping, but none of them seemed to mind
this. The sun soon would be up, and its rays would dry their clothing
and bring them warmth for the first time since their disaster of the
night before.
"Do be careful," Miss Elting was saying when Tommy swam up, and,
clinging to the pier with one hand, floated listlessly while listening
to what was being said.
"What's the matter, Tommy? Couldn't you stand it any longer?" asked
Harriet.
"My feet got tho light that I couldn't hang on."
"She means her head instead of her feet," corrected Margery.
"I think I had better go after the trunk now," decided Harriet.
"I wish you would let me go with you," urged Jane.
"No; two of us would be in each other's way. You folks had better stay
here and wait. There will be plenty to do after I get the trunk
ashore, provided I do. We must have all our outfit together by
sunrise, for we have a day's work ahead of us. Want to get up, Tommy?"
"Yeth."
Harriet reached down and assisted Grace, dripping, to the pier. Then
she slipped in and swam in a leisurely way to the sunken automobile,
which she located after swimming about for a few moments. The next
thing to do was to find the rear end of the car. This was quickly
accomplished. Harriet took a long breath, then dived swiftly. It
seemed to her companions that she had been gone a long time, when,
finally, the girl's dark head rose dripping from the pond. She shook
her head, took several long breaths, then dived again.
Three times Harriet Burrell repeated this. At last, after a brief
dive, they saw the black trunk leap free to the surface of the pond.
The Meadow-Brook Girls uttered a yell. Harriet had accomplished a task
that would have proved to be too much for the average man. Down there,
underneath the water, crouching under the backward tilting automobile
on the bottom of the pond, she had unbuckled three stubborn straps,
rising to the surface after unbuckling each strap, taking in a new
supply of delicious fresh air, then returning to her task.
Before the Meadow-Brook Girls had finished with their shouting,
cheering and gleeful dancing, the black luggage had drifted some
distance from the spot where it had first appeared. So delighted were
they with the result of Harriet Burrell's efforts that, for the
moment, the others entirely forgot the girl herself. But all at once
Miss Elting came to a realization of the truth. Something was wrong.
"Harriet!" she cried excitedly. It was unusual for the guardian to
show alarm, even though she might feel it. "Where is Harriet?"
The shouting and the cheering ceased instantly.
"Oh, she's just playing a trick on us," scoffed Margery Brown.
Suddenly the keen eyes of Jane McCarthy caught sight of something that
sent her heart leaping. That something was a series of bubbles that
rose to the surface. Jane gazed wide-eyed, neither moving nor
speaking, then suddenly hurled herself into the pond. Two loud
splashes followed her own dive into the water. Tommy and Miss Elting
were plunging ahead with all speed. Jane was the first to reach the
scene. She dived, came up empty-handed, then dived again. Tommy
essayed to make a dive, but did not get in deep enough to fully cover
her back. Miss Elting made an error in her calculations, as Jane had
done on the first dive, missing the sunken automobile by several feet.
Now Hazel sprang into the water and swam to them as fast as she knew
how to propel herself. Jane shot out of the water and waved both arms
frantically above her head.
"Spread out!" she cried in a strained, frightened voice.
"Did--didn't you find her?" gasped Miss Elting.
"No."
Jane was gone again, leaving a wake that reached all the way to the
beach, so violent had been her floundering dive.
Tommy, who had raised her head from the water a short distance from
where the guardian was paddling, uttered a scream.
"There thhe ith!" she cried; "there she ith! Right down there. Come in
a hurry. She ith under the car. I could thee her plainly. Oh, I'm tho
thcared!" Tommy began paddling for the shore with all speed.
Miss Elting did not answer. Instead, she took a long dive. About this
time Jane came up. Hazel, who was making for the spot where the
guardian had disappeared, pointed to it. Jane understood. It took her
but a few seconds to reach the center of the rippling circle left by
the guardian; then Crazy Jane's feet kicked the air a couple of times.
She had taken an almost perpendicular dive. But it seemed that she had
not been under water more than a second or two when she lunged to the
surface. A few feet from her Miss Elting appeared, threw herself over
on her back and lay gasping for breath.
"She'th got her!" screamed Tommy. "Harriet ith dead!"
Gazing out over the pond she saw Jane swimming swiftly toward shore,
dragging the apparently lifeless body of Harriet Burrell. Miss Elting
and Hazel were closing up on Jane rapidly. Reaching her side a moment
later, the guardian took one of Harriet's arms and assisted in towing
her in.
Tommy remembered afterward having been fascinated by the expressions
in their faces. She stared and stared. The faces of the two women were
white and haggard. Still farther back she saw only Hazel's eyes. They
were so large that Tommy was scarcely able to credit their belonging
to Hazel. Had Tommy known it, her own face was more pale and haggard
at that moment than those of her companions.
Jane dragged Harriet ashore; then Miss Elting grasped the unconscious
girl almost roughly, flung her over on her stomach and began applying
"first aid to the drowned."
"Ith--ith she dead?" gasped Tommy.
"She's drowned, darlin'," answered Crazy Jane McCarthy abruptly.