THE RESCUE.
Paul and Stella never forgot, to the end of their lives, that awful time
of waiting, when they were face to face with death, their hearts filled
with agony at the sight of each other in the clutches of that fearful
morass, and at the thought of their parents' grief.
All around them stretched the great brown moor, weird and lonely looking,
except for where, less than a mile away, Paul could see the chimneys of
Moor Farm smoking, and the sunlight shining on the windows. Stella had
fallen with her back to the house, and all she could see was the moor, and
the hills in the distance. She could not see even if any one was coming
to their assistance. "Mike must have lost himself," she thought, "they
are so long--"
But at that moment Paul broke in on her thought. "They are coming," he
shouted. "Help! help! help!" and he waved his handkerchief excitedly.
Stella bowed her head and prayed, she hardly knew then in what words, but
to ask God's help, and to thank Him; she knew He would understand.
Three or four persons came running towards them with ropes and planks,
while behind came another and larger group with their mother amongst them.
Stella could only hear their voices, and do as they bade her.
"How be 'ee going to get the little maid, now?" said a voice she
recognised as Farmer Minards'; "'er's the awkwardest of the two to get
'old on, by a long way. Hold up yer 'ead, missie dear, don't let yer face
touch the mud."
Stella raised her head as high as she could, but she was so exhausted that
it fell forward again, and she lost consciousness altogether.
"I can save the boy," said a voice, "if you'll give me a rope."
In a moment more a deftly thrown lasso quivered in the air, and falling
over Paul encircled his waist; then, by the aid of planks thrown across
the margin, long, strong arms soon dragged him into safety, and he lay
trembling, but safe, on solid ground, with his mother's arms around him,
and nothing but words of sympathy, and love, and kindness greeting him
instead of the sound scolding he so richly deserved. But she saw he was
in no state to be scolded then.
A few moments later another shout went up. Stella was safe. Paul raised
himself, and called to her as they carried her towards him, but no answer
to his joyful cry came from the limp and senseless little form lying in
Farmer Minards' arms. Her face was as white as the clouds above, her eyes
were closed. Paul gave a great cry of fear. "Stella, Stella," he called
in agony. "Stella, speak! She tried to save me, and--and it is all my
fault, and I've killed her." And he burst into an agony of tears, for he
really thought his sister was dead.
Mrs. Anketell, who had run to her little daughter, quickly came back to
him. "She is not dead," she said soothingly, great tears of thankfulness
in her own eyes. "Thank God, Paul. You cannot thank Him enough for
having spared you both. She has fainted, that is all, dear. Act like a
man now, and be ready to comfort her when she recovers. This is bound to
be a terrible shock to her."
Mrs. Anketell was herself faint and trembling from the shock and the
anxiety; her hands shook visibly as she laid them on Paul's hot brow, and
her head swam so she feared she would have fainted too, but for the sake
of others she made a great effort to control herself, and succeeded.
They laid the little maid on the grass, and loosened her clothes.
The sight of her little hands hanging so helplessly, with the brown mud
dripping off them, and her little white feet, for her shoes and stockings
had come off in the mud, and her dead-white face, brought tears to many an
eye there, and Paul himself turned over on the grass and wept bitterly,
without shame, before them all.
"Better let him have his cry out," said the gentleman who had thrown the
lasso, and who proved to be a doctor; "it will relieve him and do him
good. Now, you men, some of you carry him carefully home, he is not fit
to walk; and I will carry her, if you will allow me," he said, stooping
over Stella. "I think they had better be got to bed as quickly as
possible. And you, can you walk, do you think?" he added, kindly, to Mrs.
Anketell. She nodded in reply; she was too much agitated to speak.
"Take my arm, please, if it would be any support to you." His quick eye
noted the strain she was enduring, and he quietly did all he could to
cheer and distract her thoughts from the contemplation of the awful
tragedy which might have befallen two of her children.
So the sad little procession wended its way across the sunny moor again,
and Paul, all the way, was saying over and over again to himself he would
never, never again try to do what he had been told not to. He would be
good, obedient, and humble, he would take care of Stella, and his mother,
and Mike. And that night when his mother came to see him the last thing
before going to bed herself, he told her the whole story from beginning to
end. "Stella is awfully plucky, for a girl," he added at the conclusion
of his tale. "She was afraid for me to try to cross, but she didn't seem
frightened when she was being sucked down by the mud, she never screamed
at all."
"Stella has far more courage than you think," said his mother gravely,
"and I hope you will never again jibe at the cowardice of girls; it only
shows that you do not know what real courage is. Good muscles do not
always mean true courage. You must learn that it is often far more brave
to stand by and not do a thing, knowing all the time you will be called a
coward for it, than it is to be daring and defiant, as you were to-day.
Obedience in all things, pleasant or unpleasant, is true courage, and that
is what you lacked to-day, and so brought misery and pain to many, none of
whom you consider as wise or brave as yourself."
Paul certainly felt the greatest shame as he realised how foolish he must
seem in the eyes of everybody, and he certainly suffered the keenest
remorse when he saw how ill Stella was; it was Stella who suffered most
from his wrong-doing. For many days she was very, very ill, and it was
some time before she was quite her old merry self again.