ALIVE!
When Rosamond Arleigh struck the water in her mad descent down the
steep sandy bank, she gave herself up for lost.
The cold, dark water closed swiftly over her, and she sunk for a moment
out of sight; then she rose to the surface, and with numbed hands
clutched wildly at the nearest object, even as the drowning man will
clutch at a straw. Her hands came in contact with a huge pine log. She
grasped its rough bark; her hands slipped, and she fell once more.
She had lost her slippers--one was in the carriage, the other imbedded
in the wet sand near the edge of the stream. Her cloak had slipped from
her shoulders; she was utterly unprotected from the cold water, and a
chill struck to her very heart.
It was intensely dark. She could not see which way the carriage had
gone; but it _had_ gone, and that was enough to revive a feeble hope
within her heart.
If only Gilbert Warrington would not miss her until he was so far away
that she might have time and a chance to escape, then indeed there was
hope. But how _could_ she escape?
It was dark and cold; the stream was deep and treacherous, and the
current swift and strong. Besides, the logs and _débris_ in the water
choked up its course, and it was positively dangerous for an expert
swimmer to attempt to make his way through the swift, dark tide, at
that hour.
It all flashed through her bewildered brain with the rapidity with
which thought flashes at such a time, when one is upon the verge of
drowning. She tried hard to grasp the situation, but her brain was weak
and numb from the strange experience through which she had passed, and
she could not collect her thoughts, nor do anything to help herself;
only, with a vague impulse of self-preservation, the first law of
nature, she struck out blindly, with a faint hope of reaching shore.
Clutching at the tall, tough grass and native shrubs which grew near,
she might have eventually succeeded, for she was desperate; but all
at once, with a rush and a roar and a plunge down the stream, a small
raft of cypress logs fastened together came tearing madly, under the
direction of a stout negro in a small boat, who evidently superintended
the raft.
On came the logs, and poor Rosamond, directly in their way, was utterly
powerless to escape, while the negro in the boat could not possibly see
what was ahead of him; and, of course, he would not be on the lookout
for such a phenomenon as a woman struggling in the cold, dark water
alone at that unearthly hour.
Somehow it flashed across Rosamond’s understanding; she realized her
awful danger. She half arose in the water and shrieked aloud at the top
of her voice:
“_Help! help!_”
On rushed the logs! The negro in the boat, half convinced that he had
seen a ghost in that one swift glimpse of a death-white face and long,
dark, streaming hair, which for a brief space confronted him, paused in
the act of rowing, and uttered an imprecation.
“Gor a’mighty! what dat?” he exclaimed. “‘Pears like thar’s a woman--a
white woman--or a _ha’nt_! Don’t jis’ know which a one, but ’twas one
or t’odder, _sho’_!”
He guided his boat dexterously around the side of the small raft, but
not in time to avert the threatened calamity, for with a mad rush the
logs dashed onward, striking poor Rosamond full in the head with a
blow which might have felled an ox. Without a cry or a moan, she sunk
swiftly out of sight, and all was still.
The negro, trembling like a leaf, had witnessed the catastrophe, just a
moment too late. He fastened his boat to the raft and sprung into the
water.
“I isn’t gwine ter sit here and see no woman drowned,” he muttered as
he dived beneath the surface.
A moment later; then the water was agitated, and once more the negro
arose on the dark bosom of the water, grasping in his arms the
unconscious form of Rosamond Arleigh.
With some difficulty he succeeded in placing her in the bottom of his
boat, and getting in himself, began to pull for dear life, but not
to the shore that she had left. He was afraid of being punished for
allowing the lady to drown, and he firmly believed that she was dead.
He made up his mind in a moment. He would go on to New Orleans. There
were no more obstacles now in the way of his raft, which would glide
swiftly on into the lake, to be towed over by some schooner. He
determined, therefore, to convey the body to New Orleans, and have
it buried by the authorities. Perhaps it could be managed so that
no questions would be asked, and he would not be punished for his
carelessness.
He rowed onward with all his might, until the veins in his arms stood
out like whip-cords and the perspiration trickled in a steady stream
down his ebony face.
It occurred to him all at once that even when the lake would be
reached, it would be difficult to persuade a schooner captain to convey
the dead body to the city. Perhaps it would be better to bury it in the
sand at the mouth of the stream, and no one would be the wiser.
But the first faint gleams of morning sunrise showed an unexpected
sight. The woman was still alive!
[Illustration]