ne, who, on her knees before the
unconscious woman, wept and said: "Oh, she is going to die!"

"Reassure yourself," the old man said; "this poor woman's hands, icy
cold a minute ago, are becoming warmer. But what has happened? Your
clothes also are drenched. You look strangely shocked."

"Good father, at daybreak this morning, the girls who sleep in my room
and I woke up and went into the courtyard. There we heard other slaves
crying that the dikes had burst. The girls all ran to see the progress
of the inundation. I went along without knowing why. They dispersed. I
advanced to a tongue of land that is washed by the water of the pond. A
large willow stands near the spot. I presently saw a half-submerged cart
floating a little way off. It was being turned around by the opposite
currents, and it was covered by a tent-cloth."

"Thanks be to God! The spreading tent-cloth acted like a balloon and
kept the cart from sinking."

"The wind blew into this sort of a sail, driving the cart towards the
shore where I stood. I then saw this unfortunate woman, holding to the
tent-cloth, the rest of her body in the water."

"And what happened then, my daughter?"

"There was not a second to lose. The failing hands of the poor woman,
whose strength was exhausted, were about to drop. I fastened one end of
my belt to one of the branches of the willow-tree and the other to my
wrist and I leaned forward towards the poor woman calling out to her:
'Courage!' She heard me, and seized my right hand convulsively. The
sudden pull caused my feet to slip from the edge and I fell into the
water."

"Fortunately your left wrist was tied to one of the ends of the belt
that you had fastened to the tree!"

"Yes, good father. But the shock was violent. I thought my arm was
wrenched from its socket. Fortunately the poor woman took hold of the
edge of my dress. My first pain having passed I did my best, and with
the aid of my belt that remained fastened to the tree and on which I
tugged away, I succeeded in reaching the shore and pulling out this
woman, on the point of drowning. Our workshop being the nearest place
that I could think of, I brought her here; she could hardly support
herself; but, alack!" added the girl at the sight of the still inanimate
face of Rosen-Aer, for it was Berthoald's mother that Septimine had just
saved, "I may only have retarded the supreme moment for a few seconds!"

"Do not lose hope," answered the old man, "her hands