uths there--cried "Zuleika!" and leapt emulously
headlong into the water. "Brave fellows!" shouted the elder men,
supposing rescue-work. The rain pelted, the thunder pealed. Here and
there was a glimpse of a young head above water--for an instant only.

Shouts and screams now from the infected barges on either side. A score
of fresh plunges. "Splendid fellows!"

Meanwhile, what of the Duke? I am glad to say that he was alive and (but
for the cold he had caught last night) well. Indeed, his mind had never
worked more clearly than in this swift dim underworld. His mantle, the
cords of it having come untied, had drifted off him, leaving his arms
free. With breath well-pent, he steadily swam, scarcely less amused than
annoyed that the gods had, after all, dictated the exact time at which
he should seek death.

I am loth to interrupt my narrative at this rather exciting moment--a
moment when the quick, tense style, exemplified in the last paragraph
but one, is so very desirable. But in justice to the gods I must pause
to put in a word of excuse for them. They had imagined that it was
in mere irony that the Duke had said he could not die till after the
bumping-races; and not until it seemed that he stood ready to make an
end of himself had the signal been given by Zeus for the rain to fall.
One is taught to refrain from irony, because mankind does tend to take
it literally. In the hearing of the gods, who hear all, it is conversely
unsafe to make a simple and direct statement. So what is one to do? The
dilemma needs a whole volume to itself.

But to return to the Duke. He had now been under water for a full
minute, swimming down stream; and he calculated that he had yet another
full minute of consciousness. Already the whole of his past life
had vividly presented itself to him--myriads of tiny incidents, long
forgotten, now standing out sharply in their due sequence. He had
mastered this conspectus in a flash of time, and was already tired of
it. How smooth and yielding were the weeds against his face! He wondered
if Mrs. Batch had been in time to cash the cheque. If not, of course his
executors would pay the amount, but there would be delays, long delays,
Mrs. Batch in meshes of red tape. Red tape for her, green weeds for
him--he smiled at this poor conceit, classifying it as a fair sample of
merman's wit. He swam on through the quiet cool darkness, less quickly
now. Not many more strokes now, he told himself; a few, only