nd, leaning forward to the utmost extent of
her body, held out the paddle as directed. There was a moment of
sickening suspense, then came a halt, a jerk that seemed to pull her
arms half out of the sockets, and the punt swung heavily towards the
shore. The danger was over; she was helped on to the bank, where she
collapsed in a little heap, while Ralph worked the punt slowly along to
the jetty and fastened it to its chain.

_The short_ breathing space had allowed Darsie to recover her self-
possession, to master the overpowering temptation to cry, and to swallow
the lump in her throat sufficiently to be able to say in a weak little
voice--

"You've saved my life!"

"You've spoiled my trousers!" retorted Ralph in a matter-of-fact manner
calculated to put an instant check on sentimentality. He sat down on
the bank, unfastened his mud-soaked gaiters, and threw them on one side.
"The river's beastly dirty, and the mud sticks like the Dickens. A new
suit, too! It will never look the same again."

"I'm sorry."

"So you ought to be. Things are bad enough as they are, _but_... How
on earth did you come to be careering about alone in that punt?"

"I was waiting to see your sisters. I wandered down here, and thought
I'd just sit in it for a rest, then I thought I could just paddle up and
down. I managed quite well going up the stream; I got as far as the
willow!" Even at that moment a faint note of pride crept into Darsie's
voice. "We grounded there, and I--I must have fallen asleep, I suppose,
and that hateful old mill must needs choose the opportunity to begin
working at that very moment... Just my luck!"

Ralph pursed his lips in eloquent comment.

"If it comes to that, I think you have had a fair amount of luck in
another way! I heard the noise of the mill and came down to look on.
If I hadn't been there, you'd have been pretty considerably in Queer
Street by this time. Nice thing it would have been for us to discover
your drowned body in the millpond, and have had to tell your aunt!"

"I thought of that," agreed Darsie meekly. "It was one of my dying
thoughts. Don't scold me, please, for I feel so shaky, and you wouldn't
like it if I cried. It was my own fault, and I got what I deserved. I
wasn't a bit frightened till I missed the jetty, but that one moment was
like a hundred years. Did my yell sound very awful?"

"Pretty middling blood-curdling!" replied Ralph, smiling. "Good thing
it did.