wift, sharp glance was enough to waken him into real life out of
his vague dreams. The man, nervous and fierce, that had been smothered
in the unable bookworm so long, sprang up to cope with the sudden death
that faced him.

"You be too late!" he heard Cathcart's shrill cry, as he fought his way
through the surging surf; and at the same moment there was a heavy
crash,--where, he could not see.

The fog blinded him; the sand, driven by the resistless wind, cut his
skin, penetrated his eyes and nostrils; while higher and higher, as he
waded on, the muddy water crept up his body, slimy and cold, and
tangling his feet in its undertow of kelp. There was a weight on his
chest which strangled him when he tried to cry aloud.--No matter; the
next headland passed and the house would be gained.

* * * * *

She was there, standing on a heap of fallen stone, her white night-dress
torn and muddied by the rocks and branches which the water swept by her.
Jacobus wondered if that were the house whose ruins curdled the dull
sweep of water beneath her; then the thought of his wife blotted out all
besides. Around her was a creeping, seething stream, widening each
moment; he did not see how deep it was, nor that the unsteady pile of
stones on which she had climbed was crumbling into it. He threw off
Lufflin's coat and his shoes, calling out almost joyously to her, so
fierce was the new strength in his muscles, and the passion in his
heart.

_"Sois tranquille!_" he shouted. "Lotty! It is I who comes! I go to
swim!"

She never heard the words, it is probable, for only a faint cry reached
him, of which he distinguished nothing; but he saw her hand waving him
back, and laughed.

"Poor child! she thinks to die, and stupid old Jerome so near! Foolish
Sharley!"

But the water weighed him down already, as he struggled ignorantly in
it, his gaunt limbs floundering, the tender smile yet on his bony face;
it cramped his arms, closed over his head: with a groping wrench he
recovered his footing, and breast-high in the rising tide looked at her.

"It is I who comes, Sharley!" he shouted, fiercely. "Wife! wife!" The
old English word meant so much to him at that moment!

Whether hours or minutes passed in that struggle he never knew; but at
its close he lay washed, like a poor wisp of weed, upon the shore. The
stream between them, which he never should pass, deepened, deepened: it
licked her feet now, her knees.