over her head and discard it
altogether. Thus disencumbered, she had more freedom for the impending
struggle.

He glanced over his shoulder. They were on the line of breakers. Behind
them a heavy comber was surging in, crested with snow, its concave belly
resembling a vast sheet of emerald. In another moment it would be upon
them. It was the moment a seasoned swimmer would seize.

[Illustration: Whitaker felt land beneath his feet]

His eye sought the girl's. In hers he read understanding and assent. Of
one mind, they struck out with all their strength. The comber overtook
them, clasped them to its bosom, tossed them high upon its great glassy
shoulder. They fought madly to retain that place, and to such purpose
that they rode it over a dozen yards before it crashed upon the beach,
annihilating itself in a furious welter of creaming waters. Whitaker
felt land beneath his feet....

The rest was like the crisis of a nightmare drawn out to the limit of
human endurance. Conscious thought ceased: terror and panic and the
blind instinct of self-preservation--these alone remained. The undertow
tore at Whitaker's legs as with a hundred murderous hands. He fought his
way forward a few paces--or yard or two--only to be overwhelmed, ground
down into the gravel. He rose through some superhuman effort and lunged
on, like a blind, hunted thing.... He came out of it eventually to find
himself well up on the beach, out of the reach of the waves. But the
very earth seemed to billow about him, and he could hardly keep his
feet. A numbing faintness with a painful retching at once assailed him.
He was but vaguely aware of the woman reeling not far from him, but
saved....

Later he found that something of the worst effects had worn away. His
scattered wits were reestablishing intercommunication. The earth was
once more passably firm beneath him. He was leaning against the careened
hulk of a dismantled cat-boat with a gaping rent in its side. At a
little distance the woman was sitting in the sands, bosom and shoulders
heaving convulsively, damp, matted hair veiling her like a curtain of
sunlit seaweed.

He moved with painful effort toward her. She turned up to him her
pitiful, writhen face, white as parchment.

"Are you--hurt?" he managed to ask. "I mean--injured?"

She moved her head from side to side, as if she could not speak for
panting.

"I'm--glad," he said dully. "You stay--here.... I'll go get help."

He raised his eyes,