he bank. "But you be darn
careful not to move from the middle. Now--_Pas op_!"

The line whistles out into the air. Roden, keeping a careful watch upon
his balance, catches it deftly, for it has been noosed. Then, planting
his feet firmly against the end plank, to do which necessitates that he
shall lie almost flat and still preserve the balance both of himself and
his charge, he shouts to them to haul away.

In vain. In his constrained position he cannot support the tension. It
is a case of letting go or being dragged bodily from the receptacle. So
he sings out to them to slacken out again, and the box drops back to the
centre of the iron rope. The only thing to be done now is to be hauled
back, where those on the bank he has just left can fasten the line
securely to its bolt.

No sooner is this done than his charge shows signs of returning
consciousness.

"Where am I?" she ejaculates, wildly striving to sit up, an effort
which, did he not forcibly repress, would result in their prompt
capsizal.

"Sit still! sit still! We shall be across directly!" he says.

But as the box shoots down and dangles motionless for a moment above the
centre of the flood, then moves forward in jerky tugs as it is hauled to
the opposite side, the terrified woman gives vent to a series of
hysterical shrieks, struggling wildly to tear herself from his grasp, so
utterly lost are all her capabilities of reason in the mad frenzy of her
terror. It is a perilous moment, for now darkness has set in, and the
bellowing, seething rush of the great flood adds an indescribable
element of horror to the situation.

"Sit still, and don't be so idiotically foolish. Do you hear?" he
shouts angrily into her ear as he realises that her frantic struggles
almost succeed. "You are perfectly safe; but if you go on at this rate
you will upset us both."

The loud, almost brutal tone is entirely successful. It turns her
thoughts into a new channel, and seems to quiet her. Then, before she
has time to relapse, the bank is reached, and the box, grasped by
half-a-dozen pairs of hands, is dragged up into safety.

"Better take her up to the hotel, mister," says one of the men who is
working the box apparatus.

The whitewashed walls of a house standing back from the river bank some
two hundred yards are just visible above the low mimosa bushes. It is a
roadside inn, and thither Roden half leads, half carries, his fainting
charge. She, it turns o