that
other frightful thought he put away, fighting against it madly as a
condemned man might push the cup of hemlock from his lips. Forcibly
breaking the drowned one's hold upon the life-belt, he fell to work
energetically, resorting to the first-aid expedients for the reviving of
the drowned as he had learned them in his boyhood. Once, only, he flung
a word over his shoulder at Margery as he fought for the old man's life.
"Make for the nearest landing where we can get a doctor!" he commanded;
and then, in a passion of gratitude: "O God, I thank thee that I am not
a murderer!--he's coming back! he's breathing again!"

A little later he was able to leave off the first-aid arm-pumpings and
chest-pressings; to straighten the limp and sprawling limbs, and to dive
into the cuddy cabin, under Margery's directions, for blankets and rugs.
When all was done that could be done, and he had propped the
blanket-swathed body with the cushions so that the crash and plunge of
the pitching catboat would be minimized for the sufferer, he went aft to
sit beside the helmswoman, who was getting the final wave-leap of speed
out of the little vessel.

"He is alive?" she asked.

"Yes; and that is about all that can be said. He isn't drowned; but he
is old, and the shock has gone pretty near to snapping the thread."

"Of course, you remember him?" she said, looking away across the leaping
waters.

Griswold, with his heart on fire with generous emotions, felt the cold
hand gripping him again.

"He is the old gentleman you introduced me to at the Inn the other day:
Galbraith; is that the name?"

"Yes," she rejoined, still looking away; "that is the name."

Griswold fell silent for the time; but a little later, when the catboat
was rushing in long plunges through the entrance to the Wahaskan arm of
the lake, he said: "You are going to take him to Mereside?"

"Yes. He is a friend of poppa's. And, anyway, it's the nearest place,
and you said there was no time to lose."

There were anxious watchers on the Mereside landing-stage: the gardener,
the stable-man, Thorsen, and three or four others. When the landing was
safely made, Miss Grierson took command and issued her orders briskly.

"Four of you carry Mr. Galbraith up to the house, and you, Thorsen, put
Baldur into the two-wheeled trap and be ready to go for Doctor Farnham
when I tell you where you can find him. Johnnie Fergus, you come here
and take care of the _Clytie_; you know how t