rne in on him that the few halting strokes he had learned to take in
smooth water last summer would be next to useless in an emergency like
this. But he did not pause nor lessen his speed. He only knew that he
could not hesitate, with that anguished face and those clutching hands
to spur him on.

"Hold on a minute longer, Paul!" he cried, when he was within twenty feet
of the hole. "Don't let go. I--I'll--get you out!"

Jerking at the lever of his skates, he kicked them off. The hockey-stick
was still in his grasp, and, with this outstretched, he flung himself
flat on the ice and wriggled forward. He paid no heed to the ominous
cracking beneath him; there was no time for caution. Trexler had lost
the slight grip he had had on the crumbling edges of the hole and was
beating the water madly with his hands. His eyes, wild with despairing
horror, were fixed on Frank with a desperate pleading that made the boy
oblivious to everything save the vital need of haste.

With a sharp thrust of both feet, he pushed himself forward. The stick
slid over the jagged edges of the hole and straight into the groping
hands that closed over and hung upon it with the tenacious grip that
knows no reason.

"Don't jerk it!" cried Sanson, sharply, as the ice creaked and cracked
beneath him. "Just hold tight and let me draw you in."

But Trexler was too far gone to heed. There came another crack more
ominous than the others. Even now, by letting go the stick, Frank could
have escaped by rolling swiftly to one side or the other. He wanted
to--desperately; but something within him stronger even than his fear
clenched his fingers around the tape-wound hickory.

In another second the ice on which he lay gave with a crash and plunged
him into the icy water.

CHAPTER XV

THE RESCUE

As he went under, Sanson's first feeling was one of utter panic. The
shock and cold, above all the horrible sense of suffocation, started
him struggling as madly and ineffectually as Trexler had done a moment
before. Then all at once, out of the whirling turmoil of fear which
filled his soul, some vague remembrance of the brief lessons last summer
stood forth, and he thrust downward with his feet. The motion was almost
entirely instinctive, but the result was curiously steadying. The moment
that downward movement ceased, his brain seemed to clear and he got a
grip on himself.

"I mustn't come up under the ice," he found himself thinking, as he
pushed vig