a moment before his arrival, perhaps as he stood with his back to
the current.

He stepped as close to the edge as he dared. The hand doubled as if in
imprecation, shaking savagely in the face of that force which leaves its
creatures to immutable law; then spread wide again, clutching,
expanding, crying for help as audibly as the human voice.

Weigall dashed to the nearest tree, dragged and twisted off a branch
with his strong arms, and returned as swiftly to the Strid. The hand was
in the same place, still gesticulating as wildly; the body was
undoubtedly caught in the rocks below, perhaps already half-way along
one of those hideous shelves. Weigall let himself down upon a lower
rock, braced his shoulder against the mass beside him, then, leaning out
over the water, thrust the branch into the hand. The fingers clutched it
convulsively. Weigall tugged powerfully, his own feet dragged perilously
near the edge. For a moment he produced no impression, then an arm shot
above the waters.

The blood sprang to Weigall's head; he was choked with the impression
that the Strid had him in her roaring hold, and he saw nothing. Then the
mist cleared. The hand and arm were nearer, although the rest of the
body was still concealed by the foam. Weigall peered out with distended
eyes. The meagre light revealed in the cuffs links of a peculiar device.
The fingers clutching the branch were as familiar.

Weigall forgot the slippery stones, the terrible death if he stepped too
far. He pulled with passionate will and muscle. Memories flung
themselves into the hot light of his brain, trooping rapidly upon each
other's heels, as in the thought of the drowning. Most of the pleasures
of his life, good and bad, were identified in some way with this friend.
Scenes of college days, of travel, where they had deliberately sought
adventure and stood between one another and death upon more occasions
than one, of hours of delightful companionship among the treasures of
art, and others in the pursuit of pleasure, flashed like the changing
particles of a kaleidoscope. Weigall had loved several women; but he
would have flouted in these moments the thought that he had ever loved
any woman as he loved Wyatt Gifford. There were so many charming women
in the world, and in the thirty-two years of his life he had never known
another man to whom he had cared to give his intimate friendship.

He threw himself on his face. His wrists were cracking, the skin was