night had given way to the glories of the dawn. And in his
face, as he gazed before him, seeing, perhaps the troubled past, perhaps
the darkened future, there was now no trace of youth, only a great and
weary disillusionment.

CHAPTER XI

After all, Jim Herrick's introduction to Mrs. Rose came about in an
unexpected fashion.

Although he had only seen her two or three times, Herrick felt a decided
interest in Rose's young wife. From what Barry had told him he concluded
that there were breakers ahead for the young couple; and since his own
matrimonial misfortunes had made him very pitiful, he determined to try
to hold out a helping hand to the girl should the occasion arise.

The occasion arose, indeed, almost before he expected it; but luckily
Herrick was a man of action and grappled with the opportunity thus
presented.

One sunny afternoon he was returning from a pull up the river in his
skiff, when he saw a punt gliding towards him, the pole manipulated,
rather unskilfully, it must be confessed, by the girl of whom his
thoughts had been full; and he stayed in his mooring to watch her pass.

To Toni the guiding of a punt was so serious a matter that she had no
eyes for anything else, and she never even saw the man in the boat. The
river took rather a curve here, and Toni found it a little difficult to
negotiate the bend. Becoming somewhat flurried, she directed her punt
into the middle of the stream, where it hung for a moment as though
undecided whether or no to swing round in the disconcerting manner
peculiar to such craft; but Toni, becoming impatient, put fresh vigour
into her task, and sent the punt triumphantly forward with a masterful
push.

Her triumph was, however, short-lived. With the treacherous suddenness
which invariably marks this catastrophe her pole snapped as she drove it
downwards; the punt glided away immediately, and Toni, clinging
desperately to the broken pole, went down with it into the river itself.

With an exclamation Herrick sculled his boat strongly to the spot where
she had gone down, reaching it just as she came to the surface, gasping
and spluttering, and with an expression of wild terror in her face.

He guessed that she could not swim, and called out to her reassuringly.

"You're all right--hang on to my boat, and I'll get you out!"

She heard him, even in the midst of her terror, and made a frantic grab
at the side of the boat, only to miss by inches and go down ag