doubt she left her boat in some cove and went home along the shore,"
persisted the girl. "She would be sure to put in somewhere!"

Ben's face lighted up, and his eyes glowed with hope.

"It may be--of course it is. She went back long ago, no doubt on it," he
exclaimed, joyfully. "Why Ben Benson, what a precious old fool you was
not to think of that. Miss Agnes, I'll set you ashore now anywhere
you'll pint out, if the boat lives through it."

"Now, now!" cried the girl, breathless with terror, "strike for land
anywhere--I know the shore. Only put me on dry land again--it's all I
ask."

CHAPTER VIII.

OUT OF THE STORM.

Ben altered his course with a great effort, and forced a passage to the
broken shore. He was too busy in preserving his boat from being dashed
upon the rocks, to remark with what eager selfishness the girl left him,
only uttering a quick ejaculation, and darting away without thanks. By
the time he could look around she had plunged into a neighboring ravine,
and he saw no more of her.

Though the current was running high, Ben had the whole force of the wind
to urge him on, and his steady seamanship made the progress up stream
less dangerous than the descent had been. But the toil was great and
every muscle of his brawny arms rose to its full strain as he bent all
his strength upon the oars. But with his greatest anxieties at rest, Ben
cared little for this. With no life but his own at stake, the tempest
was nothing to the brave man.

But it grew terrible. The boat was more than once hurled out of water.
The waves dashed over him; the wind carried off his hat and beat
fiercely against his head, sweeping the long hair over his face. Again
and again the current wheeled his boat around, drifting it back with a
force he could not resist, sometimes close to the shore, sometimes out
in the torrent of waters. It was impossible now to see his course,
except by the lightning. The entire darkness baffled him more than the
storm.

Once when the boat was seized upon and hurled backward, Ben saw
innumerable lights sweeping by in the fog between him and the shore, and
he uttered a shout of wild thanksgiving that the steamer had not run him
down. As the water heaved him to and fro, a glare of lightning revealed
this monster boat, moving downward, and--oh, horror of horrors! Mabel
Harrington, just as the vortex engulphed her. Two white arms were flung
upward. Her hair streamed in the lightning. The death