ries of "See thee!--It is--it's t'
maester! and he has--no!--yea!--he _has_--he's gotten him. Polly, lass!
he's fetched up thy Arthur by t' hair of his heead."

It was strictly true. The school-master told me afterwards how it was.
When he found that the ice would bear no longer, he rolled into the
water on purpose, but, to his horror, he felt himself seized by the
drowning man, which pulled him suddenly down. The lad had risen once, it
seems, though we had not seen him, and had got a breath of air at the
hole, but the edge broke in his numbed fingers, and he sank again and
drifted under the ice. When he rose the second time, by an odd chance it
was just where Mr. Wood broke in, and his clutch of the school-master
nearly cost both their lives.

"If ever," said Mr. Wood, when he was talking about it afterwards, "if
ever, Jack, when you're out in the world you get under water, and
somebody tries to save you, when he grips _you_, don't seize _him_, if
you can muster self-control to avoid it. If you cling to him, you'll
either drown both, or you'll force him to do as I did--throttle you, to
keep you quiet."

"Did you?" I gasped.

"Of course I did. I got him by the throat and dived with him--the only
real risk I ran, as I did not know how deep the dam was."

"It's an old quarry," said I.

"I know now. We went down well, and I squeezed his throat as we went. As
soon as he was still we naturally rose, and I turned on my back and got
him by the head. I looked about for the hole, and saw it glimmering
above me like a moon in a fog, and then up we came."

When they did come up, our joy was so great that for the moment we felt
as if all was accomplished; but far the hardest part really was to come.
When the school-master clutched the poles once more, and drove one under
the lad's arms and under his own left arm, and so kept his burden
afloat whilst he broke a swimming path for himself with the other, our
admiration of his cleverness gave place to the blessed thought that it
might now be possible to help him. The sight of the poles seemed
suddenly to suggest it, and in a moment every spare pole had been
seized, and, headed by our heavy friend, eight or ten men plunged in,
and, smashing the ice before them, waded out to meet the school-master.
On the bank we were dead silent; in the water they neither stopped nor
spoke till it was breast high round their leader.

I have often thought, and have always felt quite sure, that i