Dorothy Dale's Great Secret Part 8

But Edna Black did not join the racers. She had never before tried "shooting the chutes" and was infatuated with the sport. Time after time she climbed the little ladder and as quickly slid down the curved, inclined plank into the water again. Dorothy and Tavia were watching her from the sh.o.r.e, calling to her in merry nonsense and joking about her sliding propensities.

"Going down!" called Tavia as Edna took one more slide.

They waited-but she did not come up!

Miss Higley, too, was watching for the young diver's re-appearance.

Ten-twenty-she counted, but Edna did not come up. Then, from the very top of the slide, where she had taken her position some time before to better watch all the girls, Miss Higley dove into the water after Edna, cleaving the fifteen feet of distance from the surface like a flash.

Dorothy and Tavia stood breathless-watching for either Miss Higley or Edna to come to the top.

It seemed ages-yes, it was too long to stay under water. What had happened to Miss Higley? Where was Edna?

An instant later, Dorothy and Tavia-without exchanging a word-kicked off their slippers and were in the water! There was no time to call to the girls farther out. Not a swimmer was near enough to offer help!

Their light summer clothing seemed to make little difference to these two country girls, who had learned to swim in Dalton pond, and, in a few seconds, both had reached the spot where Edna and the teacher had disappeared.

Tavia was the first to dive, and, in a few seconds she came up with Edna, white and unconscious, in her arms.

"Hold her-while I try-for Miss Higley!" cried Dorothy, as Tavia, supporting her burden on one arm and grasped the cross bar of the chute with her other and yelled for help.

Dorothy was now under water, groping for the other lost one. But she had to come up for air without bringing Miss Higley.

Down she went again, taking a long breath and determining to remain under until she could get a grip on the clothing of the teacher. Now the others were close at hand to a.s.sist Tavia in caring for Edna. Down and down Dorothy went, the water gurgling in her ears-down and down into the depths.

It seemed as if she could not stand the strain and pressure. A trail of bubbles and a swirl of the surface of the lake marked where she had disappeared.

Rose-Mary and d.i.c.k were the first to reach Tavia, and they at once took charge of the unconscious one, floating her to sh.o.r.e between them. Then others came up to the chute, white, frightened and trembling at the news Tavia gasped out to them. So alarmed were they that none of them dared venture to help Dorothy down there in the blackness and silence, at her grewsome task.

Tavia, as soon as she had recovered her breath, had started off to a.s.sist d.i.c.k and Rose-Mary in bringing Edna to sh.o.r.e, as the task was no light one for the three swimmers. Then, as she got into shallow water Tavia turned, suddenly remembering something, and shouted to the girls about the chute:

"Go for Dorothy! She is under there, looking for Miss Higley!"

But, as one or two of the braver girls, feeling the need of action, prepared to dive, they saw the pale face of Dorothy Dale come to the surface, and they saw that, in her arms, she held clasped the form of Miss Higley. But the hand that Dorothy stretched out to grasp the bottom of the chute, that she might support herself and the inert burden, just failed to catch hold of the wooden brace, and, amid a swirl of waters Dorothy went down again, out of sight, with the unconscious teacher.

CHAPTER VIII A LIVELY AFTERNOON

There followed an eternity of suspense for those watching for the reappearance of Dorothy. The missing of the hold she expected to get on the board and the effort to keep Miss Higley up, together with the struggle she had gone through, caused the girl to lose all control of herself. She had sunk instantly without having any opportunity of using her free arm to keep herself above water.

Seeing this Rose-Mary and Molly, who had climbed out on the base of the chute, jumped into the lake again, making for the spot where they saw Dorothy go down the second time.

But before they could reach it they saw Dorothy's head above the surface.

She had come up under the chute, in an open square of water, formed by the four supporting posts of the affair. Cautiously she reached out and caught hold of a beam. Then another arm was seen to grasp a projecting plank! Miss Higley was struggling!

She was not dead! Not unconscious!

"Dorothy!" screamed Tavia from sh.o.r.e, as she saw the form of her chum come to the surface the second time. But Tavia did not see Dorothy wave a rea.s.suring hand at her as she climbed up on the chute, and helped Miss Higley support herself across one of the base planks. For Tavia had fallen unconscious beside Edna, who was only just beginning to show signs of life under the prompt administrations of Rose-Mary and d.i.c.k.

In all this confusion the white-ap.r.o.ned matron forgot to use her telephone. But, as she now a.s.sisted the other girls in working over Edna, she directed some of the swimmers, who had come to sh.o.r.e, to look after Tavia.

Lena Berg, the quietest girl of Glenwood, rushed into the bathing office and telephoned to Central to "send doctors." Almost before those working over Edna and Tavia had realized it, and, almost as soon as the throng of young ladies had started to a.s.sist Miss Higley and Dorothy to sh.o.r.e, an automobile with two doctors in it stopped at the gate. The physicians were soon working over Tavia and Edna.

A few seconds later Rose-Mary and Molly pulled up to sh.o.r.e in an old boat they had found anch.o.r.ed near the chute, and in the craft, which they rowed with a broken canoe paddle, were Dorothy and Miss Higley!

As so often happens that one small accident is responsible for any number of mishaps, especially where girls or women become panic-stricken, it seemed now that the rescue of Miss Higley and Dorothy acted like magic to restore all four victims of the water to their senses, at least, if not to actual vigor. Tavia and Edna both jumped up as the boat grounded on the beach, and Miss Higley and Dorothy staggered ash.o.r.e.

"Be careful," cautioned one of the physicians, as the teacher was seen to totter, and almost fall. She was plainly very weak, and, while the younger doctor looked after Dorothy the other, who was his father, took Miss Higley into the bathing pavilion office to administer to her there.

Tavia had only fainted. Indeed she had been scarcely able to swim out to help Edna, not being entirely recovered from her recent nervous fever.

Edna had swallowed considerable water, but it was fresh, and when she had been relieved of it, and the usual restoratives applied, she, too, was herself again.

Dorothy insisted there was absolutely nothing the matter with her, but it was plain that such physical efforts as she had been obliged to make in her rescue of Miss Higley, must at least exhaust a girl of her frail physique. So young Dr. Morton insisted on her being a.s.sisted in a "thorough rub." Then she was given a warm, stimulating drink, and, soon after that, Dorothy was able to tell what had happened.

An hour later all the brown bathing suits had been discarded, Tavia and Dorothy had been supplied with dry clothing, and all the Glenwood girls who had come to Sunset Lake sat on the rocky sh.o.r.e back of the sand, waiting for the hour to arrive when they must start back to the school.

There was no lack of talk to make the time pa.s.s quickly.

Miss Higley seemed the least perturbed of any-she had a way of always being beyond a mere personal feeling. She never "allowed herself" to encourage pains or aches; in fact she was one of those strong-minded women who believe that all the troubles of this life are hatched in the human brain, and, therefore the proper cure for all ills is the eradication of the germ producer-sick-thoughts. So, as soon as she felt her lungs in working order again she "took the defensive" as Tavia expressed it, and sat up as "straight as a whip," with her gla.s.ses at exactly the proper pitch and the black cord at precisely the accustomed dangle.

"Mar-vel-ous!" gasped d.i.c.k, aside, giving the long word an inimitable roll, and, at the same time, bestowing a wondering look on the recently resuscitated teacher.

"But do tell us," begged Rose-Mary, "what happened first-of all those exciting things?"

"I did," answered Edna Black. "I was shooting the chute to my heart's content, when, all of a sudden, I stuck somewhere. Then, after trying everything I knew how to do to get loose, I said my prayers."

"Next," called Rose-Mary, indicating Tavia.

"Well, of course," began Tavia, "Dorothy and I were not to go near the water, but when we saw Edna turn up missing we just kicked off our slippers and, in the language of the poets, 'got busy.' I found Ned here, first shot, stuck in between the two corner boards of the chute posts.

She didn't need any coaxing to come up, once I untangled her skirt from a nail which held it fast, and I brought her up without any unnecessary explanations."

"And, in the meantime Miss Higley had gone down," interjected Dorothy.

"That is she went down after Edna first."

"And came up last," added the teacher, with a significant nod to Dorothy.

"How did you find Miss Higley, Parson?" Rose-Mary continued to question, with a view to getting the entire story.

"I found her in a mud hole, held fast, but able to help herself somewhat.

Then I-I got her up-somehow-."

"Indeed I was almost unconscious until you dragged my head up to the air," Miss Higley hastened to say, anxious to give Dorothy her due, for certainly the rescue was a matter of heroic effort, and Miss Higley, being heavy, and, at the same time, unable to help herself, gave Dorothy the most difficult of all the surprising tasks of that eventful afternoon.

"But when she sank that time-like a stone," suggested d.i.c.k to Dorothy.

"Oh, I merely missed catching hold of a plank and I had to go down-I couldn't keep up."