The Protector Part 14

"It's Mopsy," he said. "The foothold doesn't look very safe among those stones, and there seems to be deep water below."

He called out in warning, but the girl did not heed. The willows were thinner at the spot she had reached, and, squeezing herself through them, she leaned down, clinging to an alder branch.

"He's gone to holt among the roots," she cried.

Three or four men came running along the opposite bank and apparently decided that she was right, for the horn was sounded and here and there a dog broke through the underbrush; then, just as the first-comers reached the rapid, there was a splash. It was a moment or two before Evelyn or Carroll, who had been watching the dogs, realised what had happened, and then the blood ebbed from the girl's face. Mabel had disappeared.

Running a few paces forward, Carroll saw what looked like a bundle of spread-out garments swing round in an eddy. It washed in among the willows, and he heard a faint cry.

"Somebody help me, quick; I've caught a branch."

He could not see the girl now, but an alder bough was bending sharply, and he flung a rapid glance around him. The summit of the rock he stood upon rose above the trees, and though he would have faced the risky fall had there been a better landing, it seemed impossible to alight among the stones without a broken leg. Further down-stream he might reach the water by a reckless jump, because the promontory sloped towards it there; but he would not be able to swim back against the current. His position was a painful one; it looked as if there was nothing that he could do.

Next moment men and dogs went scrambling and swimming down the rapid; but they were in hot pursuit of the otter, which had left its hiding-place, and it was evident that the girl had escaped their attention. Carroll shouted savagely as his comrade appeared among the tail of the hunt below. The others were too occupied to heed, or perhaps concluded that he was urging them on; but Vane, who was in the water, seemed to understand. In another few minutes he was swimming down the pool along the edge of the alders. Then Carroll saw that Evelyn expected him to take some part in the rescue.

"Get down before it's too late!" she cried.

Carroll spread out his hands, as if to beg her forbearance, and while every impulse urged him to the leap he endeavoured to keep his head.

"I can't do any good just now," he answered, knowing he was right and yet feeling horribly ashamed. "She's holding on, and Wallace will reach her in a moment or two."

Evelyn broke out on him in an agony of fear and anger. "You coward!" she cried. "Will you let her drown?"

She turned and ran forward, but Carroll, dreading that she meant to attempt the descent, seized her shoulder and held her fast. While he grappled with her, Vane's voice rose from below, and he let his hands drop.

"Wallace has her! There's no more danger," he said.

Evelyn suddenly recovered some degree of calm.

Standing, breathless, a pace or two apart, they saw Vane and the girl appear from beneath the willows and wash away down-stream. The man was swimming but he was hampered by his burden, and once he and Mabel sank almost from sight in a whirling eddy. Carroll said nothing, but he turned and ran along the sloping ridge, until where the fall was less and the trees were thinner he leaped out into the air. He broke through the alders amidst a rustle of bending boughs and disappeared; but a moment later his head rose out of the water close beside Vane, and the two men went down-stream with Mabel between them.

Evelyn scrambled wildly along the ridge, and when she reached the foot of it Vane was helping Mabel up the sloping bank of gravel. The girl's drenched garments clung about her, her wet hair was streaked across her face; but she seemed able to stand, and she was speaking in jerky gasps.

The hunt had swept on through shoaler water, but there was a cheer from the stragglers across the river. Evelyn clutched her sister, half laughing, half sobbing, and incoherently upbraided her. Mabel shook herself free, and her first remark was characteristic.

"Oh!" she said, "don't make a silly fuss." Then she tried to shake out her dripping skirt. "I'm only wet through, Wallace, take me home."

Vane picked her up, which was what she seemed to expect, and the others followed when he pushed through the underbush towards a neighbouring meadow. Evelyn, however, was still a little unnerved, and when they reached a gap in a wall she stopped, and leaning against the stones turned to Carroll.

"I think I'm more disturbed than Mopsy is," she said. "What I felt must be some excuse for me. I'm sorry for what I said; it was unjustifiable."

"Anyway, it was perfectly natural; but I must confess that I felt some temptation to make a fool of myself. I might have jumped into those alders, but it's most unlikely that I could have got out of them."

Evelyn looked at him with a faint respect. She had not troubled to point out that he had not flinched from the leap, when it seemed likely to be of service.

"How had you the sense to think of that?" she asked.

"I suppose it's a matter of practice," Carroll answered with amus.e.m.e.nt.

"One can't work among the ranges and rivers without learning to make the right decision rapidly. When you don't, you get badly hurt. The thing has to be cultivated, it's not instinctive."

Evelyn was struck by the explanation. This acquired coolness was a finer thing, and undoubtedly more useful than hot-headed gallantry, though she admired the latter.

"Wallace was splendid in the water," she broke out, uttering part of her thoughts aloud.

"I thought rather more of him in the city," Carroll replied. "That kind of thing was new to him, and I'm inclined to believe I'd have let the folks he had to negotiate with have the mine for a good deal less than what he eventually got for it. But I've said something about that before, and after all I'm not here to play Boswell."

The girl was surprised at the apt allusion; it was not what she would have expected from the man. Since she had not recovered her composure, she forgot what Vane had told her about him, and her comment was an incautious one. "How did you hear of him?"

Carroll parried this with a smile.

"Oh!" he said, "you don't suppose you can keep those old fellows to yourselves--they're international. But hadn't we better be getting on?

Let me help you through the gap."

They reached the Dene some time later, and Mabel, very much against her wishes, was sent to bed, while shortly afterwards Carroll came across Vane, who had changed his clothes, strolling up and down among the shrubberies.

"What are you doing here?" he asked.

Vane looked embarra.s.sed. "For one thing, I'm keeping out of Mrs.

Chisholm's way; she's inclined to be effusive. For another, I'm trying to decide what I ought to do. We'll have to pull out very shortly, and I had meant to have had an interview with Evelyn to-day. That's why I feel uncommonly annoyed with Mopsy for falling in."

Carroll made a grimace. "If that's how it strikes you, any advice I could offer would be wasted. A sensible man would consider it a promising opportunity."

"And trade upon it."

"Do you really want the girl?"

"That impression's firmly in my mind," said Vane, curtly.

"Then you had better pitch your quixotic notions overboard, and tell her so."

Vane made no answer, and Carroll, seeing that his comrade was not inclined to be communicative, left him.

CHAPTER XI

VANE WITHDRAWS.

Dusk was drawing on when Vane strolled along the terrace in front of the Dene.

He was preoccupied and eager, but fully aware of the need for coolness, because it was very possible that he might fail in the task he had in hand. By and by he saw Evelyn, whom he had been waiting for, cross the opposite end of the terrace, and moving forward he joined her at the entrance to a shrubbery walk. A big, clipped yew with a recess in which a seat had been placed stood close by.

"I've been sitting with Mopsy," said Evelyn. "She seems very little the worse for her adventure--thanks to you." She hesitated, and her voice grew softer. "I owe you a heavy debt--I am very fond of Mopsy."

"It's a great pity she fell in," Vane declared.

Evelyn looked at him with surprise. She scarcely thought he could regret the efforts he had made on her sister's behalf, but that was what his words implied.