Rock Island Argus. (Rock Island, Ill.) 1893-1920, 1912-01-26

lance against "nAcn ne STRUGGLED In
vain. he added the assurance that
whatever his message he would be
unwelcome on account Of what had
gone before; he could not force him.
self to go to her OF even to call to
her, not yet. He would keep her un-
der surveillance, however, and If the
worst came he could intervene in time
to rescue her. He counted without
his cost, his usual Judgment bewil-
dered. So he followed her through
the trees and down the bank.
Now he was so engrossed in her
and SO agitated that his caution slept,
his experience was forgotten. The
storm in his own breast was so great
that it overshadowed the storm brew
ing above. Her way was easier than
his and he had fallen some distance
behind when suddenly there rushed
upon him the fact that frightful and
unlocked for cloudburst was about to
occur above their heads. A lightning
fash and a thunder clap at last ar.
rested his attention. Then, but not
until then, he flung everything to the
winds and amid the sullen and almost
continuous peals Of thunder he sent
cry after cry toward her which were
lost in the tremendous diapason of
sound that echoed and re-echoed
through the riffs Of the mountains.
Wait" he cried again and again.
Come up higher. Get out Of the
canon. You'll be drowned"
But he had waited too long. The
storm had developed too rapidly; she
was too far ahead of and beneath him.
She heard nothing but the sound Of a
voice, shrill, menacing, fraught with
terror for her, not a word distinguish
able; scarcely to her disturbed soul
even a human voice, 1t seemed like
the wierd cry Of some wild spirit Of
the storm. It sounded to her over
wrought nerves SO utterly inhuman
that she only ran the faster.
The canon swerved and then dou-
bled back, but he knew its direction.
Losing sight Of her for the moment he
plunged straight ahead through the
trees, cutting of the bend, leaping
with superhuman agility and strength
over rocks and logs until he reached
a point where the rift narrowed be-
tween two walls and ran deeply. There
and then the heavens opened and the
floods came and beat into the open
NAV Of that vast crevice and filed 1t
in an instant.
AS the deluge came roaring down,
bearing onward the sweepings and
scourings of the mountains, he caught
a glimpse of her white desperate face
rising, falling, now disappearing, now
coming into view again, in the foamy
! midst of the torrent. He ran to the
cliff bank and throwing aside his gun
/ he scrambled down the wall to a GER
tain shelf Of the rock over which the
rising water broke thinly. Ordinarily
ic was twenty feet above the creek
bed. Bracing himself against jagged
projection he waited praying. The
canon was here so narrow that he
could have leaped to the other side
and yet it was too narrow for him to
/ reach her If the water did not sweep
/ her toward his feet It was all done in
/ a second. Fortunately a projection on
/ the other side threw the force of the
1 torrent toward him and with it came
/ the woman.
She was almost spent. She had
| been struck by log upheaved by
/ some mighty wave, her hands were
/ moving feebly, her eyes were closed
| she was drowning, dying, but indomit
| ably battling on. He stopped down
/ and. as surge lifted her, he threw
/ his arm around her waist and then he
/ braced himself against the rock tc
/ sustain the full thrust of the mighty
food. AS he seized her she gave way
! suddenly, as If after having done al
! that she could there was now nothing
left but to trust herself to his hand
and Gods. She hung a dead weight
on his arm in the ravening watel
which dragged and tore at her madly
He was a man of giant strength
but the struggle babe fair to be too
much even for him. 1t seemed as 4
the mountain behind him was giving
way. He set his teeth, he tried des
/ perately to hold on, he thrust out hi!
! right hand. holding her with the 9th
er one, and clawed at the dripping
rock in vain. In a moment the tor
rent mastered him and when 1t did 81
it seized him with fury and threw hin
like a stone from sling into tn.
seething vortex of the mid-stream
But in all this he did not, or would
not, release her.
Such was the swiftness Of the mo
ton with which they were swep
downward that he had little nesd Il
swim, his only effort was to keep hi!
head above water and to keep from
being dashed against the logs tina
tumbled end over end or whirlet
sideways, or were damned into clus
tiers only to burst out on every hand
He struggled furiously to keep him
self from being overwhelmed in tn,
seething madness, and what wa
harder, to keep the lifeless woman il
his arms from being stricken o
wrenched away. He knew that below
the narrows where the canon widene,
the water would subside, the awful
fury of the rain would presently cease
If he could steer clear of the rocks Il
the broad he might win to land wit
her.
The chances against him were thou
sands to nothing. But what ar
; chances in tha aves of Godf Tho m q,