Wood County reporter. [volume] (Grand Rapids [i.e. Wisconsin Rapids], Wis.) 1857-1923, 1916-11-02

'You all rignt?"
She replied with as much difficulty:
"1es you may let
90 ;"
To relax the swollen fingers that
grasped the lifeline was pure torture.
He attempted no further communion
non. None, indeed, was neeued. II
was plain that she understood their
situation
Some minutes passed before he be-
came aware that they were closing in
quickly TO the shelving beach. He
glanced over his shoulder. They were
on the line Of breakers Behind them
heavy comber was surgfng in, crested
with snow, its concave belly resembling
vast sheet of emerald. In another
moment it would be upon them. 1t
was the moment a seasoned swimmer
would seize.
His eye sought the girls. In hers he
read understanding and assent. OF one
mind, they struck out with all their
strength. The comber overlook them,
clasped them to its bosom, tossed them
high upon its great CLASSY shoulder.
They fought madly to retain that place,
and to such purpose that they rode it
over dozen yards before it crashed
upon the beach, annihilating itself in
furious welter of Dreaming waters.
Whitaker felt land beneath his feet.
The rest was like the crisis of a
nightmare drawn out to the limit of
human endurance. The undertow tore
at Whitaker's legs as with a hundred
murderous hands. He came out of 1t
eventually to find himself we'll up on
the beach leaning against the careened
hulk of a dismantled catbOat with a
gaping rent in It's side. At little dis
lance the woman was sitting in the
sands, bosom and shoulders heaving
convulsively, damp, matted hair yelling
her like curtain of sunlit seaweed.
He moved with painful effort toward
her. She turned up to him her pitiful,
Writhen face, white as parchment.
"Are you-hurt?" he managed to ask.
81 mean-injured?
She moved her head from side to
side, as if she could not speak for pant
ing.
"I'm-glad," he said DULY. "You
stay-here I'll go get help"
He raised his eyes, peering inland.
Back of the beach the land rose in
long, sweeping hillocks treeless but
green. His curiously befogged vision
made out a number of shapes that re-
sembled dwellings.
Go get help ~
he repeated thickly.
He started off with brave, stagger.
ing rush that carried him a dozen feet
| inland. Then his knees turned to wa
| ter, and the blackness of night shut
down upon his senses.
When Whitaker awoke the afternoon
was clOudy-Warm and bright, so that
his eyes were grateful for the shade of
q white parasol that a girl was holding
over him. He grew suspicious of his
| senses; and when the parasol was
! transformed into the shape of a wom-
| an wearing a clumsy jacket of soiled
! covert cloth over a nOndescript gar
ment of weirdly printed calico-then
he was sure that something was wrong
| with him.
Besides, the woman suddenly turned
and bent over him an anxious face, ex.
| claiming in accents of CONSERVATION
80 dear! If he's deirious-!"
His voice, when he strove to answer
rustled and ratified so that he barely
managed to say: "What nonsense! Tn
| just thirstyw
II thought you would be-" said the
woman, calmly; $50 1 brought water
| Here :"
She offered a tin vessel to his lips
| He sat up suddenly, seized the vessel
| and buried his face in it, gradually tilt
ing it, while it's cool, delicious sweet
| ness irrigated his arid tissues, until
every blessed drop was drained. Then,
and not till then, he lowered the pail
| and with sane vision began to renew
acquaintance with the world.
He was sitting in the lee Of the
beached catboat. The woman he had
rescued sat quite near him. The gale
was still booming overhead, but now
with less force Tor so he fancied)
| and the surf still crashed in thunders
| on the beach a hundred feet or more
| away; but the haze was lighter, and
| the blue of the sky was visible, if tar
-;5htcs
The sands curved off in a wide cres-
cent, ending in a long, sandy spit.
There was low, ragged earth bank
rising from the sands. Midway be-
tween the beach and where the hazy
uplands lifted their blurred profile
against the faded sky, stood a COM
monplace farmhouse, in good repair,
strongly constructed and neatly paint
ed; with a brood of out buildings.
Here and there, in scattered groups
and singly, sheep foraged.
With puzzled eyes Whitaker sought
counsel and enlightenment of the wom-
an, and found in her appearance quite
as much to confound anticipation and
deepen perplexity. What she had
worn the night before he could not
say; but it certainly could have had
nothing in common with the worn,
stained, misshapen jacket covering her
shoulders, beneath it the calico wrap
per scant and crude beyond belief, I'D
on her feet the rusty wrecks that once
had been shoes.