He
reached the edge of the precipice and looked down. Below him was
the canoe and Jeanne. She was fighting futilely against the
resistless flood; he saw her paddle wrenched suddenly from her
hands, and as it went swirling beyond her reach she cried out his
name again. Philip shouted, and the girl's white face was turned
up to him. Fifty yards ahead of her were the first of the rocks.
In another minute, even less, Jeanne would be dashed to pieces
before his eyes. Thoughts, swifter than light, flashed through his
mind. He could do nothing for her, for it seemed impossible that
any living creature could exist amid the maelstroms and rocks
ahead. And yet she was calling to him. She was reaching up her
arms to him. She had faith in him, even in the face of death.
"Philip! Philip!"
There was no M'SIEUR to that cry now, only a moaning, sobbing
prayer filled with his name.
"I'm coming, Jeanne!" he shouted. "I'm coming! Hold fast to the
canoe!"
He ran ahead, stripping off his coat. A little below the first
rocks a stunted banskian grew out of an earthy fissure in the
cliff, with its lower branches dipping within a dozen feet of the
stream. He climbed out on this with the quickness of a squirrel,
and hung to a limb with both hands, ready to drop alongside the
canoe.
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