Page:The Country-House Party.djvu/38

30 She admired the muscles that twisted in his arms, as he pulled the light boat upstream.

'We are safe,' she said, wondering at the stern lines that crept into his face. She looked back, and saw, in the place they had left, dogs and men running to and fro. She could hear the baying of the hounds as they tried to follow along the wooded bank, and were entangled or engulfed in little natural chasms. As she looked it seemed to her hot eyes as if the men had flung themselves into the water, for the crowd came swarming out into the river like water-spiders, and began to speed after them.

The man smiled at her bewilderment. 'They have little canoes, and are following. They mean to have me!'

She cried out in her helpless rage, 'They shall not! they shall not!' And all the time with every backward glance she beheld the canoes coming nearer, and yet more near.

'Oh, speed more quickly!' she cried, and seeing the mottled arms and dripping brow of the rower, knew how useless it was to ask more of him.

'I shall fling myself into the river and let you