nearer. Surely the horse, or pony, as Harry now saw it to be, was running away. The boy who had never been a coward except about "sea things," tumbled down the steep grassy slope in no time, and stood in the middle of the road eager to see what he could do. The flying vehicle was near enough now for him to see that it was the pony-carriage of two girls, a little older than Dora, whose home was one of the pretty houses a little way from Seacliff. He had often seen them drive down in it to the shore to bathe.[Pg 71] [Pg 71] But what a queer figure was driving now. The pony was not running away, on the contrary, it seemed as if it could not run fast enough to please the driver; a girl with hair streaming, dressed only in a blue flannel bathing gown, streaming too, who stood upright in the carriage, lashing the poor pony as if she were mad, while from time to time she screamed, in a shrill and yet choking voice, "Help, help—for God's sake, help!" "What is it?" screamed Harry too, as she passed. She would not stop, but she threw back some words on the wind. "My sister—Alice—drowning. Going to the village to fetch some one—can swim." And then again came the terrible cry, as if she hardly knew what she was saying, "Help, help!" "Oh," thought Harry, "if she could have stopped and taken me back, we'd have been at the shore in a moment. I can swim. I can swim." And he could run too. It was not so very far from the bathing-place. How he got there Harry never could tell. On he rushed, tearing off his clothes as he went. Off flew hat, jacket, collar and shirt, till there was nothing but trousers and tennis-shoes to pitch away, as in his little clinging woven drawers only, brave Harry flung himself, fearless and dauntless, into the sea, and struck out for the round dark object, poor Alice's head, which it had taken but an instant to point out to him. "I can swim! I can swim!" were the magic words with which he was able at once to push off the friendly hands that would have drawn him back, whose owners now stood watching him with flushed faces and tearful eyes, murmuring many a fervent prayer for his success, or saying aloud with clasped hands, "The brave boy, the splendid little fellow! It is her only chance!"[Pg 72] [Pg 72] It was her only chance. Long before poor Lilian, for all her headlong