A College Girl Part 31

The three girls had breakfast in bed the next morning, somewhere about twelve o'clock--a delightful occasion when all three talked at the same time, relating thrilling experiences of the night before, comparing notes, admiring, quizzing, shaking with laughter over a dozen innocent drolleries. These after-conferences are perhaps the best part of the festivities of our youth; and Noreen, Ida, and Darsie began that fine June day as gaily, as happily, as unconscious of coming ill as any three girls in the land.

Ralph had been anxious that his people should again lunch in his rooms, but Mrs Percival had prudently decided in favour of a simple meal at home, and it was approaching tea-time when the party sallied forth to witness the day's "b.u.mping" on the river. The elders were frankly tired after their late hours, but the three girls looked fresh as flowers in their dainty white frocks, and enjoyed to the full the kaleidoscopic beauty of the scene.

The two Percivals' interest in the b.u.mping was of the slightest description--Ralph was not taking part this afternoon, and with Ralph began and ended their concern. They stood on the crowded bank, rather hot, rather bored, amusing themselves by scanning the people near at hand. The Vernon party were but a few yards away, and Hannah attracted special attention.

"She _is_ plain!" exclaimed Noreen; whereat Darsie snapped her up in double-quick time.

"Of _course_ she is plain! She wouldn't dream, of being anything else!"

Beloved plain Hannah! No features, however cla.s.sic, could be as eloquent as hers in her old friend's eyes. Darsie tossed her head, and looked fl.u.s.ty and annoyed, whereat Noreen feebly apologised, emphasising her offence by blundering explanations, and Ralph grew restless and impatient.

"I say! This is getting slow. Come along, girls; let's take the ferry and cross to the other side. It's not half bad fun to see all the shows. It will be a change, anyhow, and you can come back when you're tired."

"I'll stay with mother," Noreen decided dutifully. Ida surveyed the crowd on the opposite bank with the dubious air of one who has lived all her life within her own gates. "I don't _think_ I care to go into that crush."

"Oh, come along, Darsie. Thank goodness you're not so squeamish. Let's get out of this." Ralph pushed impatiently forward, and Mrs Percival turned to Darsie, with raised eyebrows, and said urgently--

"Do go, dear! Ralph will take care of you. We will wait for you here."

Darsie smiled a.s.sent, the thought pa.s.sing lightly through her mind that Mrs Percival looked particularly sweet and gracious when she smiled.

She never dreamt that that particular smile, that little glance of appeal, were to remain with her all heir life, to be her comfort in a bitter grief.

They pa.s.sed the spot where Hannah and Dan were standing with their friends, and acting on a sudden impulse, Darsie turned her head, with a few laughing words of explanation: "We're going to look at the Punch and Judies!"

There was no definite response, but Hannah's exclamation had an envious tone which made Ralph quicken his footsteps. It was rare good luck to get Darsie to himself for an hour; he certainly did not wish to be saddled with plain Hannah as an unwelcome third.

The ferry-boat was on the point of starting, its flat surfaces crowded with pleasure-seekers. Ralph and Darsie had to run the last few yards in order to secure a bare s.p.a.ce for standing. Ralph took the outside with the nonchalance of the true boating-man, who would almost as soon fall in the water as not. Darsie, standing close by his side, glanced from one to the other of her companions, her never-failing interest in _people_ discovering a story in each new group.

They had reached the middle of the stream, when a movement of the deck upset her balance, and sent her swaying against Ralph's arm. She looked up with a laughing apology, and was startled by the sight of his face.

So far was he from sharing her amus.e.m.e.nt, that never in the course of their acquaintance had she seen him so pale, so set. He seized the hand she had laid on his arm, and held it in a vice-like grip, as he bent to look at the deck. At that moment Darsie stumbled afresh, and felt the lapping of water against her thinly clad feet. She exclaimed loudly, but her voice was drowned in the chorus of cries, questions, and appeals which arose from every side.

How swiftly, with what incredible, paralysing speed a scene may change, and seeming security give way to panic fear! Darsie, turning her head to look at the crowd of faces which towered so strangely above her, met but one expression in every eye--breathless, agonising dread.

Looking back upon the scene in after-life, it seemed the nightmare of a moment; then the grip upon her arm tightened, she felt herself being pushed past Ralph towards the edge of the boat, heard his voice speaking to her in crisp, firm tones which she had heard in dreams, but never, never from his living lips.

"Darsie! She's turning turtle! There's no danger, darling, if you jump clear. The water's not deep. Some one will come. I'm going to throw you in. Strike out for your life!"

She was lifted like a doll in his strong arms; her wild eyes, searching his, met a cheery smile in response, she felt herself swayed to and fro, realised with a shudder the parting from the firm grasp--fell, splashed, felt the water close over her head.

When she rose to the surface the water near her seemed full of struggling forms; she caught a terrified glimpse of a perpendicular deck, of pa.s.sengers falling like flies from their perch, and with the instinct of despair struck out in the opposite direction.

Like most Newnham girls, she was a fair swimmer--happy hours spent in the swimming-tent had ensured so much; but it was her first experience of fighting the water in all the crippling fineries of race-week attire.

Her shoes, her skirts, the floating ends of sash and scarf all held her down; her soaking hat flopped over her eyes, her very gloves seemed to lessen the force of her stroke; but breathless and spent as she was, she could not pause while from behind arose that dread, continued cry.

Ralph had told her to strike out, that there was no danger if only she kept clear.

"All right, Darsie--all right! Keep calm--keep calm! I'm coming! I've got you! Leave yourself to me."

It was Dan's voice speaking in her ear, clear and distinct in the midst of the clamour; she felt herself seized in scientific fas.h.i.+on--in the way at which she herself had played at rescuing her companions from imaginary death--and, relinquis.h.i.+ng all effort, was towed numbly to the sh.o.r.e.

It seemed as if hundreds of people were waiting to rescue her; hundreds of arms stretched out in welcome; hundreds of eyes grew suddenly moist with tears. She was tired, and wet, and dazed, but she could stand on her own feet, had no need of helping arms. Dan took her hand in his and ran swiftly across the gra.s.s to the nearest tent, where already preparations were in train for the restoration of the unfortunates.

Darsie was the first of the crew to reach this shelter, and Mrs Percival and the girls awaited her tearfully on the threshold. She awoke to fuller consciousness at sight of their faces, smiled in rea.s.surement, and murmured disjointed phrases.

"Quite all right--only wet! Ralph saved me! A second time! So calm and brave!"

"Yes, dear child; yes! Take off that wet hat!" replied Mrs Percival urgently, the girl's praise of her son adding to her tender solicitude, and she hovered around with tender touches, the while from around rose a ceaseless string of suggestions.

"Brandy! Hot tea!" "She ought to change at once!" "My house is just at hand--do come to my house!" "My motor is waiting outside! Let me drive you home!"

So on, and so on, innate kindliness of heart bubbling to the surface as it invariably does in moments of disaster. As each unfortunate entered the tent the same programme was enacted, the same kind offices volunteered. "My house is close at hand--do come to my house!"

"My motor is waiting--do let me drive you back!" Each victim of the immersion wore at first the same dazed, helpless expression, but the presence of their companions, the kindly voices speaking in their ear, the hot, reviving draughts soon brought about a change of mood, so that they began to smile, to exchange remarks, to congratulate themselves on escape. Darsie, with characteristic elasticity, was one of the first to regain composure, and the Percivals hung delightedly on her description of Ralph's composure and resource.

"I was terrified. It was a dreadful sensation to feel the deck sinking beneath your feet on one side, and to see it gradually rising above you on the other. And all the bewildered, terrified faces! Ralph never turned a hair. He told me that there was no danger so long as I kept clear of the boat; he lifted me up in his arms as if I had been a doll."

The colour mounted to Darsie's white cheeks as she spoke, and a thrill of emotion tingled her blood. The first time she hears herself addressed as "darling" in a man's deep voice is one that a girl cannot lightly forget. She turned her head over her shoulder so as to be able to see the entrance into the tent.

"Where _is_ Ralph?"

"He will be here presently. None of the men have come in yet. Ralph will be so useful. He is as much at home in the water as on land. He will be busy helping the others."

Mrs Percival spoke with happy a.s.surance; nevertheless, she left Darsie's side and edged her way through the crowd towards the open doorway, through which she ought now to be able to see her son's return.

As she was within a few yards of the entrance it was suddenly blocked by a group of men--hatless, dripping, dishevelled, but in demeanour composed and cheery, as if what had happened had been quite an enjoyable experience.

The foremost of the group greeted their friends with smiles and waving of hands.

"Hullo! Hullo! Here we are! How are you feeling? All serene now?

Every one comfortably on sh.o.r.e? Got any tea left?"

"Is my son with you? Have you seen my son--Ralph Percival?"

Mrs Percival spoke in a high, clear voice, at the sound of which a young undergrad. wheeled round quickly towards his companions.

"By Jove--yes! He was on board. I thought we were all here. Where's Percival?"

He dashed out of the tent, stood looking blankly around, turned a blanched face towards the tent.

Then from an inner corner of the tent another voice questioned sharply: "Mary! Where's Mary--Mary Everard? She was with us--standing quite near. _Mary's not here_!"

No one answered. There was a breathless silence, while each man and woman in that crowded tent was subtly, overpoweringly conscious of a new presence filling the atmosphere around--the presence of _Fear_! Heavy as a palpable presence it pressed upon them; it lapped them round; the fumes of it mounted to their brains.

Months before, Darsie had listened while a woman who had been near San Francisco at the time of the earthquake and fire endeavoured to describe what was in truth indescribable, how the very air itself was at that time charged with a poignancy of agony--an impalpable spiritual agony, apart from such physical cause as heat and fire, an agony which arose from the grief of thousands of tortured hearts.

She had listened--interested, curious, pleased to nestle in her easy- chair, and ponder over a novel thought; but at this terrible moment she had no need to ponder; realisation came sharp and sure. Tragedy was in the air; she inhaled it with every breath, tasted it, felt its heavy hand.

With one accord the occupants of the tent streamed across the lawns towards the waterside, where even now an informal inquiry was taking place. The officials in charge of the ferry-boat were defending themselves against their accusers. Overcrowded? The ferry-boat had been as crowded on two previous days, and all had gone well. It was impossible to account for the accident. Since no further harm than a few minutes' ducking had happened to the pa.s.sengers, the greater loss was on their own side.

To these officials, protesting, excusing, arrived in a ma.s.s a body of white-faced men and women, demanding with one voice their lost--a young man, an undergraduate; tall, fair, in a white flannel suit; last seen standing on the side of the boat helping to lower the women into the water; a young girl, in a boating-dress of blue and white. They were not among the rescued. They had not been seen since the moment of the accident.