dark tresses falling loose about her, dashed here and there with a speck of white foam from the boiling waves that broke on the rocks around, her delicate white fingers interlaced in the rope by which she held, thrilled him as he gazed up at her, with a strange magical charm. He had come to save a woman, it was true, but it was such a woman as the rough uncultured beings among whom his life had been spent had made more familiar to him than any finer or more delicate type of womanhood, and could this fair vision be nothing more? No syren just risen from the wave ever seemed lovelier to the dazzled eyes of wandering seamen than the beautiful girl he now gazed at seemed to Keefe Dillon. Ferdinand could not have felt more wonder and admiration when his eyes first encountered Miranda. But he quickly recovered his self-possession; this was no time for fancy or fooling, but an emergency which required the firmest nerves and promptest energies. He had seen as he neared the wreck that its frame was rapidly opening, and he knew it could not hold together much longer.
“Is there any one else but you?” he asked. At first Helen could not answer, her lips moved, but they uttered no sound. Unable to endure the tortures of uncertainty, she had steeled her nerves to watch the progress of the skiff she had seen leave the shore, and though she dreaded every moment to see it go down, she continued to gaze as if spell-bound, till it reached the wreck; and now the certainty that she might really hope again, agitated her so much that it almost deprived her of breath and sense. But at last words came:
“My father! But he cannot move without help.”
“Mind yourself, Con, till I get on board,” said Keefe. “There, now, all’s right.”
Following Helen to the spot where her father lay perfectly passive, and almost insensible, Keefe tried to rouse him.
The young stranger’s clear and manly voice, his air of courage and determination, and the look of hope and animation that had returned to Helen’s eyes, partially revived Mr. Lennox, and Keefe managed to get him safely into the skiff with less trouble than he had expected. Then he helped Helen to descend.
“Make haste, Mr. Dillon,” cried Con; “there won’t be a bit of the wreck together in another minute.”
Helen looked up for Keefe in an agony of terror, but it quickly passed as she saw him spring into his place, seize his oars, and bring the boat round. In a minute they were flying over the waves with greater speed than even before, for the wind and sea were now in their favour, and there was not nearly so much difficulty in keeping the skiff from falling broadside to the waves. “If we take in water you must bale,” said Keefe to Helen, pointing to a tin dipper beside her.
She nodded promptly, but so skilfully did he and Con manage the boat that they scarcely shipped a cupfull ere they reached the shore amidst the cheers of the crowd assembled to greet them, and the answering hurrahs of Con. Then Keefe looked back for the schooner, but she was gone; they had scarcely left her side when she parted asunder and disappeared among the breakers. Helen’s glance had followed Keefe’s, and as she saw by how short a space she and her father had escaped death, she shuddered. Then she looked at Keefe.
“Thank God,” she said, “and you!”
Never while he lived did Keefe forget that look.
But Helen’s joy was saddened by anxiety on her father’s account. He lay at the bottom of the skiff, his head resting on her lap, unconscious that their perils were over, insensible to his daughter’s tender care, and scarcely giving any sign of life, except the breath he feebly drew.
“Father! dear father!” said Helen, “we are safe. Father! don’t you know me? Speak to Helen!” But he remained silent and motionless.
“He does not hear me—he does not know me!” she exclaimed in great alarm.
“He’s only tired and worn out,” said Keefe, gently. “When he gets warmth and sleep he’ll soon come round.”
Foremost of all the crowd to welcome them was Con’s mother, laughing, crying, and praying in her ecstacy of joy.
“Sure I knew he’d come back safe!” she cried. “I trusted in God’s goodness and in your strong arm, Mr. Dillon, the brave, generous man that you are!”
“It was good luck more than good management brought them back, Mrs. Doyle,” said a well dressed, consequential-looking man in a very supercilious tone of voice.
“Good luck!” cried the woman, scornfully; “let me see the man who says he could do the like with all the luck was ever given to cowards, and I’ll know what to call him.”
“It has been a madman’s deed,” said the supercilious gentleman, “and Dillon has had a madman’s protection.”
“Fortune always favours the brave, Mr. Nibbs,” said Keefe, gaily. “Now, some of you, help me to place this sick stranger under the shade of those cedars, till we get some way of carrying him to my house.”
“But why didn’t you wait for me, Keefe?”
“Why didn’t you send for me?”
“And for me?”
“And for me?” Cried three or four young men who had not come down to the beach till Keefe and Con had put off for the wreck.
“If I had, I might as well have stayed away,” said Keefe; “there were not many seconds to lose. Why did you dance so late last night, and sleep so long this morning? Con, if you have done kissing your mother, run and tell Mrs. Wendell to have a bed ready. Davis, let us get a door from that old shanty, and when we put some coats on it, it will carry the sick man comfortably.”
Meanwhile, Helen sat beside her father, supporting his head, and the women gathered round her, partly from pity and sympathy—partly from curiosity; all pouring forth such condolences as they thought the case required, and asking such
