I was now only a few feet from the rock whose very touch meant safety to me—but it was just beyond my reach! I was sinking to my doom!—I could see the horror in Norah's eyes, as she gained the rock and struggled to her feet.
But even Norah's love could not help me—I was beyond the reach of her arms, and she no more than I could keep a foothold on the liquifying earth. Oh! that she had a rope and I might be saved! Alas! she had none—even the shawl that might have aided me had fallen off in her struggle with Murdock.
But Norah had, with her woman's quick instinct, seen a way to help me. In an instant she had had torn off her red petticoat of heavy homespun cloth and thrown one end to me. I clutched and caught it with a despairing grasp—for by this time only my head and hands remained above the surface.
"Now, O God! for strength!" was the earnest prayer of her heart; and my thought was:—
"Now, for the strong hands that that other had despised!"
Norah threw herself backward with her feet against a projecting piece of the rock, and I felt that if we could both hold out long enough I was saved.
Little by little I gained! I drew closer and closer to the rock! Closer! closer still! till with one hand I grasped the rock itself, and hung on, breathless, in blind desperation. I was only just able to support myself, for there was a strange dragging power in the viscous mass
