"Help, Tina, help! I've hurt my leg. I can't swim!"
To the little girl's horror, she saw him swept down by the current. In an instant she was off her pony and running along the bank. It seemed as if quick sight was given to her. She saw a shallow part of the river a little distance off, with a large rock in the middle of it. It flashed across her that if she could get there first, she could catch hold of Dawn as he came past.
No fear now was in her heart, Dawn and only Dawn filled her thoughts. She ran as she had never run before; she dashed into the water and reached the rock, and an instant after had clutched hold of Dawn by his long hair as he was being whirled along.
He was not unconscious, and struggled up to the rock, but when he was safely there fainted away.
Then Christina called for help, and in a few minutes the village boys reached them and assisted them across to the bank.
But Dawn lay still and white, and Puggy cried out frantically: "He's drowned! He's dead!"
A farmer driving by saw that an accident had happened, and came up to the children. He whipped out a flask from his pocket, and made Dawn swallow some of it.
"Bless your hearts!" he cried cheerfully. "He's all right. 'Tis only a bit o' faint. I knows the young gent and I'll drive him straight home. Any more hurt?"
His eye fell on Christina. She was wet up to her waist, and, now the danger was past, was shivering with fright and cold.
"I think you'd best come along too!" he said, and he lifted her into his cart.