"It is Best so, Amy, Dear."
And all through that dreadful night raged one of the most terrible and disastrous typhoons that had visited Japan for many years. Mrs. Nugent and Lord Martinworth, not returning to their respective domiciles, an immediate search was instituted, but as the darkness deepened the wind and rain increased in fury. It was a sheer impossibility to stand up against the raging gale, and eventually the hopeless search had to be temporarily abandoned. In that one night the lake rose six feet, huge landslips descended from Nantai-san, and bridges and roads and dwellings were washed away and demolished, as if mere sheets of paper.
As dawn approached the torrents ceased, and the wind abated.
At length the sun rose in full glory, casting in brilliant irony its penetrating rays over this grievous scene of waste and desolation. And mingling with the foliage of a great tree blown across the still raging stream the auburn tint of Pearl Nugent's hair shone like red gold among the green.
On the upsetting of the boat she had been borne down the torrent. A few seconds more and she would have been dashed over the rocks, hundreds of feet high, which form the cascade. But some hours before, during the fury of the storm, a giant pine tree had fallen with a deafening crash half across the stream. It was that tree that saved Pearl from a watery grave, for wedged, as in a vice, between a fork of its branches, her bruised, unconscious form was ultimately discovered. Her head and shoulders were out of the water, and the rushing stream, instead of loosening, had apparently been the means of entangling only more securely the rent and dripping garments to the branches of the tree. From the bank could be seen her head, with its ashen face and closed eyes, thrown back and pillowed, as it were, upon a wealth of green foliage, while the torrent tore around her with raging fury, in its onward relentless course battering and bruising the delicate limbs.
It was at considerable risk to their own lives that Ralph and Count Carlitti, and other brave men with them, crept cautiously and with the greatest difficulty along the trunk of the tree, over the greater part of which the water was still rushing. By dint of clinging with all their strength to the upstanding branches they at last succeeded after many vain attempts and countless perils, in reaching the tossed, unconscious form.
Count Carlitti clung on to Ralph with all his force, while the latter laid himself down flat on the trunk, and set about cutting away, as best he could, the remnants of Pearl's clothing from the branches. After a wearisome, and what appeared an endless time, this difficult task was at length successfully accomplished, enabling them to drag the inanimate body gently and tenderly along the trunk of the tree, finally rescuing it from the watery bed in which it had been helplessly tossed by the stormy elements for so many hours.
As Ralph bent his head, resting it on her breast, his face brightened somewhat.
"Her heart beats," he murmured. "Thank God she still lives."
Between them they bore her home, and laid her with loving care on the little bed from which Pearl Nugent was fated never to rise again, for human skill was unavailing.