“We haven’t got a boat,” piped old Jan in his thin, wavering voice. “Nowt but a rope. Our Mestlebury fleet went out on the morning tide, there ain’t a boat nearer than Paston, and with such a sea it would take four hours to row round.”
“He’ll be drowned afoor then, poor chap, he will; for the tide is flowing in fast, and his boat won’t lift more than another foot!” cried Mrs. Saunders, who was weeping like the German.
Bertha turned sick and faint. If only, only she had gone the other way, instead of stumbling on a scene like this! Suddenly old Jan turned upon her with an almost fierce expression on his kindly old face. “You can swim, missie. Tak’ a roop oot to that poor chap yonder, and we will tow you back safe enough, boat and all.”
“Oh, I am afraid, I am afraid!” she cried, covering her face with her hands to shut out the sight of the grey, heaving sea, the little boat wedged in under the rocks, and the man who sat there waiting for death to take him, because he could not swim, and his boat was caught too fast for any effort of his to push it off.
“He will drown! Ah, what a cruel fate it is, and my three boys gone just the same! Dear Lord, when shall it be that the sea will give up its dead?” wailed Mrs. Saunders.
“Ach! Ach! And such a proper man too! Dear Gott in Heaven, don’t let him die before our eyes,” sobbed the German, sinking on his knees in the roadway with his hands clasped in supplication.
“I will run for Anne; she can swim, and she is so brave!” cried Bertha, whose breath was coming in lumpy gasps of excitement.
“No use at all; he would be drowned before school-marm could get here, if she ran every step of the way,” said old Jan hoarsely. “See, the boat bumped that time, and he got a nasty knock, poor chap! It is your chance, missie, and only yours; and it is a man’s life that is hanging on your hands, to save or to throw away.”
Bertha felt as if her brain would burst. A man’s life to hang on her feeble, incapable hands! And it was the wonder of it that roused her to prompt, decided action.
“Fetch the rope!” she said curtly, as she wrenched off her coat and stooped to the buttons of her boots.