All the while they were sliding down an invisible hill, swiftly, smoothly. A narrow ribbon of open water lay below them, and Hildegarde imagined Potter to be heading for it as a place of landing.
“Why,” she exclaimed, “there’s a house!”
Potter did not turn his head; he was busy now with the ’plane.
“There are a few scattered in the bay—squatters and summer folks. Muskrat trappers and French fishermen.... Mighty lonesome, I’d say.”
A puff of wind caused the ’plane to swerve and rock. Hildegarde saw Potter suddenly in feverish action. They were swerving away from the ribbon of water, which was now close below, veering toward the island upon which she had been astonished to see a house.... The ’plane would not obey. It swept on and down.... Almost in a winking of the eye the solid land was before them ... a tree.... Hildegarde felt a wrench, a shock, heard a crash, and saw the planes at their right side crumple and shatter as they were sheared off in collision with the willow-tree.... The crippled ’plane careened sickeningly—and there was a frightful shock....
Potter, half blind, dizzy, suffering agonies, crept out of the wreckage. One leg dragged helplessly. There was a wrenching pain inside. Dumbly he looked for Hildegarde. She lay at a little distance—without movement. She was stretched at full length, her face pillowed on her arm as if she had lain down on the grass for a nap. Peacefully, gracefully she lay—but very still. Potter dragged himself toward her, reached her. Then he was conscious that a man was running to them, was stooping over them. He looked up into the man’s face. It was very confusing. He seemed to know the man, yet it was impossible the man should be there....
“How do you do, Cantor?” he said. “Did you—bring—your letters?...”
Then his arms failed him and he slumped downward, his face resting on Hildegarde’s knees.
The man Potter had called Cantor turned the young man over gently, wiped the blood from his face with his handkerchief, and grunted. He opened Potter’s clothing and laid an ear to his breast. The heart was beating feebly.... Hasty examination showed him Hildegarde was alive, too.
“Start the boat,” he called over his shoulder. “Be quick about it.” He lifted Hildegarde and carried her past the house to a tiny dock and handed her aboard a narrow, cabined motor-boat. “Two of you get the man,” he said.