To seize the oars so imprudently abandoned by Frederick and row with desperate energy to the spot where the young man had just disappeared was David's first movement; at the end of two minutes of inexpressible anguish, he saw Frederick rise above the gulf, swimming vigorously with one hand, and dragging a body after him.
With a few strokes of the oar, David joined his pupil.
The latter, seizing the prow of the little boat with the hand with which he had been swimming, sustained with the other hand, above the water, Raoul de Pont Brillant, pale, inanimate, and his face covered with blood.
The marquis, struck on the head by a piece of the wreck which came near sinking the yawl, had been, by the same violent blow, thrown into the water, while the frightened oarsmen were occupied in relieving the craft from the timber which encumbered it. The canoe had hardly recovered her equilibrium, when the coxswain, seeing that his master had disappeared, looked around the craft in consternation, and at last discovered the marquis as he was held by the rescuing hand of Frederick.
The six oarsmen soon gained the spot where the little boat lay, and took on board Raoul de Pont Brillant, who had fainted.
Frederick, with David's assistance, came out of the water, and entered the little boat, when the oarsmen from the castle cried out to him in terror:
"Take care! a float of wood!"
In fact, the floating mass, coming rapidly behind the little boat, had not been seen by David, who was entirely occupied with Frederick.