To my barred windows, and to bend
Once more, upon the mountains high,
The quiet of a loving eye.”
He wrote in the dimming luster of a perfect day. Below him rippled the long lake churning an inarticulate melody, and a tiny island with trees upon it rested the eye. As he gazed, beyond the dazzling beryl foliage, set in the sunset, a spot rivetted his look. A moment before the white sail of a boat had glanced there; now a confused flat blur lay on the water.
Gordon thrust his commonplace-book into his pocket and leaned forward, shading his eyes from the glow. The blot resolved itself into a capsized hull and two black figures struggling in the water, one with difficulty supporting the other.
The next moment he was dashing down the bank, hallooing for Fletcher, peeling off coat and waistcoat as he went.
“There’s a boat swamped,” he shouted, as the valet came through the garden. “Where is the skiff?”
“Miss Clermont has it, my lord.”
Gordon plunged in, while Fletcher ran to summon the Shelleys. They came hurrying along the vineyard lane with frightened faces, Mary to watch from the high bank, and Shelley, who could no more swim than Fletcher, to stride up and down, his long hair streaming in the wind. The excitement brought a picturesque dozen of goitred vine-dressers from the hillside, who looked on with exclamations.
All were gazing fixedly on the lake, or they might have seen two men enter the grounds from the upper road. Of these, one was a Swiss with a severe, thin face and ascetic brow, the syndic of Cologny, the nearest town—a bigot functionary heartily disliked by the country people. The other was a Genevan attorney. From the road they had not seen the catastrophe, and the overturned boat, the struggling figures, and the swimmer forging to the rescue came to their view all at once.