Presently, a figure creeping along the foot of the rock not far away seized Carroll's attention.
"It's Mopsy!" he exclaimed. "The foothold doesn't look very safe among those stones, and there seems to be deep water below."
He called out in warning, but the girl did not heed. The willows were thinner at the spot she had reached, and, squeezing herself through them, she leaned down, clinging to an alder branch.
"He's gone to holt among the roots!" she cried.
Three or four men running along the opposite bank apparently decided that she was right, for the horn was sounded and here and there a dog broke through the underbrush. Just as the first-comers reached the rapid, there was a splash. It was a moment or two before Evelyn or Carroll, who had been watching the dogs, realized what had happened; then the blood ebbed from the girl's face. Mabel had disappeared.
Running a few paces forward, Carroll saw what looked like a bundle of outspread garments swing round in an eddy. It washed in among the willows, and he heard a faint cry.
"Help!—Quick! I've caught a branch!"
He could not see the girl now, but an alder branch was bending sharply, and he flung a rapid glance around him. The summit of the rock on which he stood rose above the trees. Had there been a better landing, he would have faced the risky fall, but it seemed impossible to alight among the stones without a broken leg. Even if he came down uninjured, there was a barrier of tangled branches and densely growing withes between him and the river, and the opening through which Mabel had fallen was some distance away. Farther down-stream, he might reach the water by a reckless jump, as the promontory sloped toward it there, but he would not be able to swim back against the current. His position was a painful one; there was nothing that he could do.
The next moment, men and dogs went scrambling and swimming down the rapid. They were in hot pursuit of the otter, which had left its hiding place, and it was evident that the girl, clinging to a branch beneath the willows, had escaped their attention. Carroll shouted savagely as his comrade appeared among the tail of the hunt below. The others were too much occupied to heed; or perhaps they concluded that he was urging them on.
"Help! Mabel!" Carroll shouted again and again, gesticulating wildly in his desperation.