Margaret looked somewhat timidly about her. An indistinct idea flitted through her mind—how glad she should be to be accidentally, innocently drowned; and scarcely recognising it, she proceeded.
“You get on well,” shouted Mr Hope, as he flew past, on his return up the river.
“There, now,” said Sydney, presently; “it is a very little way to the bank. I will just take a trip up and down, and come for you again, to go back; and then we will try whether we can’t get cousin Hester over, when she sees you have been safe there and back.”
This was a sight which Hester was not destined to behold. Margaret had an ignorant partiality for the ice which was the least grey; and, when left to herself, she made for a part which looked less like glass. Nobody particularly heeded her. She slipped, and recovered herself: she slipped again, and fell, hearing the ice crack under her. Every time she attempted to rise, she found the place too slippery to keep her feet; next, there was a hole under her; she felt the cold water—she was sinking through; she caught at the surrounding edges—they broke away. There was a cry from the bank, just as the death-cold waters seemed to close all round her, and she felt the ice like a heavy weight above her. One thought of joy—“It will soon be all over now”—was the only experience she was conscious of.
In two minutes more, she was breathing the air again, sitting on the bank, and helping to wring out her clothes. How much may pass in two minutes! Mr Hope was coming up the river again, when he saw a bustle on the bank, and slipped off his skates, to be ready to be of service. He ran as others ran, and arrived just when a dark-blue dress was emerging from the water, and then a dripping fur tippet, and then the bonnet, making the gradual revelation to him who it was. For one instant he covered his face with his hands, half-hiding an expression of agony so intense that a bystander who saw it, said, “Take comfort, sir: she has been in but a very short time. She’ll recover, I don’t doubt.” Hope leaped to the bank, and received her from the arms of the men who had drawn her out. The first thing she remembered was hearing, in the lowest tone she could conceive of—“Oh, God! my Margaret!” and a groan, which she felt rather than heard. Then there were many warm and busy hands about her head—removing her bonnet, shaking out her hair, and chafing her temples. She sighed out, “Oh, dear!” and she heard that soft groan again. In another moment she roused herself, sat up, saw Hope’s convulsed countenance, and Sydney standing motionless and deadly pale.
“I shall never forgive myself,” she heard her brother exclaim.
“Oh, I am very well,” said she, remembering all about it. “The air feels quite warm. Give me my bonnet. I can walk home.”
“Can you? The sooner the better, then,” said Hope, raising her.
She could stand very well, but the water was everywhere dripping from her clothes. Many bystanders employed themselves in wringing them out; and in the meanwhile Margaret inquired for her sister, and hoped she did not know of the accident. Hester did not know of it, for Margaret happened to be the first to think of any one but herself.
Sydney was flying off to report, when he was stopped and recalled.