He gained the spot in an instant. A lighter stood moored close to the bank. With a tremendous spring Sir Frederick gained the deck, and leaning anxiously over the side, he gazed earnestly into the stream as it rippled by. A stifled cry met his ears. He looked in the direction from whence it came, and saw a dark object hurried on by the water.
It was but the act of a moment to dive from the deck of the lighter, and in the next the athletic Sir Frederick Hartleton touched the bottom of the Thames.
He was an admirable swimmer, and rising to the surface, just as the watchmen on the Surrey side began to spring their rattles, and give an alarm by calling out that some one had fallen in the river.
Some few hundred yards in advance of him, he saw the dark object still hurrying on. Assisted by the tide, and his own vigorous swimming, he soon neared it. A few more sweeps of his arms brought him within arm’s length, and he grasped poor Maud, for it was she, indeed, by her long raven hair which had escaped from its confinement, and floated in a dark mass upon the surface of the water.
“Help!” cried Sir Frederick in a clear voice, and turning towards the Surrey shore, which was now much nearer to him than that from which he had come.
Several boats had now pushed off, and in one a man stood up with a link that cast a lurid glare over the stream.
“Hilloa!” cried the man. “Who’s in for a ducking now? Hilloa there.”
“Hilloa!” cried Sir Frederick, and the rowers at once pulled towards him.
“Back water!” cried the man with the light—“I see him—here ye are.”
The magistrate grasped the side of the boat, and said—