"Go you! Now!"
How the water did fly as they struck out in overhand strokes, shouting and laughing, cheered on by Miss Elting and Margery, on the other side by the irrepressible Tommy, who was dancing up and down on the shore, shouting and clapping her hands in great glee! The swimmers landed, laughing merrily as they made for shore. But they did not wait to argue with Tommy. Instead they picked her up bodily and tossed her into the pond. Tommy screamed and tried to fight, but she had little opportunity for resistance before she went in with a splash.
They sprang in after her, pulling the girl down, she having got to her feet in the meantime.
"Swim! swim, or we will hold your head under!" threatened Jane.
Tommy refused to swim.
"Grab her foot. We'll tow her," commanded Harriet. Suiting the action to the word, she grasped one of Tommy's ankles, and throwing herself on her back began to swim with feet and free arm for the opposite side of the pond.
"Hooray!" cried Jane, making a couple of leaps forward, and getting a firm hold of the other ankle of the now loudly screaming Tommy. "Toot, toot! The tug is going ahead. How do you like being towed, darlin'?"
Tommy's yells indicated that she did not fancy it, especially being towed feet first. Her head went under water almost instantly. Tommy was obliged to help herself or drown. She began working her arms, trying to keep her head above water, but found it awkward swimming that way. She never had tried the feet first style of swimming. No one of the party ever had, except Harriet, who could make very good progress that way.
"Hold your breath, dear," suggested Harriet sweetly. "You will not swallow so much water that way."
"How—how long must I hold it?"