"What happened," she asked, then, as memory came sweeping back to her, she gave a little cry and covered her eyes with her hand.
"Oh, girls," she cried, "I thought I was going to die!"
"Yes, yes, we know," said Betty soothingly, as though she were talking to a little child, "but you're all right now, dear."
"Don't try to tell us about it unless you want to," added Mollie.
"I swam out farther than I meant to," Amy went on, as though they had not spoken. "And when I tried to get back I found that something was wrong with my right leg." She was shivering with exhaustion and the memory of the awful experience she had gone through, but when the girls tried to stop her she would not listen and hurried on feverishly.
"It was a cramp I guess, and the harder I tried to get rid of it the worse it got till finally I got panic-stricken. I called to you girls, but you didn't seem to hear me. Then—" she paused, and the girls held their breath as she looked around at them. "Then—I went down. I came up again and called, and—and—I saw you, Betty. Oh, it was terrible!"
"Then," cried Betty, her voice trembling, "when you went down that last time—"
"I didn't go down," Amy contradicted her. "I struggled so hard that I succeeded in getting my head above water and—that was when you reached me—Betty—"
"Thank Heaven," said Betty, with a little sob, "that I was there!"