He rowed onward with all his might, until the veins in his arms stood out like whip-cords and the perspiration trickled in a steady stream down his ebony face.
It occurred to him all at once that even when the lake would be reached, it would be difficult to persuade a schooner captain to convey the dead body to the city. Perhaps it would be better to bury it in the sand at the mouth of the stream, and no one would be the wiser.
But the first faint gleams of morning sunrise showed an unexpected sight. The woman was still alive!
CHAPTER XVI.
NO HOPE.
Alive! Could it be possible?
The negro uttered an exclamation, half terror, half surprise.
“Lawd ha’ marcy!” he ejaculated, scratching his woolly head in blank perplexity. “Dat ’ar ’ooman sho’ly is a quare ’un! Done got a lick side de head ’nuff to knock over a mule! So ’pears to me,” reflectively; “but den some folks kin stand a heap.”
Now it happened that the force of the blow was greatly exaggerated in appearance; at all events, Rosamond had made a wonderful escape; for the logs had rushed violently down the swirling stream just as she had turned aside in her mad scramble for the shore, and had dipped beneath the water like a sea-bird, coming up just in time to receive a blow upon the head, but not the brunt of the collision.