"Hold on a moment more!" I shouted to her.
I grasped the steering oar, and vainly struggled to turn the raft, so as to bring it near enough to the sufferer to enable me to haul her on board; but the only effect was to cause it to whirl in the current. Both the woman and our craft were carried along by the stream, fifty feet apart; but neither had the power to approach any nearer to the other.
"I'm sinking!" called the woman, throwing one of her hands up into the air.
"No! Hold on for your life!" I shouted, as loud as I could scream.
My voice had some effect upon her, for she grasped the stick to which she was clinging.
"O, Buckland!" cried Flora, wringing her hands and sobbing hysterically. "Can't you do something?"
"I can, and will!" I replied, with some of the earnestness that thrilled my soul; and I felt that I ought to die myself rather than permit the poor sufferer to perish before my eyes.
"Do!" gasped my poor sister; and I knew she would have sacrificed her precious life to save that of the stranger.
"Come here, Sim!" I called.
My blundering deck hand came promptly at my call, and I gave him the steering oar, bidding him keep the raft steady before the current. I took the long lines, which I used as mooring ropes, and tied them together, making a cord at least a hundred feet in length. I took off all my clothes but my pants and shirt, and secured the cord around my body, making fast the other end to the raft.