And then the storm struck them in its fury. A blinding sheet of driving rain, that darkened the air and drove against the river, and rose again in clouds of spray; a gale that lashed the water into fury; and darkness that shut out the river, and the boat, and the swimmer, and left nothing but a humbled group of shivering cadets.
CHAPTER XXVII.
WHAT MARK DID.
The surprise of the helpless watchers on the shore precludes description. They knew that out upon that seething river a tragedy was being enacted; but the driving rain made a wall about them—they could not aid, they could not even see. They stood about in groups, and whispered, and listened, and strained their eyes to pierce the mist.
Mark's friends were wild with alarm; and his enemies—who can describe their feelings?
A man has said that it is a terrible thing to die with a wrong upon one's soul; but that it is agony to see another die whom you have wronged, to know that your act can never be atoned for now. That there is one unpardonable sin to your account on the records of eternity. That was how the yearlings felt; and even Bull Harris, ruffian though he was, trembled slightly about the lips.
The storm itself was one of those which come but seldom. Nature's mighty forces flung loose in one giant cataclysm. It came from the north, and it had a full sweep down the valley of the Hudson, pent in and focused to one point by the mountains on each side. It tore the trees from the tops as it came; it struck the river with a swish, and beat the water into foam. It flung the raindrops in gusts against it, and caught them up in spray and whirled them on; and this, to the echoing crashes of the thunder and the dull, lurid gleam of the lightning that played in the rear.
One is silent at such times at that; the frightened cadets on the shore would probably have stood in groups and trembled, and done nothing through it all, had it not been for a cry that aroused them. Some one, sharper eyed than the rest, espied a figure struggling in the water near the shore. There was a rush for the spot, and strong arms drew the swimmer in. It was Captain Fischer, breathless and exhausted from the race.
He lay on the bank, panting for breath for a minute, and then raised himself upon his arms.
"Where's Mallory?" he cried, his voice sounding faint and distant in the roar of the storm.