“It was about sunset, and the good Dutch country people were all at home for the night. The nearest house was half a mile away.”
“Why didn’t he put a rock or a stick of wood in?” demanded Kittie eagerly.
“There was no wood handy, I suppose; and even if there had been, the water would have soon forced it out of the hole. A pebble would have been useless for the same reason. No, the boy must hold the ocean with his one little hand—the wind pushing, the moon pulling against him.
“‘Help! help! The dyke is breaking!’
“Nobody came. The night-fogs began to creep up from the sea, the wind shifted back to the old stormy quarter and blew hard toward the land. The tide was still rising, and the ‘white cows’ outside bellowed more and more terribly. The stars went out, one by one.
“‘Help!’ Hans felt his finger, his hand, his whole arm, beginning to ache from the strained position, but he did not dare to change. Would nobody come?
“Blacker and blacker grew the night. The awful booming of the sea drowned entirely the now feeble cry of the boy. The leak was stopped: but could he bear it much longer? The pain shot up and down his arm and shoulder like fire-flashes, until he groaned and cried aloud. He said his prayers, partly for somebody to come and partly for strength to hold out till they did.
“The temptation came to him powerfully to take out his aching hand and run away. Nobody would know of it; and the pain was so keen! But he said his little Dutch prayers the harder, and—held on.
“In the early gray of the morning a party of men came clambering along the dyke, shouting and swinging lanterns. At last one of them—can you guess which?—espied what looked like a heap of rags lying on the ground.