And when, within a few feet of the river the girl stopped running, shrank
back, covered her face with her hands, then staggered on, she knew that
that girl was going to the river to kill herself.

There was one frozen instant of powerlessness. Then--what to do? Call to
her? She would only hurry on. Run after her? She could not get there. It
was intuition--instinct--took the short cut a benumbed reason could not
make; rolling headlong down the bunker, twisting her neck and mercilessly
bumping her elbow, Katherine Wayneworth Jones emitted a shriek to raise
the very dead themselves. And then three times a quick, wild
"Help--Help--Help!" and a less audible prayer that no one else was near.

It reached; the girl stopped, turned, saw the rumpled, lifeless-looking
heap of blue linen, turned back toward the river, then once more to the
motionless Miss Jones, lying face downward in the sand. And then the girl
who thought life not worth living, delaying her own preference, with
rather reluctant feet--feet clad in pink satin slippers--turned back to
the girl who wanted to live badly enough to call for help.

Through one-half of one eye Katie could see her; she was thinking that
there was something fine about a girl who wanted to kill herself putting
it off long enough to turn back and help some one who wanted to live.

Miss Jones raised her head just a trifle, showed her face long enough to
roll her eyes in a grewsome way she had learned at school, and with a
"Help me!" buried her face in the sand and lay there quivering.

The girl knelt down. "You sick?" she asked, and Katie had the fancy of
her voice sounding as though she had not expected to use it any more.