Isaac, roused by her call from the deep trance of exhaustion which only
a few minutes before had fallen upon his misery, stood up, felt the
blast rushing in through the open door at the back, and ran blindly.

The door had swung to again. He clutched it open; in the dim weird
light, he saw a dark figure stoop over the well; he heard something
flung aside, which fell upon the snow with a thud; then the figure
sprang upon the coping of the well.

He ran with all his speed, his face beaten by the wind and sleet. But he
was too late. A sharp cry pierced the night. As he reached the well, and
hung over it, he heard, or thought he heard, a groan, a beating of the
water--then no more.

Isaac's shouts for help attracted the notice of a neighbour who was
sitting up with her daughter and a new-born child. She roused her
son-in-law and his boy, and through them a score of others, deep night
though it was.

Watson was among the first of those who gathered round the well. He and
others lowered Isaac with ropes into its icy depths, and drew him up
again, while the snow beat upon them all--the straining men--two
dripping shapes emerging from the earth. A murmur of horror greeted the
first sight of that marred face on Isaac's arm, as the lanterns fell
upon it. For there was a gash above the eye, caused by a projection in
the hard chalk side of the well, which of itself spoke death.

Isaac carried her in, and laid her down before the still glowing hearth.
A shudder ran through him as he knelt, bending over her. The new wound