"I've brought you some bread. That moves it often when water fails. Chew it for a moment, then gulp it whole. As big a piece as you can. It's a wretched feeling, but it will pass. A big bite now!... Swallow it whole." She snatched it from him, crammed it in her mouth, struggled with a force that was frightening to see, choked and retched, and staggered against his arm. The bone had not moved. From behind came a murmur of consternation. Grizel and Teresa swept forward, calling out confused instructions. "More water!" "Kneel down; bend your head!... Massage your throat. Press downwards! More bread; gulp _hard_!" Cassandra faced them suddenly, her lips curved back from her teeth. She struggled to speak, but the hoarse sounds had no coherence, her eyes rolled from one face to the other, and on each as she looked there fell the dawning of mortal fear. They had read the terror in Cassandra's eyes, the next moment they saw it afresh in the sudden violent breakdown of her composure. She no longer avoided them, but came nearer, stretching out her hands in appeal. Her face was red and mottled, and strangely, horribly changed. Grizel was white as paper, but she kept her composure better than the girl by her side, and spoke in calm, level tones. "Cassandra, try, _try_ to be quiet! You make things worse by rushing about. We _will_ help you. It will be all right. Try pushing something down... Here's the handle of my fan. Try that. Hard! Push it well down. Oh, don't, don't give up!" For after one desperate trial Cassandra had sent the fan spinning into space over the edge of the cliff. For a moment in her desperation she looked inclined to follow herself, and Dane quickly moved his position so as to stand between her and danger. How many moments had elapsed since they had been happily seated on the grass? So few,--so pitifully few, yet enough to wreck the exquisite machine of life! Not alone to Cassandra herself, but also to the anguished onlookers, came now the realisation that this accident was no trifling happening of a moment, but a grim battle between life and death. The bone was a long one, lodged in such a manner that to attempt to move it by the usual means was but to accelerate the process of suffocation. Cassandra was being suffocated; moment by moment the inhalations of breath became more difficult, her strength was weakening beneath the strain, but still she struggled and fought, and raised wild arms to the sky, while moment by moment, youth, beauty, and charm fell away from the blackening face, leaving behind nothing but a mask of torture and despair. Both the women were weeping, but they were unconscious of their tears. At that moment existence meant nothing more than an anguished realisation of helplessness. Theirs was the most lacerating trial of life,--the torture of looking on helplessly, and watching a fellow-creature done to death.