“And leave this young lady alone? Not so was I brought up, young man,” answered Lawson, with great dignity. “Give me your hand, miss, I will steady you.” Louise shrank from his touch and stepped back to the end of her plank. “Get on that plank, idiot!” cried Gordon, wrathfully. “And if you dare step on this lady’s board again, I’ll wring your neck. Do you hear?” He had stepped lightly off his own plank for a moment while he drew Louise back to it. The ice gave treacherously, and a little pool of water showed where his foot had been. Louise faltered. “It—it—flows so fast,” she said, nervously. “It is nothing,” he reassured her. “I will be more careful another time.” It was a perilous place for two. He hurried her to the next board as soon as the subdued transgressor had left it, he himself holding back. It was indeed an odd procession. Dark figures balanced themselves on the slim footing, each the length of a plank from the other, the line seeming to stretch from bank to bank. It would have been ludicrous had it not been for the danger, which all realized. Some half-grown boys, prowling along the Velpen shore looking for safe skating, gibed them with flippant rudeness. Lawson took fire. “Whoop ’er up, boys,” he yelled, waving his hat enthusiastically. He pranced up gayly to the Judge, tripping along on the bare ice. “Your arm, your honor,” he cried. “It is a blot on my escutcheon that I have left you to traverse this danger-bristling way alone—you, the Judge. But trust me. If the ice breaks, I will save you. I swim like a fish.” “My friend,” said Dale, fixing on him eyes of calm disapproval, “if you are the cause of my being forced to a cold-water plunge bath against my wishes, I will sentence you to the gallows. Now go!” He went. He was hurt, but he was not deterred. He would wait for the lady. A gentleman could do no less. Louise stopped. Gordon stopped. The whole back line stopped. Each man stood to his colors and—his plank. Louise, glancing appealingly over her shoulder, gave an hysterical little laugh. “Move on!” cried Gordon, impatiently. Instead of moving on, however, Lawson came confidently toward Louise. She stifled a little feminine scream in her handkerchief and stepped hastily backward. “Don’t be afraid,” said Lawson. Gordon repressed a rising oath, and cried out, “If you dare—,” but Lawson had already dared. His heavy step was upon Louise’s frail support. She thought shudderingly, intuitively, of the dark, swift, angry current under its thin veneer of ice—the current that was always hungry and ate islands and fertile fields in ravenous mouthfuls. She ran back to the end of her plank. “Have no fear,” said the drunken man, blandly. He stepped to the bare ice at her side. “A man can’t walk pigeon-toed always,” he confided. “Besides, there’s not a particle of danger. These fools are making a mountain of a mole-hill.” Gordon came forward quickly. “Run ahead, Miss Dale, I’ll tend to this fellow,” he said.