The Turn of the Tide: The Story of How Margaret Solved Her ProblemPorter, Eleanor H. (Eleanor Hodgman)
General
The Turn of the Tide: The Story of How Margaret Solved Her Problem
Porter, Eleanor H. (Eleanor Hodgman)
Fiction
All night they worked by the aid of numerous electric lights hastily
placed to illuminate the scene; and when Wednesday morning came, a new
shift of workers took up the task that had come to be now merely a
search for the dead. So convinced was every one of this that the men
gazed with blanched faces into each other's eyes when there came a
distinct rapping on a projecting timber near them. In the dazed silence
that followed a faint cry came from beneath their feet.
With a shout and a ringing cheer the men fell to work--it was no ghost,
but a living human voice that had called! They labored more cautiously
now, lest their very zeal for rescue should bring defeat in the shape of
falling brick or timber.
Ned Spencer, who had not left the mills all night, heard the cheer and
hurried forward. It was he who, when the men paused again, called:
"Frank, are you there?"
"Yes, Ned." The voice was faint, but distinctly audible.
"And McGinnis?"
There was a moment's hesitation. The listeners held their
breath--perhaps, after all, they had been dreaming and there was no
voice! Then it came again.
"Yes. He's lying beside me, but he's unconscious--or dead." The last word
was almost inaudible, so faint was it; but the tightening of Ned's lips
showed that he had heard it, none the less. In a moment he stooped
again.
"Keep up your courage, old fellow! We'll have you out of that soon."
Then he stepped aside and gave the signal for the men to fall to work
again.
Rapidly, eagerly, but oh, so cautiously, they worked. At the next pause
the voice was nearer, so near that they could drop through a small hole
a rubber tube four feet long, lowering it until Spencer could put his
mouth to it. Through this tube he was given a stimulant, and a cup of
strong coffee.
They learned then a little more of what had happened. The two men were
on the fourth floor when the crash came. They had been swept down and
had been caught between the timbers in such a way that as they lay where
they had been flung, a roof three feet above their heads supported the
crushing weight above. Spencer could remember nothing after the first
crash, until he regained consciousness long afterward, and heard the
workmen far above him. It was then that he had tapped his signal on the
projecting timber. He had tapped three times before he had been heard.
At first it was dark, he said, and he could not see, but he knew that
McGinnis was near him. McGinnis had spoken once, then had apparently
dropped into unconsciousness. At all events he had said nothing since.
Still, Spencer did not think he was dead.
Once more the rescuers fell to work, and it was then that Ned Spencer
hurried away to send a message of hope and comfort to Mrs. Merideth, who
had long since left the great house on the hill and had come down to the
Mill House to be with Margaret. To Margaret Ned wrote the one word
"Come," and as he expected, he had not long to wait.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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