For a moment Winefred was petrified with horror. For a moment she was unresisting as the powerful woman gathered her up and strode with her to the verge, the water oozing about her from the soaked garments under the pressure. But it was for a moment only. In that moment it was to Winefred as though she heard the sea in louder tone, multiplied five-fold, laugh and smack its lips, conscious that living beings with human souls were to be given to it to tumble and mumble, to pound on the pebbles and hack on the reefs. It was as though she saw through the darkness the cruel ocean throw up spray-draped arms to catch and clutch her as she fell. But the moment of pause and paralysis was over. With a shriek and a knotting together of all her powers, and a concentration of all her faculties, she writhed in her mother's arms and fought her. She smote in her face, she tore at her hair, she turned and curled, and gathered herself into one muscular ball, she straightened herself, and threw herself backward in hopes of over-balancing her mother. 'I will not!' she shrieked. 'Let go! I will not.' Instead of freezing rain trickling down her brow, the sweat broke out in scalding drops. Her blood surged and roared in her veins and hammered in her ears. Fire danced before her eyes――then there came a falling. O God!――a falling―――― And then a stillness. 'What is this?' And a light smote into her face. CHAPTER III A COMMON CHORD Almost before she had recovered her senses, Winefred found herself in a cottage, warm, where a good fire burnt, throwing out waves of yellow light as well as grateful heat, and she was being undressed by her mother and put to bed. She was stupefied, exhausted by her struggle for life. The thoughts in her head were as straws, leaves, feathers in a swirl of water. She knew not whether what she experienced was a phase of dream or a piece of reality. But when food was forced upon her, and a mug of hot elderberry wine put to her lips, she drew a long breath, rubbed her eyes that were brimming with tears, rain, and sweat, looked about her and asked, 'Mother, where am I?' 'With me,' answered Jane Marley. 'Where are we both?' 'Captain Job Rattenbury has taken us in,' said the woman. 'Enough for you to know at present. Go to sleep and dream away the past.' 'O mother, did you really intend to throw me over the cliff?' 'Winefred, I would have cast myself over with you in my arms. But that is gonebyes. Forget and sleep.' But none can undergo great excitement of brain, tension of nerve, pass through peril of life, and sleep sweetly after it. The brain continues to start, the nerve to quiver, the horror to come back, perhaps in receding waves, yet with imperceptible decline of force. If the girl fell into a doze it was to again spring up and cry out, under the supposition that she was falling, or to battle with hands and feet, as though wrestling once more to preserve life.